How do sportsbooks and bettors benefit from esports?

Betting on esports events has numerous advantages when compared to sports betting. First of all, it’s because of its “always present” nature.

Unlike sporting events, held at a particular time of the year, esports events are available for bettors and fans 24/7/365.

Additionally, it is pretty easy to bet on esports events because there is a wide variety of live esports matches on various gaming and streaming platforms, including sportsbooks. Traditional sporting events: football, basketball or ice hockey are seasonal and follow a rigid schedule, unlike their console counterparts (efootball, ebaskteball, eice hockey). The esports betting world is the complete opposite, it’s all about 24/7 tournaments, a plethora of match formats that are constantly updated, a broad range of markets, and gripping competitions.

However, sports will always drive the esports industry. Even though the Covid-19 pandemic has significantly impacted the schedule of sporting events, they still attract millions of fans to tune in to traditional broadcast television instead of streaming platforms and services. Sports still get more views than esports, but it might only be a matter of time because the esports industry appears to be entering an impressive development stage.

Esports is expanding the betting industry

Thanks to regular broadcasts of esports events that boosted the gaming, esports and betting industries began to enjoy phenomenal demand. Even the international tournaments like the 2020 UEFA European Football Championship have increased the need for esports betting. According to the ESportsBattle tournaments’ organizer, their efootball matches became more sought-after by sportsbooks’ customers during the EURO 2020. The quantity of ESportsBattle efootball matches streamed by one of the leading betting operators has increased x3 from December 2020 to June 2021.

In July 2021, when IEM Cologne 2021 took place, ESportsBattle CS:GO matches chalked up far more views; the numbers have risen dramatically: from 120K in June to almost 200K in July. Furthermore, the number of views increased by 73% from the beginning of 2021. One betting operator stated a nearly 40% uptake in the number of active bettors of EsportsBattles’ CS:GO events (from June to July).

Bettors of ESportsBattle CS:GO tournaments are provided with the following markets to place bets on: match winner (2-way or 3-way), match handicap, total maps, correct map score, map winner (2-way and 3-way), total rounds.

How to bet on esports?

The betting landscape contains lots of companies and brands covering numerous events, including various formats and modes. Let’s say you have only 15 minutes and want to place a bet on the whole match. It is possible with esports because you will be able to watch the game, check the result, and get a quick bet calculation within this time slot.

Sportsbooks offer fast esports content to meet the above mentioned bettors’ needs. Once you have chosen the operator the next step is to select the markets to bet on. We’ll name the most common of them.

Betting Outrights

These are outright bets you usually make before an event begins. One of the most traditional bets in this category is which player or team will be the outright champion of a tournament.

Match Winner

As the name implies, all you have to do is choose which team or player you believe will win. The odds in this market may be fixed, indicating that they are set by an odds compiler some time before the match starts, or they may depend on how many bets are placed on one of the outcomes.

Handicap Betting

Handicap betting is similar to match-winner betting because you are choosing between only two outcomes. However, in this case, the sportsbook tries to remove one of the player’s or teams’ advantages by giving them a head start.

Totals

If you were to bet on this market, you would bet on how many of something (e.g., maps in CS:GO) will be played out in a match. For CS:GO, you can bet on the number of maps played in a match, or the number of rounds played in a map. The thing is that your bet is entirely focused on how long a match will last.

To sum up: if you are new to esports betting, the best way to be good at it is to try it. And the most incredible thing about esports betting is that anyone can do it since the bet types are pretty simple, and you only need to choose your sportsbook.