Betsafe are now closed to UK customers. This came into effect on 21st October 2020 with customers able to withdraw from site until 18/11/2020. After this time you can withdraw any funds through customer support up to 31st December 2020 at which time any remaining money will be donated to GambleAware. Customers from outside of the UK are unaffected.
The closure was instigated by the brand owners, Betsson, who have been steadily withdrawing from the UK over the past few years. They have failed to gain a significant market share and are now leaving as they feel the tax rates and regulation levels are too high for them in the UK to justify their presence.
Betsafe really are a safe bet for sports bettors – no apologies for that pun! Seriously though Betsafe have been running sports betting and gaming markets since 2006 and are one of the best known names in Europe.
The brand, Swedish in origin, is the jewel in the crown of the Betsson group, one of the biggest betting companies in operation today. If you are looking for a very well stocked sportsbook and casino site with all the features you’ve come to expect from the top bookies, but one with a refreshingly modern outlook, Betsafe are a very good shout.
The company’s continental mean that you get all of the typical depth for traditional British markets but you also get access to a huge range of sports that are rarely found with UK focused sites. The Betsson group also own Racebets, meaning you get access to the unparalleled range of racing markets from home and abroad, including the best quality live streaming available anywhere.
- Refreshing Modern Brand – A new take on an old classic.
- European Outlook – Access to a wider range of interesting markets.
- Wealth of Resources – They can offer better features and odds than their competitors.
Odds Prices & General Value
Generally good value is offered all round with honest basic odds prices alongside a decent number of daily enhanced acca markets that often provide better value still. Football fans can enjoy Betsafe Boosts across UK, German, Italian, and Spanish top leagues.
Racing markets in particular show healthy prices due to the link with RaceBets; indeed, there are many racing odds here that you simply cannot get elsewhere, so while the prices don’t need to be especially competitive, they still are, and you couldn’t bet on them anywhere else in any case.
At the lower end are sports like darts and American football, but they are still fair if you can’t be bothered to shop around, and once everything has been averaged out Betsafe rank very highly indeed overall.
Betsafe are the perfect bookie to have in a portfolio, and it’s a good idea to check in with them before you place any bets to see what they have got. You will probably find you end up placing more wagers with them than you thought.
Punters can choose between fractional, decimal, and American odds.
Interface, Navigation & Appearance
For as long as I can remember Betsafe have maintained the same high contrast white text on black background with striking red menus and buttons. This may sound like a ridiculous thing to focus on but I think credit should be given to the company here.
Most betting sites are constantly chopping and changing the design, whereas Betsafe have maintained a relatively simple, functional, decent looking and easy to navigate structure that their customers understand and enjoy. The ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it’ approach, very Scandinavian, is a virtue of this site.
The menu depth is at the right level, everything can be reached direct from the home page of the site, including on mobile. The unelaborate site design lends itself to very fast page loading and bet placement times, which is particularly useful on the move or when betting in play.
There is nothing that is going to blow you away about this site, it could almost be described as spartan, but maybe that is precisely the point. Those after a more colourful design may be better off with someone else, but those that want their online bookie to be a betting site and nothing more will be very happy here.
By making full use of the resources of the Betsson group, Betsafe is packed with products and features. This includes the frankly faultless racing interface from Racebets, with streams, a genuinely well written and frequently updated blog piece, and all the gaming, poker and virtual options you could wish for.
Exploring the Bets
The site is structured proportionally with the bettor firstly making use of the main menu bar, before either continuing with a section specific sub-menu or making use of the interactive sports list and/or search option. This goes some way to allowing personalisation of the home screen which is useful for seeing an overview of a few specific sports in one place.
Once inside an event it can be a bit of a scroll fest with no way to funnel the bet types, and collapsible menu’s have been used sparingly which can add further frustration when trying to track down a bet or fixture. A lot of the filtering is done via the sports list and while this is useful to a point, it does leave you with fewer options along the line.
Sports & Non-Sports Markets
You are going to have to be interested in some fairly obscure markets for them not to be covered by Betsafe. The company’s Scandinavian origins are evident from the many European markets not often found at UK focused sites. League’s as diverse as Armenia Cup and the Copa Sudamericana are available here.
Market depth is also good, although not outstanding, typically boasting up to 150+ lines available on top football matches for example. Live betting markets are impressive with a range matched only by the biggest sites.
Betsafe are a great place for betting on the Olympics and Winter sports as well as more modern markets such as eSports. If you like novelty bets and specials such as TV and film, politics, world events, or anything like that, then this is a good bookie.
To be honest, each of the 35 or so sports on the list hold a better than predicted range of markets. If you just bet on football then perhaps there are better options, but if you like to spread your activity across lots of different sports and markets, from traditional British to obscure continental, then this is a good site to hold an account with.
This is also one of the best places in the world to bet on global horse racing, since they share their book with RaceBets. You might think this makes RaceBets redundant but they have more racing specific offers over there. If racing only makes up a portion of your betting though you are better off with Betsafe.
Payment Options & Banking
{module title=”JL – Banking Table” listing=”161″}
A positive aspect of Betsafe being a European rather than a UK bookie is they have a wider target market and so offer a range of currencies: British Pounds (GBP), Bulgarian Lev (BGN), Euro (EUR), Norwegian Kroner (NOK), Polish Zloty (PLN), Swedish Kroner (SEK) and US Dollars (USD). It is worth noting that once you pick a currency you will need to stick to it.
Further Reading
Keeping the minimum deposit the same across the board (except for Paypal) keeps things nice and simple for everyone and affordable for most. Another example of providing a user focussed service.
The stated maximum deposits are £10,000 by card or bank, £45,000 by Skrill or Neteller and £200 by PaySafeCard. This is a transactional limit not an overall limit, and the overall limit will depend on the punter.
There are not any standard fees for deposits or withdrawals which is as it should be.
Withdrawal maximums vary from £100,000 by bank transfer to £1000 by Entropay; Skrill and Neteller are both £30,000, Visa is £8,700, and PayPal £5,500. Note that this is a transactional limit – you can make several withdrawals.
Processing times are all within 24 hours, meaning instant payment eWallets will take up to one day, bank and card transactions between three – six days once all other aspects have been taken into consideration.
Minimum/Maximum Bet & Payout Thresholds
The Betsafe minimum bet is a nice and affordable £0.10. The maximum bet is not stated but is instead defined by the maximum payout limit, which is £100,000 for any one bet. This doesn’t mean to say that every bet pays that amount of course, and annoyingly, Betsafe don’t tell you their maximum payout limits by sport. These are usually tiered with the most popular markets yielding the highest maximums.
If you are betting on major markets such as match result on major sports then you can expect the maximum payout limit – like most sites now, Betsafe won’t allow you to stake more than you can win in any case. This is a well-resourced company, however, so in most cases I wouldn’t expect an issue unless you are a very high stakes player.
{module title=”JL – Review Payout Limits” listing=”161″}
In addition to the £100k bet cap any one customer can win up to £250,000 a day or £500,000 a week. Only the very biggest betting companies provide higher limits than this.
The Betsafe Brand
Betsafe have been around since 2006 and are in fact one of the most experienced online betting and gaming brands in Europe – although you may not have guessed that if you live in the UK because it is only more recently that the brand has started to move into the British market. They are not doing it by halves either; becoming the main betting sponsor of the likes of Man City, Connor McGregor and Saracens rugby team shows their intentions.
The Betsafe brand is Swedish, launched independently and grew steadily in its early years primarily as a sportsbook. In 2011 the Betsson group, who own a number of other European focused gaming sites, acquired full ownership of the brand to increase market presence in the sports sector in particular.
To give you an idea of the size of Betsson, they employ around 2000 people, have offices in 7 countries and run nearly 20 brands with annual revenues in excess of half a billion euros.
Other Betsson brands include the specialist racing site RaceBets along with the classic old British football pools brand Vernons (bought from Netplay in 2017). The group also own around 15 other European betting and gaming brands that you may not have heard of but are very successful on the continent.
Betsafe is therefore backed by a vast amount of resources and experience. The Betsson group have been clever in creating a balanced portfolio of sites that complement each other to create an overall better brand. For example, the merger with RaceBets now means that Betsafe are able to offer an unparalleled selection of worldwide racing markets and live streaming, while the numerous gaming sites provide a vast portfolio of games.
Betsson headquarters is in Stockholm, Sweden, however the Betsafe brand is licensed under a subsidiary company of Betsson, the Betsson Malta Ltd (BML) group based in Malta..
Live Betting, Live Streaming & Cash Out
In play betting with Betsafe has three major advantages: range and choice of live markets; speed of the interface allowing quick no fuss betting; live streaming of lots of horse racing as well as many other sports.
The in-play feature is very well balanced, which is becoming a common theme in this review. I think it is the continental focus on function over form providing punters with a no frills experience that still looks good and has a lot to offer. The ability to flit between an event overview, a calendar, and a combi view is particularly handy.
You can find more live streams at other bookies, but Betsafe couldn’t be accused of being miserly in this department, and their streams are free too which is a rarity in the industry. A live graphic is the next best thing when no live stream is available, although you can only see match stats if you expand this feature.
Speaking of stats, there is also a comprehensive stats tool that you can use in conjunction with live betting, and while the content is thorough and useful the tool isn’t very user-friendly and can be difficult to look at for too long.
Cash out is fully available and in good depth too, presenting as an option on almost all in-play markets and most ante-post and pre-event bets too. Partial cash out is currently not available.
Unique Selling Point
Yep, you guessed it, the overall USP of the Betsafe brand is balance. There is nothing overly special about this bookie in any one department, but overall there are very few chinks in their armour and they have achieved the near impossible by offering a sportsbook that is likely to please everyone.
The one obvious highlight is the horse racing markets – as well as the brilliant interface it shares with RaceBets – which makes Betsafe a terrible omission if you like to bet on horses as a first port of call but plenty of other sports too.
I would still recommend it as a perfect portfolio bookie though rather than a bookie to use exclusively. You might well find better prices dotted around, although not my much, nevertheless if you only tend to bet on big events or traditional football another bookie in your portfolio might be a better fit. For the average bettor who likes to sample a few different markets, however, Betsafe is a must try.
Mobile Betting
Betsafe’s mobile app and mobile optimised website both basically mirror the desktop version in style and theme, although the layout has been adapted to better suit a portable device. The sense of simplicity remains and it feels more like a betting tool than a fancy pants entertainment app.
It helps in a practical sense too. I actually tested their app on a sunny day last summer against a range of other bookies, attempting to find a specific market with the full glare of the sun on the screen. Betsafe came out as one of the best due to the high contrast interface.
Speed is everything when we are on the move or time limited and this is exactly what the mobile design prioritises. This app is all about easy to access markets, user friendly features, and an intelligible menu structure with more than one way to find your destination.
In many cases, such as inside event view, it is actually easier to sort through the multiple choices of bet types etc due to the way the collapsible menu bars function, although the visualisation feature isn’t the best in the industry if you ask me.
The main menu button does feel slightly overloaded with options but it’s never confusing, and the betslip is wonderfully considerate, only showing up when you have a selection on and even then taking up a minimal amount of screen space unless you choose to expand it.
Gaming & Casino
Betsafe isn’t a betting site that just slapped a bog standard casino onto the side of it. When it comes to the range of different games you can see the depth of the Betsson network shining through once more.
A good range of 10+ software providers, Microgaming amongst them, provide almost 1,500 different titles, spanning video slots, table games like blackjack and roulette, jackpots, classic slots, and video poker. There is also a powerful live casino.
Once again, balance comes to the fore here, making it a good casino for those who enjoy a little bit of everything – and sports bettors who like to dabble in the casino world will never run out of options.
Customer Service & Support
Customer services at Betsafe are excellent, the best of the best. They are open 24 hours a day all year round and have good response times day and night. There must be a reason that their customer services department have won industry recognised awards.
The agents are also knowledgeable about the brand and know the difference between variations of the product in different countries. This is not something to be taken for granted, as many operators enlist contractors to run their customer support and that invariably is a bad thing; all Betsafe customer services are run in house. There are also specific numbers and offices for different countries rather than one central system.
Live chat is generally answered within one minute, email takes an hour or less in most cases, and phone response times are instant – you can even request a call back if you’re feeling lazy.
On top of this there is a stack of information in the FAQ, and even the terms and conditions have been made as user-friendly as something that dull can be.
This is the standard that all other bookies should aspire to.
Licence Information & Contact Details
- Name: Betsafe
- Registered Company Name: BML Group Limited
- UK Licence ref/No: 39579
- Parent Company: Betsson
- Freephone: +44 808 238 0028 (Freephone)
- E-Mail: [email protected]
- Customer services address: ‘Betsson Experience Centre’, Ta’ Xbiex Seafront, Ta’ Xbiex, XBX 1027, Malta
- Phone betting: Not accepted
- Text betting: Not accepted
- Twitter: @Betsafe
- Registered Company address: As Customer Service.