The best way to analyze if they are profitable in the long term is by calculating the expected value.

Many gamblers have mixed feelings as to whether or not parlays are a wise play.

Profitability of parlays in sports betting The following is an example of a traditional Las Vegas Parlay Card, which shows the typical payouts for an up to 10 team parlay bet based on −110 prices (amount won is assuming $100 is bet) : In reality, however, if one assumes that each single game bet is 50/50, the true payout should instead be 3:1.Įxamples Typical payouts for up to 10 team parlay bet For instance, a common two-team NFL parlay based entirely on the spread generally has a payout of 2.64:1. Parlay bets are paid out at odds higher than the typical single game bet, but still below the 'true' odds. A naive application of odds that treated these events as uncorrelated would not accurately reflect the probability of the linked bet. These are not independent events, as a team that scores more than three goals is also very likely to win the match. Correlated parlays are two or more bets from the same game that rely on a closely related outcome: for example, betting that a football (soccer) team might both score more than three goals in a match, and also win the match. The benefit of the parlay is that there are much higher pay-offs, although as usual, casinos and bookkeepers offering parlays often exploit the poor calculation of gamblers by not increasing the pay-out as much as the odds truly demand, with the effect of the house edge increasing in parlays.Īlthough a variety of bets can be used to build a parlay bet, correlated parlays are usually not allowed at betting sites. Parlay bets are high-risk, high-reward linking the possibilities drastically reduces the chance of the bet paying off overall. If any of the plays in the parlay ties, or 'pushes', the parlay reverts to a lower number of wagers with the payout odds reducing accordingly. If any of the bets in the parlay lose, the entire parlay loses. Winning the parlay is dependent on all of those wagers winning together. ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)Ī parlay, accumulator (or acca), combo bet, or multi is a single bet that links together two or more individual wagers, usually seen in sports betting. Please help improve the article by adding descriptive text and removing less pertinent examples. This article may contain excessive or irrelevant examples.

Sports betting parlay calculator