The odds offered by reputable online sportsbooks will determine how much your bets will pay out if your selection proves correct. If you’re looking for an online bookmaker, it’s crucial to choose one that offers the most competitive odds around.
Bookies traditionally make their odds quite tight, and it can be tricky to find the best sports betting odds online with so many choices on offer. Luckily, there are hundreds of review websites available that make it easy to find top odds. Here are some more tips to help you find what you’re looking for!
Identifying the Best Odds
The first thing you should know about choosing sites with the best odds is how to read and interpret those odds. Online sportsbooks supply odds in three formats; American, fractional and decimal. You should know how to read all three formats if you want to find the best betting value!
- Decimal odds come with decimal numbers, like 2.4. If a sportsbook shows odds as 2.4, that means that you could stand to win $2.40 for every $1 you wager. You can convert decimal odds into fractional odds by subtracting one. Thus, odds of 5.0 could also be read as 4/1 in fractional format.
- Fractional odds also show the amount of money a bettor could earn for every $1 wagered. You can break fractional odds down into decimal odds, too. As an example, odds of 1/2 could also be read as 0.5.
- American odds are listed either as positive or negative numbers. Negative number show that bettors will need to wager that amount to win $100. Positive odds show how much you stand to earn for every $100 wagered.
Shopping for Top Odds
Now that you know how to find the best odds, you can start looking around for them. There are many quality sportsbooks on the web that offer highly competitive and consistent odds, but there is more to it than just choosing the right bookmaker.
One thing you can do to ensure that your odds are solid is to look for the underdogs. The odds for the underdog will always be better than those for the expected winners – and if your bet on the underdog wins, you’ll earn much more than even a larger bet on the favourites.
Of course, the underdogs don’t always win, so it’s a better idea to hunt for good value odds and games in which a team is not a huge underdog or rank outsider.
Opt for Well-Matched Games
Alternatively, you can bet on games with well-matched competitors. The odds on these events are usually great value, as the teams have similar chances of winning. In these situations, bookies cannot adjust their odds to give either team an edge, and unadjusted odds are more favourable than those that have been altered.
Lastly, bet on events where ties and draws are possible if you can. These events, like soccer tournaments, offer some of the best odds around. After all, if your game ends as a tie, you’ll have a guaranteed win no matter your selection!