On the 21st October 2020 the Betsson Group, the owners of Racebets, decided to close all brands to the UK market. This means new and existing users can no longer bet with racebets from the UK with a UK account. Customers can withdraw funds from the website until 18th November and then until 31st December by contacting the BML group directly. Unclaimed funds after this date will be donated to GambleAware.
Racebets were bought by Betsson in 2016 and the writing was on the wall for them from that point onwards as Betsson have historically hated the UK market. It is unfortunate as Racebets of all of their brands was the most special. As a unique racing specialist they offered a product no one else could match, especially for racing abroad and streaming.
The principle reason for leaving, like most things in life, is money. The BML group only earn around 3% of their money from the UK and they feel the higher regulation required in this market makes keeping the brands open nonviable.
If you don’t bet much on horse racing or the dogs then read no further. If, on the other hand, you do like a few quid on the races then bookmakers don’t come any better than RaceBets.
This is an exclusive horse and greyhound racing betting site covering just about every single recognised race from around the globe, with hundreds available for live streaming each day. On live broadcast quality alone, the site is unbeatable. Add in the exceptional stats and form guides, editorials, blogs, and promotions and it is hard to find a reason to bet on racing elsewhere.
The range of existing promotions is superb too. Focusing on the single product means there are more racing specific offers here than with any other major bookie. Generally, every single race you wager on is covered by some form of enhancement or insurance, and for regular race bettors this long term value can add up.
- Best Horse Racing Betting Site – Masters of their trade.
- Live Streaming – More to watch here than anywhere else, and better quality streams too.
- Added Value – Promotions aplenty give added value to already decent odds.
Pound Coins & Bank Notes
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On the payment options front RaceBets are very good. There is a good mixture or card, ewallets, and pre-paid options to choose from.
You generally tend to find the European bookmakers have a better range than the UK only companies, and this is the case here.
Accounts can be held in British Pounds Sterling (GBP), Euros (EUR), Swedish Krona (SEK) and Norwegian Krone (NOK).
You can change your account currency but once set you cannot change it again, so if you do tend to deal in more than one currency have a think about this before you get started.
Deposit
Maximum deposit limits (per transaction) apply, £5,000 for debit cards and PayPal, £20,000 Skrill and £25,000 bank transfer.
In general, for higher deposits it is worth contacting them in advance, you can often make larger transfers this way.
Fees are not charged for any deposits.
Withdrawals
Minimum withdrawals are the same across the board, but the team at RaceBets can help you out if you don’t have that much in your account. If you contact them first, they will often allow you to deposit the shortfall to get your balance up to £20 so you can then withdraw the lot. That’s service for you.
Withdrawals are usually processed within a day but RaceBets say this can take up to 72 hours (over holidays and weekends, etc). Once approved by the company transfer times are standard.
There is no maximum stated withdrawal limit, but if the withdrawal is over £5k you may need to split it into a few different requests, payment method depending. As always you will need to verify your account, withdrawal limits will be in place until you complete this.
Finally, while fees don’t really apply to withdrawals either, if you make more than 3 in any 30-day period you may incur a nominal fee, the same goes for withdrawals via non-SEPA bank transfers.
Range of Racing Markets & Bets
There are actually three sports covered by RaceBets: horse racing, greyhound racing, and chariot racing.
For UK and Irish racing only you may not notice a huge degree of difference between this site and a big established bookmakers, as both have full market coverage, offers such as best price guaranteed, and streaming. Go a little further afield, however, and no one can touch RaceBets.
The sheer range and depth of coverage is huge, with racing from all over Europe (France, Italy, Spain, Germany, Sweden, Norway, Belgium, Czech Republic, etc) and the world (USA, Canada, India, Turkey, New Zealand, Australia, Turkey, South Africa, Brazil, UAE and more). In total, racing markets are delivered from over 40 countries with over a quarter of a million races annually. That is bigger than any other betting site in the business. Consider too the ability to stream a lot of these races.
Even if you never bet on racing outside of the UK or Ireland there are plenty of reasons to use this site. Ante-post odds are more advanced than most others and if you study form and stats the wealth of information here is unbeatable, including racing post race previews, note taking and horse tracker features.
For those that want a little help RaceBets have a top notch FAQ section called ‘Knowledge Base’ that will explain everything form the basics of betting to more complex wagers and also helps you understand racing and betting terminology.
Exclusive RaceBets Betting Syndicate
Of course, in the UK we’ve all heard of the Tote and Totepool betting pools, but RaceBets have their own exclusive syndicate for German racing. This is a great way to get big wins from small stakes and as it is exclusive this is the only site where you can do this.
The pool works exactly the same way as totepool syndicates work for UK racing; if you win you can earn a proportion of the dividend equal to your stake. The betting tips service also advises on the top three favourites for qualifying races, if you follow the experts opinions and they win RaceBets will also be paid out without deductions.
Horse & Greyhound Racing Odds
Horse racing odds are genuinely good, of course for many races you are covered by the best odds guarantee any way (UK, Irish, UAE, and South African races), but fixed prices in general tend to be in the top 25% for bigger races especially. Factor in too that even with foreign racing you are often getting small bonuses that in effect can work to enhance winnings and therefore the relative odds prices.
In reality there are very few UK licensed betting sites that have the range that this site provides. For many worldwide races you will often find RaceBets are the only ones giving odds, in which case beggars can’t be choosers any way.
I would say RaceBets could do better when it comes to their greyhound racing prices. They do offer best price guarantees for UK races but there are few offers to support long term value. Then again, their coverage is second to none.
Elsewhere the promotions are usually in good shape, and may include things like first fence fallers insurance, first past the post, and money backs.
Odds can be changed between factional and decimal, as you would expect, but an added feature here is the ability to covert all of the stats between metric and imperial measures. Never seen that before, hugely useful.
Staking Limits & Winning Caps
The minimum overall stake for fixed odds is £0.50, although the unit stake can be lower if placing an each-way or full cover bet. There is no maximum stake as such but there are maximum winnings limits to be aware of, and while these are high it’s still something to take into account if you bet large stakes or big odds.
What does really matter however is the £100,000 limit on net winnings per customer each week. This is the only let down of the site but as stated should only affect very high stakes punters – although worth bearing in mind for all when placing big accumulators.
Something else to be aware of are the winning limits per race. These are in place to stop RaceBets going bust effectively, but they could affect you especially if you bet on the greyhounds. The total loss RaceBets can incur is £200,000 in category 1 races (this includes all UK and Irish racing), £100,000 for cat 2, and £25,000 for cat 3 and most greyhound racing.
If the total winnings per race surpass these limits, all winning betslips worth £300 or more will suffer pro rata reductions to meet the limit. Winning bets of less than £300 will be paid out in full.
Website Functionality & Features
The appearance of the RaceBets desktop site is certainly nothing to brag about, but that is precisely the point. This isn’t designed to be graphic rich and colourful, rather it has been engineered to be useful to the bettor first and foremost. And it works.
Everything about the site has simplicity at its core. The yellow and black colour scheme along with well laid out menus make finding a race amid the plain white backdrop especially easy, and the race finder tool is an outstanding piece of web design. Taking up very little screen real estate, this customisable tool displays races by type (gallop, trot, jump, greyhound) and country, but you can also choose to view current or ante post races, as well as use it as a racing calendar up to a year in advance. It’s incredibly innovative and a doddle to use even for the tech shy.
You can place a bet within three clicks, and for non-UK racing especially you will not be able to access markets quicker than with RaceBets. When placing a bet things work slightly differently to the norm in that your selections won’t be added to your betslip initially. When you make a selection, a small console opens within the interface and this is where you enter your stake and confirm the wager, at which point it will show up in your open bets.
Let’s face it, this site is great to use and get around because it has limited scope. By not having to feature 30 other sports or side products such as casino and games sections, the site is less cluttered compared to other bookies websites as well as being lightning quick. Everything you need is on the home page, you don’t need to go looking for the horse racing or greyhound racing sections, and if you bet on the move you will really feel the benefit of this.
Statistics & Form Guides
The stats, results and form guide sections of RaceBet are simply unbeatable. No other online bookmaker can match the range, depth and quality of these services.
You can click on any horse to see an overview of general statistics, an in-depth form guide, a chart of recent success and even a ‘duals’ section that details if that runner has faced any other horses in the field previously and what those results were. You can also see what other upcoming ante-post races the horse is listed to compete in. Horses can be tracked over time and you can even make your own notes on them.
There are also whole sections devoted to jockey and trainer stats; trainers and jockey starts, wins, places and earnings can all be found within one click. Usually you would need to have a separate website window open to see these types of stats when betting, but with RaceBets it is all nicely packaged into one website.
Racing Editorials, Blogs & Tips
The blog news section is as good as the Racing Post. This is not some half-baked seldom updated blog, rather this is a well written series of news articles and previews updated daily. RaceBets give punters a wealth of material through these features, so you certainly can’t say you didn’t have enough information if you lose when you bet with them.
RaceBets also offer a tips area where they give three favourites in order for select races abroad. This is really useful for those that only bet occasionally on foreign racing and don’t have the same knowledge base compared to UK and Irish racing.
The betting rules and guides are equally superb, detailing everything from ‘what is a lucky 15’ to the basics of betting on horses. You can tell this is a company that wants punters to be informed and enjoy betting on racing, they go out of their way to help.
Help at Hand
Customer service isn’t 24 hours a day, but it’s very good when it is open.
Free telephone support and live chat runs from 9am until 10:45pm (GMT), emails and the onsite contact form are answered within 24 hours. These shorter hours are generally considered to be a bad thing, although if you consider that RaceBets support is open when most racing is on and they don’t offer other sports and games, I think this is fair enough.
The best aspect of the support is their knowledge. If you are a regular racing punter and you contact support at some bookmakers you find yourself having to explain bets and markets to the customer support agent. This is not the case here; the staff know about racing, they know their terms and conditions inside out, and this saves a huge amount of time. They are very friendly and pleasant too.
There is an informative FAQ which opens in a new window and is searchable, so alongside the general betting help and info elsewhere on the site you shouldn’t really need to contact customer support for most queries.
Support is available in English and German.
Race Streaming & Live Options
Betting in play live on racing isn’t quite the same deal as with football and other sports as there are not a huge number of live markets available for racing, and that is true of any site.
You can however still bet on horses while the race is running and not every betting site offers that feature. Wagers are taken live up to a certain point in the race, and this timing varies depending on the race type, distance, and how the race plays out.
Cash out is not available at RaceBets, but then it is not widely used alongside horse racing anyway.
Live streaming, however, is another matter; this has to be the single stand out feature of RaceBets. You can watch 100’s of races from around the world every day and you don’t even need to bet on the race to do so. Live streams have their own menu allowing you to see upcoming meetings and you can also see weeks in advance what is being broadcast.
It is not just the quantity of global racing which can be streamed that is so impressive, but the quality. RaceBets stream at a higher data rate and this makes the picture good enough to fill a full screen rather than a poxy little pop up window. They claim the quality is HD. I’m not sure it is quite HD but the streaming really is good enough that you don’t need a specialist TV subscription to enjoy famous races from around the globe.
Pocket Bookie
The RaceBets site is fully scalable to phones and tablets, maintaining the clear simple graphics and fantastically easy navigation on all devices. The mobile version of the site is perfect for racing punters, not because it looks good or has lots of features – although to be fair it looks better than the desktop site – but because it is so easy to bet on a race in a matter of seconds.
There is no mobile app although I am not sure you really need one for a site like RaceBets.
The mobile site begins as the race finder tool found on the desktop site, with the same funnelling options to guide you speedily to the race you want. Because of this, finding your race is a pleasure compared with the hassle of finding the same race on a big sportsbook site where football tends to dominate the home page. There are no quick links to speak of, but then you don’t really need any.
The menu button grants access to extra’s, highlights, streaming, head to heads, etc, and because the site isn’t overloaded you can move between these options seamlessly. Navigation is as effortless as the operation.
Account management options are nestled under another menu that floats in from the opposite side and keeping these two menu’s separate feels sensible and avoids any confusion.
Streaming is available on all devices too and you can even turn down that high-quality video if you need to save on data.
Making A Case For RaceBets
This unique selling point here is fairly obvious – RaceBets is the bee’s knees for horse racing betting. For anyone who places most or all of their wagers on the nags then there honestly is no other betting company that can match the all around package; the markets, features, and options available cover every angle.
Unless you pick your horses by their name alone you are guaranteed to find a better betting experience for racing at this bookmaker.
Even if you like to bet on other sports as well as racing and you are thinking it’s easier to just stick with a bookie that does both, you might want to think again. Market range and betting features aside, RaceBets boast good odds, more live streaming than most, and customer support that puts others to shame.
About The Company
RaceBets are limited in range but it’s by design rather than down to poor management; they have focussed on a very specific area of the market and there are no points for guessing which area that is. The company has in fact been in existence since 2005 and is one of the most experienced operators in race betting. By concentrating on horse and greyhound betting, RaceBets have been able to develop an uncompromising product that is quite frankly unbeatable for punters who mainly bet on the sport.
RaceBets International Gaming Ltd, the company behind the brand, are based in Malta but the group originate from Germany, where they are one of the country’s largest bookmakers. This is one reason why the site can be accessed in German and English, along with another 15 major languages.
By 2010 the bookie had become the biggest in the country and subsequently German Racing (German equivalent to the British Horseracing Authority) were invited to invest. This relationship allows better access to the racing industry for the bookie while at the same time allowing some of the profits to be re-invested into grass-roots racing. In the same year they moved their head offices to Malta.
Full UK and Irish racing were added in 2012 and this completed the package for the company who, along with their vast range of overseas racing, have the biggest book of its type available to punters. The whole group are now owned by Betsson, the massive Swedish online gambling company, however this doesn’t appear to have dented the RaceBets brand which maintains itself entirely focused on its namesake, race bets.
Betsafe are a sister brand of Racebets, since they are also owned by Betsson.
Contact & License Details
- Name: RaceBets
- UK Licence ref/No: 39428
- Registered Company Name: RaceBets International Gaming Ltd
- URL: http://www.racebets.com/
- Customer Services: 0808 238 0022 or 0203 747 6778 (UK)
- E-Mail: [email protected]
- Registered Address: Dragonara Business Centre, Dragonara Road, St Julians, STJ 3141, Malta
- Phone betting: Not accepted
- Text betting: Not accepted
- Twitter: @RaceBetsCom