Don't Get Limited!
Sportsbooks can and will limit you. Getting limited or banned is the worst thing that can happen to you as a matched bettor. Getting limited means your max bet amount is restricted to a much lower-than-normal amount. Sportsbooks likely will not tell you if you are limited until you try and bet. MGM is often the first book to limit bettors.
Key Takeaways
- Sportsbook's will limit you if they think you are a profitable bettor
- Being a VIP or having a relationship with a VIP Rep does not prevent limits
- Sportsbooks have terms and conditions that protect them from paying out lines that were a mistake
Examples
Read these articles to see that sportsbook will limit you if they think you are a profitable bettor or are betting lines that are a mistake.
- ESPN: A 13-minute error and the erosion of the bettor-bookie relationship
- ESPN: Looking back at four years since PASPA: Jan. 9, sports betting's almost doomsday
- Washington Post: Sportsbooks say you can win big. Then they try to limit winners.
- USA Today: Sportsbooks limit your ability to make a living off betting, but they're happy to let you go broke
There are two types of bans. One is being promo banned meaning you can make other bets just not promotional ones. The other is a complete ban from a sportsbook. See conversations below from DraftKings and Fanatics about limits.
Avoiding Limits
There is no perfect way to avoid getting limited. In general, you want your behavior to look like a normal bettor, instead of a matched bettor. There are a few things you can do about this:
- Exchanges: If they are available in your state use a betting exchange. They are bettor friendly and like matched betting. Learn more about exchanges in this guide.
- Round Your Bets: Instead of betting $23.74, bet $25.
- Main vs Alternate Lines/Props: For large bets use money lines, spread, and totals instead of player props or alternate lines. While there’s no exact number for what constitutes a large bet, consider anything over a few hundred to be a large bet.
- Large Markets: The bigger the market the safer. The largest markets are main lines on professional sports. Tennis and small NCAAB/NCAAF games have much less wagered on them and may want to be avoided.
- Avoid Book Errors: Sometimes a sportsbook makes a mistake in their posted lines. Do not bet on the obvious mistakes. For example, every book but one has the Yankees money line near -250 but one book has the line at +200 for the Yankees. This would result in a massive arbitrage opportunity. Books are quick to void that bet and have been known to limit/ban you for betting a line that was clearly a mistake.
- Withdraws: Do not withdraw after immediately hitting a sign-up offer. Leave money in your account and make some more bets/hedges before you withdraw. Ideally weeks or months later. Books track historical deposits vs withdraws.
- Hedge Book: Always hedge on a different sportsbook than the promotion.
- Hedge Betting: Only betting promotions is another way sportsbook can identify you as a matched bettor. Work in some hedge bets on every book.
- Browsing: Don’t always log in, immediately bet and log out. Scroll around from time to time to look like a normal user.
- Closing Line Value: Consistently beating the closing line is a sign to the sportsbook that you will be a profitable bettor in the long run, even if you are not currently up on that book. It can be impossible to avoid beating the closing line on every bet, but it is harder to beat if you bet closer to the start of the event.
These actions will often result in a lower conversion but might help you avoid being limited which will allow you to continue to profit over years of matched betting instead of betting a few large high-conversion bets.