Matched betting: Free money - Principles

A guide to matched betting

Last updated 22nd April, 2007

You've now read the main page and should have a rough understanding of how it all works. Basically, many bookmakers offer incentives in the form of free bets to new customers. By making bets in such a way that you never lose, by betting for and against the same outcome, you can cash in on this money.

Principles

The principles of matched betting are very simple. Bet on the outcome of an event at a bookmaker, and find equivalent odds at a betting exchange against that same outcome. There is a small caveat here. Bookmakers tend to offer odds that are slightly lower than what is perceived to be the optimum odds (they need to make money somehow) and betting exchanges often charge a small amount of commission on winnings (typically 5%). This means that the real 'skill' of matched betting lies in finding very similiar odds between the bookmaker and the betting exchange. In truth, you will always lose a very small percentage of money on every bet(e.g. £1.00), but this is more than made up for by the free money on offer (e.g. £25).

A typical example will find you betting £25 on the outcome of a match, and making about £24 back - a loss of £1. This is known as your qualifying bet. However you have then unlocked a free bet of £25 from this bookmaker, which you can use in the same way. In theory, you can make £24 back from this free bet too, leaving you with a total profit of £23 from two risk free bets.

There are however a few other little problems to consider. The above example assumes that the free bet stake is returned when the bet is won, however this is often not the case. Usually only your winnings are returned, but this is realistically about 75% of the stake value(and can be higher). That would still however leave you losing a single pound on your qualifying bet, but making around £18-19 on your free bet. That's £17 profit from two bets, and less than an hours work.

Keen to see how it works? If you want to see a real life example, why not read on.

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