Get to know your bonus types and how to use them

It can be argued that the odds will always be in the bookies favour in the long run, making it difficult to get the better of them. However, one way to make sure you get ahead with often little downside risk is through bonuses – neglecting them would be masochistic.

Bookies often offer bonuses as part of their marketing strategy to get players to remain loyal or to receive new signups. So, bookies are happy to hand over X amount of money in return for new customers or more activity from their current users. This turns out to be a mutually beneficial exchange as you can take full advantage of these bonuses – often with very little risk involved for yourself.

So, let’s take a look at the main types of online betting offers and bonuses available.

Free Bet

A free bet is a nice and easy bonus that’s fairly universal across the world. Whilst they can come in many different formats, such as single bets, express bets, live match bet etc., they’re ultimately a great way to take a swipe at an event with less risk.

A No Risk-free bet essentially gives you back the bet amount in real money if you lose the bet. If you win, you get the winnings as per usual. However, an OnlyWin bet will be with a credit/bonus money that isn’t seen in your betting wallet. Ultimately, the winnings are credited to your account if you win the bet but you usually don’t get the stake money back – seeing as it was bonus money in the first place. An AllWin free bet means you do get that stake money back along with the winnings.

Cashback

The cashback bonus can come in many forms, but it’s often used as a way to get partial repayment over a loss. So, a certain % of the lost bet is repaid. Generally, this is just a one-time bonus for a specific event or championship.

However, the money isn’t often repaid as actual money that you could withdraw. Instead, the repaid cashback comes in the form of a free bet or wager bonus.

Wager Bonus

A wager bonus is essentially a bonus that has wager requirements for you to eventually convert it into cold, hard cash. Basically, this is a bonus where you need to bet a certain amount (either in terms of amounts of bet or value of bets) to make validate this money into withdrawable cash.

This is extremely common among sign-up bonuses and events bonuses. So, a company claims they can match your deposit up to, say, $100, but that $100 they hand over will likely have to be bet a certain amount of times before it’s cash.

These are often the most eye-catching of bets, but they hold more risk than the free bets because they require you to bet your own money first, and continue betting with any bonus money. However, if things pan out well for you, these can also be the most lucrative because of the high bonus amounts being offered.