U.S. Sportsbooks Cross $200B in Bets in Under Five Years

• Between 2018 and 2023, U.S. sportsbooks have taken in over $200 billion in bets.
• New Jersey, Nevada, and Illinois are among the top contributors, thanks in part to their early legalization.
• Sportsbooks have only held onto less than 5% of revenue in only Kansas and Massachusetts, which are among the most recently regulated states.

LAS VEGAS – Sports betting regulation has taken the U.S. by storm in the five years after the Supreme Court ruled a 1992 federal law prohibiting sports betting to be unconstitutional. Since that glorious day in 2018, sportsbooks have accepted over $200 billion in bets and raked in $14 billion in revenue.

With three states regulating sports betting in the last year and 16 left to go, it seems unlikely that the momentum will stop. Massive untapped markets like Texas and Florida are still available, showing legal sports betting is on track to grow many more times over in the coming years.

Biggest Contributors

But since 2018, the largest amount of money placed on bets is in New Jersey. At a whopping $34.8 billion dollars when they became one of the first states to legalize sports betting, New Jersey is looking to make the case as the premier betting market in the country.

Nevada is unsurprisingly the next state in the rankings at almost $30 billion total since 2018. What is even more impressive is that Nevada has allowed sportsbooks to only keep 5.67% of those bets placed, the third lowest in the U.S.

Even the two states ahead of them, Kansas and Massachusetts, only legalized in 2022 and have a very small sample size. With that impressive track record and the second most money wagered overall; it looks like Nevada betting is holding onto their title as the sports betting capital of the U.S.

Illinois rounds out the top three states that wager the most money with a strong $18.65 billion. While that number is seemingly low compared to the top two states, Illinois did legalize in 2019, thus missing out on the first year of legal sports betting and bringing down their numbers a bit.

Regardless, Illinois is quickly becoming one of the bigger markets in the U.S. for sports betting and should continue their momentum as the years go on.

New York is right behind Illinois with $18.45 billion in handle. But their notability is for other reasons: namely, the government has received an incredible $771 million in tax revenue, by far the most in the nation and over six times more than Nevada.

With a 51% tax rate for sports betting, New York dwarfs the rest of the country, with Pennsylvania at 36%. However, New York betting officials have stated that this tax rate is expected to be lessened in the coming years.

Massachusetts Off to a Hot Start

One of the most interesting oddities in sports betting revenue reports is the numbers for Massachusetts. As one of the newest states to legalized sports betting, they have just over $510,000 in bets placed. However, Massachusetts betting is the only state that has sportsbooks in the negative, making them lose over $7,000 to date.

While this is just a blip on the radar and Massachusetts sportsbooks should easily recoup these losses as the volume of bets rises, it is an interesting start for the Commonwealth and one they can hopefully continue for as long as possible.

News tags: Florida | Illinois | Kansas | Massachusetts | Nevada | New Jersey | New York | Pennsylvania | Texas