The 10 Most Useful and Interesting Sports Betting Websites
The old saying that anything worth doing is worth doing well applies perfectly to sports betting. If you’re going to risk your hard-earned money betting on future events with uncertain outcomes, it is well worth your time to invest some effort in improving your knowledge and understanding of sports betting. Otherwise, you might as well go play roulette.
Thanks to the internet, we have a world of sports betting tips and advice at our fingertips – and most of that knowledge is offered absolutely free of charge. There really is no excuse in the modern day to neglect continuing our education and becoming more informed sports bettors.
Admittedly, the noise-to-signal ratio on the internet is fairly poor these days due to the internet being so accessible. Any Random Joe with a computer or smartphone can set up a blog and offer advice that is completely untested and unfounded.
Over the past 11+ years I’ve spent writing on sports betting and gambling, I have come to find certain websites stand heads and shoulders above the vast majority of the competition. These sites have been publishing quality content for years. If you compare the articles and information published on these sites to content published at most other sports betting websites, it isn’t even close.
1. Sports Insights Blog
Sports Insights is a paid sports data service that offers sports betting software, public betting trends, live odds and picks to members for a monthly fee. I have no personal experience with the paid service at Sports Insights and can therefore offer no opinion on their paid service, but I have been reading their free-to-the-public articles for years and find those to be very high-quality offerings.
The topics of discussion range from debunking dishonest win-rates of scammers to breaking down the numbers behind fading the top MLB teams down the stretch at the end of the season.
What I like most about the Sports Insights blog is their numbers-heavy approach. They don’t just tell what they think as experts; they actually do the research, show their work and let you decide for yourself if you like what they’re saying.
Mind you, this is not a plug for the Sports Insights paid service. I’m sure it is a fine service, but I have no experience with it and no opinion either way. Their blog, however, is unquestionably worth a bookmark.
2. Pinnacle Sports Blog
Pinnacle Sports is an old hand in online sports betting having been established in the late 90s. The people at Pinnacle Sports pride themselves on being knowledgeable and they prove this constantly by publishing high-quality sports betting articles on their blog quite frequently.
The topics of discussion cover a wide range of ground here as well. One day you may read an article about how substitutions impact live odds in soccer and the next day you may see an article with a unique take on identifying edges in betting.
Like Sports Insights, the Pinnacle blog takes an analytical approach to sports betting. They don’t just offer opinions; they offer opinions based on math and real-world past results. Pinnacle articles can be fairly long reads complete with breakdowns of the math and graphing results.
3. The Sports Geek Articles Collection
The SportsGeek.com was started by a guy named Kevin McClelland whom I’ve actually interacted with a few times over the course of business and he has always been nothing but a class act. I have word he has since sold the site, but the Sports Geek still posts high-quality content and is full of in-depth strategy articles.
The articles published on the front page of the Sports Geek website tend to be based more on current sporting events, but my favorite part of the website is a collection of strategy articles that offer in-depth advice that can be applied to sports betting in general.
For a little background information, the Sports Geek was one of the few sports betting tips websites that actually stayed in business for the long term. Kevin was never in the business of posting phony picks or making grand promises for a quick buck and that has endeared me to his work for a long time.
4. Betfair Betting Strategy Resource
Betfair is an exchange wagering site that matches customers with one another to place bets. In a betting exchange, you compete against other players rather than against the house. This means Betfair does not care if you win or lose – they get their piece of the action either way. Thus, Betfair has been more than happy to publish many strategies and tips articles for success in exchange betting.
The Betfair strategy page is geared towards exchange betting, but many of the principles and ways of thinking they present can also be applied to regular sports betting. Betfair also has a frequently-updated blog with in-depth previews of upcoming events in all sports. Both are great resources for the serious sports bettor.
5. The Sports Curmudgeon
A visit to the Sports Curmudgeon always makes for an entertaining and informative read. I don’t think he is as much of a curmudgeon as his blog name would suggest, but he does have a way of writing that will have you at least crack a smile once or twice per blog post.
The Sports Curmudgeon also has a simple and straightforward way of writing without a lot of fluff, yet his posts still manage to be quite lengthy. This is because he packs a lot of information into each post and explains reasons why. His main topics of discussion are the major professional and college US sports.
Make sure to check the NFL wagers category on his blog for betting-related discussions and comments. The Sports Curmudgeon is humble and acknowledges the realities of sports betting, but still backs his picks with sound logic. It is refreshing to see this style of picks and betting tips in a landscape dominated by people who overpromise and underdeliver.
6. Covers.com
Covers.com is a massive sports betting and information website full of content provided by multiple writers. They have expert picks, hot matchups, game previews, betting odds and more for just about every sport on the planet.
The expert picks section includes picks from various handicappers and it includes their winning records, lists of their recent picks and columns explaining their upcoming picks. There is so much content here that it is difficult to wrap your head around it all at first. The website also has an active discussion forum for even more reading material.
7. Soccerway.com
Soccerway.com is a statistics mega resource that should be bookmarked by anyone with an interest in betting on soccer. If you like to make your own picks, this is the place to visit to do your research, look for trends, find live scoring results, and much more.
The database is utterly comprehensive with stats for players, competitions, and leagues from around the world. Whether you’re looking for the latest Premier League results or the historical stats of Afghanistan’s Simorgh Alborz FC, Soccerway has it.
8. OLBG
OLBG.com is a community-driven sports betting tips website with user-submitted tips, discussions, and blog posts for nearly every sport on the planet. Public tips are attached to user profiles with confidence ratings powered by how those tips turned out. Each tip also allows comments so other users can comment on the tipster and offer their own takes on the validity of each tip.
These are not necessarily “expert” picks, but that label is overused in sports betting anyways. The nice thing about these tips is the transparency. With each tipster having a public record of results and each tip open to comments, there is no hiding from the public eye here.
The various blogs at OLGB add additional content for your reading pleasure. Overall, this is just a massive website with something for everyone.
9. Betinf.com
Betinf.com is another statistics-heavy resource with a whole range of statistics for football/soccer competitions around the world, coverage of all major US sports, and more along with predictions, previews, and tips.
The statistical resources here include live scores and statistics for all manner of teams, comparison tables and more. The notable trends section is also useful as it uses the Betinf.com database to point out sports trends that are useful for savvy handicappers.
This is not the type of betting site to hold your hand and walk you through tips provided by so-called industry experts. For the most part, this site sticks to the facts and lets you draw your own conclusions. Breaking news, comprehensive stats, and recent trends are all presented in a straightforward, no-nonsense manner. This site is best for those who already have some familiarity with sports betting basics.
10. Betbrain.com
Betbrain.com is perhaps the best odds comparison website available to the public. With a data feed that provides live scoring and odds comparison services for more than 60,000 events per month, this is the place for serious odds-shoppers to visit once they have selected a team to back in any competition.
For example, if you want to back the Jacksonville Jaguars to beat the Baltimore Ravens in today’s NFL game, you could visit Betbrain.com to see which bookmakers are paying the most for the Jaguars to win. You can also sign up for an account at Betbrain.com to customize your own list of bookmakers, odds formats, and more.
The odds data is not just limited to picking the winner of any particular match. You can visit any particular match on the Betbrain website and can then choose specific markets such as the over/under or correct score to see which bookmakers are paying the most for those markets as well.