BETFAIR Review

Overview

You’d be forgiven for thinking that a brand as big as Betfair must have been up and running pretty much since the dawn of time. Incredibly though, they only went into business for the first time in the year 2000. As of today, their success story speaks for itself – over 1 million active users on a global basis, bringing in weekly revenues in excess of £50 million. Which in turn means that whatever it is that Betfair is doing, they’re doing it right. 

Betfair Standout Features 

We’ll cover it in a little more detail later, but the single biggest standout feature of Betfair has to be the exclusive Betfair exchange. In addition, they have one of the very best mobile apps on the market and the customer service team is nothing short of outstanding. 

A great addition are the live streaming and livescores, which are excellent, and more importantly free. Combined with the access to Betfair labs, where users can see and test the new features as they are being developed, the overall offering of Betfair is nothing short of outstanding.

Safety and Security 

While Betfair as a brand in general is considered to be comprehensively safe, there have been quite a number of complaints regarding the performance and stability of the site itself. Slow running, occasional crashes and various problems associated with heavy use of flash, though we personally didn’t face any such issues during our tests. They are extensively licensed and regulated, while state of the art SSL encryption helps bolster account and transaction security. 

Betting and Margins 

Across the board, Betfair is viewed as a standard industry go-to when it comes to determining fair and competitive odds. It’s rare to find them offering odds on major and minor events that are anything less than market-leading – certainly in line with those of rivals. Margins are fair across all betting markets, though commissions of up to 5% are taken from every win made via the Betfair Exchange facility. 

Betfair Markets

Another notch on the belt of Betfair comes in the form of betting markets covered – the catalogue being one of the largest you’ll come across. Of course, football and horse racing tend to be the two primary areas of focus at Betfair, but you’ll also find comprehensive coverage of NFL, NBA, NHL, tennis and cricket events. Like many others, they also keep things enjoyable and entertaining with various alternative betting options, like political events, TV show results and so on. 

Betfair Live Streaming and Live Betting 

In-play betting represents a very big and important part of the experience at Betfair, with pretty much every major football, horse racing and cricket event covered. The facility is great to use and anyone placing a bet of at least £2 will have the opportunity to tune into the live streaming service. As for the live streaming itself, it’s nothing short of excellent when it works, though has a reputation for being slightly unreliable. The experience to expect therefore varies in accordance with your chosen device, browser, connection and so on, though for the most part gets the job done just fine. 

Payments and Placing Bets 

Along with placing bets in the normal fashion, Betfair also gives players the opportunity to go head-to-head using Betfair Exchange. It’s basically a case of taking the middleman out of the equation, in order to come up with your own wagers on your own terms with other gamblers using the same facility. Brilliantly fun and with limitless room for creativity, though with the one caveat (as mentioned) that up to 5% is snipped off every win by Betfair. Still, you can’t expect them to work for free!

Customer Service 

There’s really nothing but positives to say about the customer care team at Betfair, aside from the fact that they’re yet to offer 24/7 telephone support. You can at least get in touch by way of live chat 24/7, but still…phone support would be better.  

Getting Started 

The bonuses on offer at Betfair are more than worth checking out, which at the time of writing included three £10 bets (£30 in value) simply be depositing and wagering £10 of your own money. There’s also the opportunity to scoop up a free £20 bet over in the Betfair Exchange arena. Terms and conditions of course apply, though aren’t nearly as steep as they tend to be elsewhere. 

Betfair Mobile 

Betfair scores big points in mobile stakes by offering customers the option of downloading an app or simply using the mobile version of the website. We’d have to say that the mobile app goes over and above the browser-based mobile experience, but both really are excellent. They’re also simply brilliant for accessing the rest of Betfair’s online gaming assets, too. 

Betfair Casino

The casino over at Betfair is pretty impressive on the whole and features hundreds of cutting-edge games. If anything, the only downside is that there’s perhaps a little too much focus on slots, with certain table games having been covered in a slightly weaker fashion. Still, this is somewhat made up for by the live-dealer table games, the excellent poker room and the increasingly popular virtual sports on offer. 

Conclusion 

Bringing it all together, Betfair remains a market-leader in sports betting for a number of very good reasons. The markets and odds themselves are always great, the Betfair Exchange might change the way you look at sports betting forever and the rest of the available online assets are equally impressive. The customer care team is also a joy to work with, it’s just a shame there’s still no 24/7 telephone support. If they could just plug this hole, along with that of the live streaming not always performing as well as it might, they’d be well on their way to gold-star status. 

Contact Details 

The team at Betfair can be contacted on a 24/7 basis via live chat or email, while telephone lines are open 7.30am to 12.30am. Call 0344 871 0000, direct emails to sport@betfair.com or get in touch via social media using @BetfairCS.