No-risk matched betting uses a sportsbook’s free bet or bonus bet and a second bet on the opposite result, sized so that you come out ahead whichever side wins. The profit comes from the promotion, not from predicting the game, and the risk is small but not zero: price moves, mistakes and the promotion’s own terms can still cost you.
It works in two stages. First you place a qualifying bet to unlock the promotion, covered by an opposite bet so that you lose little or nothing. Then you use the free bet and cover it the same way, which turns most of its face value into cash.
The two bets: back and lay
A back bet is an ordinary bet for something to happen. A lay bet is a bet against it, placed on a betting exchange, where you take the other side of another customer’s bet. When you lay at decimal odds of 3.10, you win the other person’s stake if the result does not happen, and pay out 2.10 times their stake if it does.
Where no exchange is available, the second bet is placed on the opposite side at a different sportsbook. The arithmetic below shows both versions. Every price and amount in it is made up, to show how the calculation works; none is a current offer.
Stage one: the qualifying bet
Say a book requires a $50 bet to release a $50 free bet. You back Team A at decimal odds of 3.00 with the book, and lay Team A at 3.10 on an exchange that charges 2% commission on winnings.
The lay stake is the back stake times the back odds, divided by the lay odds minus the commission: $50 x 3.00 / (3.10 – 0.02) = $48.70.
- Team A wins: the back bet profits $100. The lay loses $48.70 x 2.10 = $102.27. Net: -$2.27.
- Team A does not win: the back bet loses $50. The lay wins $48.70, minus 2% commission, $47.73. Net: -$2.27.
That $2.27 is the cost of unlocking the free bet, and it is the same whatever happens.
Stage two: the free bet
Check whether your free bet returns its stake. If it pays only the winnings, as in this example, the calculation changes: a $50 free bet at 3.00 pays $100 on a win, not $150.
The lay stake is then the free bet’s winnings divided by the lay odds minus the commission: $100 / (3.10 – 0.02) = $32.47.
- Team A wins: the free bet pays $100. The lay loses $32.47 x 2.10 = $68.18. Net: +$31.82.
- Team A does not win: the free bet costs nothing. The lay wins $32.47 minus commission, $31.82. Net: +$31.82.
Take away the $2.27 from stage one and the promotion is worth $29.55, from a $50 free bet.
Without an exchange: hedging a bonus bet at another book
The same idea works with two sportsbooks. Say you hold a $100 bonus bet that pays winnings only, and you place it on Team B at +150, where a win pays $150. Another book has Team C, the other side of the same game, at -160.
To make both results equal, the cash bet on Team C is $150 / (1 + 100/160) = $92.31.
- Team B wins: the bonus bet pays $150, and the $92.31 on Team C loses. Net: +$57.69.
- Team C wins: $92.31 at -160 wins $57.69, and the bonus bet costs nothing. Net: +$57.69.
In these examples, the longer price keeps more of the bonus. The same $100 bonus bet at +400, hedged at -500, needs $400 / 1.2 = $333.33 on the other side and locks in $66.67 either way.
Where the risk actually is
The method only works if both bets stand at the prices you calculated. These are the ways it goes wrong:
- The price moves between your two bets, so the second one is no longer the right size.
- A stake is typed wrong, which leaves you with a real bet on the game.
- The terms differ from what you assumed: minimum odds, a deadline, a rule on which markets count, or bonus funds that pay winnings only.
- The book limits the account. FanDuel’s Massachusetts house rules, approved by the state’s Gaming Commission on March 27, 2025, say its “promotions are available at the discretion of FanDuel Sportsbook” and that it “reserves the right to restrict the availability of a promotion to any person at its absolute discretion.”
Our guide to why sportsbooks limit players goes further on that last point.
Is matched betting legal?
Matched betting is ordinary betting: each bet is a normal wager, placed at a book or an exchange. What decides whether you can do it is whether online sports betting is legal where you are, and each operator’s own terms, which you accept when you open the account. Read them before you start.
A free bet is also a one-off. Once a book’s sign-up offer has been used, the numbers above depend on whatever that book offers existing customers, and that is up to the book.
Where to go next
The arithmetic here rests on reading odds correctly, which our explainer on how betting odds work covers. For the second half of the method in more detail, see our guide to hedging bets, and for books to compare, our sportsbook reviews.