Online betting has become a huge part of the industry, with consistent year on year growth in the volume of bets placed over the internet and a general decline in over the counter wagers. The virtual world has also leveled the playing field as it gives smaller operators access to the same potential customers as the high street giants, but without needing to match their physical presence.
This next section of the site is dedicated to online bookies, starting with a list of those bookmakers who have a strong online product. Most also run sign up offers to new customers registering on their websites which we’ve also included below.
Best Online Bookmakers
Bet365
BetVictor
Unibet
Betfred
Boylesports
Whilst the high street may be your “home” when it comes to betting, it’s probably safe to say that you’ve at least heard of online betting. In fact, many of you will have dabbled in both online and high street betting at some point. The link between the two is as strong as ever. Many of the high street bookmakers are offering features that link one account to use both online and in their stores. This makes the whole transition and even the integration between the two much more seamless.
What you need to be aware of is that the two worlds can be very different though. You can’t necessarily bet on all markets that are online within a betting shop and vice-versa. But it’s these subtle differences that make the worlds so interesting on their own. The online platforms are definitely outperforming the high street these days in terms of the number of people using them. It’s often easier for the newer generation of bettors to access online betting as this is what they are used to, but that doesn’t mean the high street is dead. Far from it!
Throughout this article, we will be looking at how online compares with your high street bookmaker and if one is particularly better than the other. If you are new to online betting then we will break down the barriers and questions that you might have about how it works and also the links between the high street and online.
Is Everything in the Shop Available Online?
Those of you familiar with high street betting will know that there is a huge range of choice these days. The sports, coupons and bet types are higher now than they’ve ever been, and this makes the high street a real buzz.
Bigger Range Available Online
But, the fact of the matter is that everything that you can get in your high street bookmaker you can get online, and then some. The range of sports, markets and bets that are available online will far exceed that of your local betting shop.
Football Example
If we take football as an example. Most online platforms will have hundreds of markets to choose from for the higher profile matches (think Premier League, La Liga, Champions League etc.) and with it just about every single betting base covered.
The high street will have a huge chunk of these markets, but not all of them. One of the key omittances is that of Asian Handicap markets. These bets are super popular online and have now become one of the go-to markets for football bettors all over the world, not just Asia.
Availability of Markets
These markets work a little differently than most and run to three decimal places. This means the odds and markets move much faster than a traditional betting market. Online it’s pretty easy to keep on top of this as they are automated, but in the high street stores it becomes highly difficult to keep altering these lines. Whilst there are some that still provide them, they are few and far between, which is just one area where markets are different from each platform.
The fact of the matter is, for a high street store to offer hundreds of betting markets for event single game would mean a huge amount of work to be done manually, not just in keeping on top of them but also then refreshing for each game that they provide. Online has the upper hand overall and if it’s the depth and range of markets that you are after, then this is going to suit more than the high street.
High Street Flexibility
Having said all that, most high street betting shops are keen to state that they are willing to take your money on almost anything if you ask for a price on it. So, you could literally walk up to the counter and get a price on any market that is online if you wish. It’s not as smooth or seamless as online though and the pricing might be different (we talk more about this next) but it’s still there.
McIlroy Bet
A good example of this is when people (often parents) place money on their child to play for England or win a certain tournament when a very young age. A great example of this when Gerry McIlroy, Rory McIlroy’s father, and a group of his friends wager £400 on McIlroy to win The Open within 10 years in 2004 aged just 15. The 500-1 price was set in his local Ladbrokes store and they duly paid out almost £200,000 as a result of McIlroy winning the 2014 Open.
This sort of bet likely wouldn’t have been accepted online at the time, but the bookmakers “ask for odds on anything” policy meant that they were able to place this in their store.
Request a Bet Function
Online has developed though and now they have included a “request a bet” function with most online bookies. This is where you Tweet the bookmaker and ask for odds on pretty much anything. They can often be quite obscure or can be a number of different markets all tied together to form an accumulator of sports within the same match.
This feature pretty much means you can bet on anything. So, whilst online has a much larger base of markets to bet on, as you are able to request odds on pretty much anything, you can likely get access to most of the online markets in your local betting shop, as well.
Are the Odds the Same Online & in the Shop?
The short answer to this is not always. You’re often going to find that online prices are better than their high street betting shops, which is pretty common practice. This may sound very strange given that it’s the same bookmaker, but it’s pretty common. In fact, you could head into a high street bookmaker in two different cities (same brand) and see the odds for the same bet be slightly different.
Shop Overheads & Costs
Whilst the high street shops are part of the same company, they do work independently of each other. This might be things to do with rent, salaries, number of employers and overheads. A betting shop in Newcastle is likely going to be cheaper to run than a betting shop on Oxford Street, London for example.
The same can be said for online and the high street in general. The online prices don’t have the overheads and costs that the high street has. You’ve also got to remember that the footfall for an online bookmaker is going to be way bigger than a single high street betting shop.
A good way to look at it is a bit like a car dealership. You can buy the same car, from the same company at different dealerships for a different price. Whilst BMW, Audi or Mercedes, work as part of the same company, each dealership can work independently of each other, which is similar to how high street betting shops work.
Margin Differences
To create the difference often you find the margins have increased with the bookmaker. We’ve written about bookmakers margins in other articles, but briefly the margins is the percentage of money they look to take from each market. Online this usually about 3-7% on most markets, but the high street is often over 10%, which can be significant.
The differences in price aren’t huge. So, it’s not like you walk into Coral betting shop and back Manchester City to win the Premier League at odds of 2.00 and then you check online with Coral and the price is actually 5.00. It’s probably going to be less than 10% difference overall.
Accumulator Bets
But, depending on what type of bets that you make can mean that you feel it more than others. For example, accumulator bettors are almost always going to better placing bets online than at the equivalent high street store. If you’ve 5 selections that are even marginally better online than at the high street, it’s going to make a big difference.
Let’s take a look at how even small changes can affect these bets. Below we have the high street price and the online price for a 5-fold accumulator.
5-Fold Accumulator Bet Online v. High Street
| Online | High Street | |
|---|---|---|
| Man City | 2.00 | 1.95 |
| Man United | 1.80 | 1.80 |
| Newcastle | 2.50 | 2.30 |
| Arsenal | 2.10 | 2.05 |
| Chelsea | 1.90 | 1.80 |
| Total | 35.91 | 29.78 |
As we can see, we have very subtle differences but a huge overall difference in price. For this example, for every £10 that is staked you would make over £60 more betting online over the high street.
Now, this is just an example, the margins aren’t always this big and there will be times where you can get a better price in the high street shop over the bookmakers’ online platform, but they will be few and far between. Online will offer you better odds in the long run the high street shops, even if they are the same brand.
Betting Limits
You will find that that betting shops have a slightly lower payout limit than that of online. It’s not a huge gulf by any means and some are the same but betting online will always have the highest possible pay out for pretty much all bookmakers and betting shops that we have looked at.
If there are differences in the amount, it’s not like it’s going to be huge amounts by any means. For example, below we have listed the payout limits for football at Ladbrokes both online and the high street for you to see the difference.
Ladbroke Payout Limits Online v. High Street
| Online | High Street | |
|---|---|---|
| Grade 1 Matches | £1,000,000 | £1,000,000 |
| Grade 2 Matches | £500,000 | £250,000 |
| Grade 3 Matches | £250,000 | £250,000 |
| All Other | £100,000 | £50,000 |
As you can see, the higher amounts definitely come from the online platform, although they aren’t huge differences. You will find that this is pretty common for pretty much all bookmakers as well.
Are Betting Coupons Available?
The short answer: yes.
One of the reasons why high street betting is so popular are the betting coupons that are on offer. These are basically long lists of bets that you can place, and they are often linked to betting on football.
The coupon can include dozens if not hundreds of games and they change every day. The bookmaker can offer up a wide range of coupons and markets to access, as they range. So, for football, you might have a match result coupon, Both Teams to Score, Over/Under 2.5 goals and so on. As you add in more games, the odds for that continues to rise.
Fixed v. Live Prices
Some of these coupons are fixed price and some are reflective of the live price for that bet. A fixed price coupon would be where the odds are already agreed and the most selections you add, the higher the price. For example, they might pay 3.00 for 3 picks, 5.00 for 4 picks, 10.00 for 5 picks and so on. Coupons that are price reflective will take the price of each individual bet and then multiply them together, just as you would an accumulator bet.
These types of bets are probably as popular as they come for high street bookmakers. But, to go back to the original question, they are 100% available online, as well. Granted, coupons took a while to really take off online, but you’re going to find that most of the big high street brands are now offering them via their online platform as well. The range of coupons seems to be increasing as well and they offer them across a variety of sports, not just football.
You will start to see that the number of coupons online are actually greater than that of the high street. The main reason is the ease in which they can be created online and again, the number of people that are going to use them.
Odds-On Coupon
For example, a popular online coupon is the odds-on coupon. This takes a range of games for the day (usually football) that are all odds-on favourites. The punter then scrolls through and takes their pick. These coupons aren’t all that popular on the high street for whatever reason. Things like the match result and Both Teams to Score and much, much more popular.
Combined Online/High Street Accounts
One of the best innovations for high street bettors in recent years has been the emergence of joint accounts. This is where they are able to link both a high street betting account with an online account. It basically allows the punter to keep everything in one place and means that they can access both wherever they are in the country.
Ladbroke’s Grid & Coral Connect
Each bookmaker has their own list of features with these and the likes of Ladbrokes has what they call the Grid and Coral a Coral Connect account. One of the reasons that we like is because you are able to place a bet in the betting shop and then check the status of the bet via the app. This also allows you to cash out where possible as well, meaning that for the first-time high street bettors can take advantage of the cash out functionality.
Another feature is that you are able to deposit and withdraw instantly. So, if you’ve placed a bet online then usually you have to wait several days to withdraw your balance back to your bank or your deposit method of choice. However, with the linked accounts, it means that you can take your membership card to the high street betting shop and then withdraw the money instantly in cash.
On top of this, it means that you are able to bank in the betting shop but still take advantage of betting online. So, if you didn’t want to keep banking information online, then you could go to the betting shop, deposit in cash and then use the money to bet online. It gives so much more flexibility this way, rather than simply having one option from either the bookmaker or online banking.
Overall, what you’re getting here is the best of both worlds. It allows you take advantage of both the positives of online and high street betting, merging the industries into one.
Playing FOBT’s Online
There’s a fair chance that if you’ve spent any time in a betting shop, then you will be aware of Fixed Odds Betting Terminals, or FOBTs for short. These are one of the reasons why there are still as many high street betting shops as there are right now as they are highly lucrative for the bookmaker.
If you’re not aware of them, then they are basically a casino in a box. They include a wide range of games, such as Roulette, Blackjack, Craps and plenty of variations of each. They’re quite controversial machines given the amount of money that can be won and lost, but regardless, they are highly popular.
For those that aren’t aware, you can access all of these games and many more online, as well. You see, bookmakers are more than just a sports betting platform these days. The majorly include things like online casino, poker and bingo as standard. Often, they are referred to as gambling portals, rather than just betting sites.
This means that you are going to be able to enjoy all the games from FOBTs online with the bookmaker. In fact, the online coverage is much, much larger. Often online casinos include hundreds of casino games and they are of the highest quality these days, as well. The games play out in the same way as FOBTs so if you are looking to make the switch across, then the games will likely be very familiar straight out of the box.
Watching Live Sport
A huge attraction that high street bookmakers have is the vast range of sports that are free to watch live in the shop. Horse racing and greyhound racing play a big role in the bulk of these, but they also include football, cricket, rugby, golf and many other sporting events.
Many people attend bookmakers just to sit and watch these events live. It’s not that they are being aired exclusively in the betting shops, but the atmosphere, the people and just everything about is set up to be sport orientated, which makes it highly engaging. You are going to be able to get access to pretty much all these sports online, as well. Live streaming has been a part of online betting for over a decade now and it’s grown seemingly year on year.
Often the services are free with most bookmakers, although you might need either a funded account or to have placed a bet within the last 24 hours to get access. Sports include football, golf, tennis, cricket, rugby, netball, badminton, hockey and much, much more.
Live Streaming
To go alongside this, many bookmakers have teamed with the likes of Racing UK and At The Races to offer their live streaming services as part of the bookmaker. This means you get access to a huge range of horse races and greyhound races throughout the UK and around the world.
These channels work a little differently and to get access to a live stream of a race you will need to have bet on that race. So, you can’t enjoy the full program unless you bet on every race, which is going to unlikely. This is where the betting shops have the monopoly over online as they can show the full coverage throughout the day within their stores.
There’s little doubt that online steaming has the better coverage than that of the betting shop. This is just because you are able to select from a huge range of matches and races at any one time. It’s not like it’s one channel where you watch a game and then another and so on. It’s a service where you can literally have 10 games being streamed all at once if you want, although this might get a little too much.
There are obvious conflicts with the likes of Sky Sports, so you won’t get things that are covered on there generally. But you will get full coverage of major football leagues in Europe, such as La Liga, Serie A, Bundesliga and so on.