Free bets today: what the new UK bonus rules mean for the offer in your account

Updated October 2026

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A £30 free bet is rarely worth £30. That sentence is the whole of this guide. Under the rules the Gambling Commission put in force on 19 January 2026, every free bet and every bonus offered by a bookmaker licensed in Great Britain carries a number the marketing never names — a wagering multiple, a minimum price, an expiry date, and, for most free bets, the fact that the stake is not paid back when the wager wins. The number that follows from those four mechanics is what an offer is worth, and it sits between roughly 50p and 75p for every £1 stated, depending on the market the free bet is spent on. This page explains why, on what maths, and where to look before claiming one.

The data current as of 26 October 2026 was verified against the Gambling Commission’s public register and each operator’s own customer terms.

The fundamentals every free bet in Britain shares

A free bet is a credit the bookmaker loads onto an account after a condition has been met — usually a first deposit and an opening wager at a stated minimum price. The wager that releases the credit is called the qualifying bet. Once credited, the free bet can be spent on another selection; winnings accrue to the withdrawable balance, but in almost every case the stake itself is not returned. That single rule — stake-not-returned — is the gap between what a free bet appears to be worth (its face value) and what it is actually worth, and it is the rule most bettors do not register before they claim one.

Three more mechanics apply across the British market, and each can swing what an offer clears into. The first is the minimum odds: the free bet must be placed at a stated price or higher, often 1.50, 1.75 or 2.00 in decimal form. The second is the expiry, typically seven days for small credits and up to thirty for larger ones. The third, which applies to bonus cash rather than to most free bets, is the wagering requirement — a multiple the bonus must be turned over before any winnings become withdrawable.

The four mechanics in plain English

• Stake not returned. A £10 free bet at 3.00 that wins pays £20 — £30 in gross return minus the £10 stake. Cash on a winning bookmaker bet at the same price would pay £30, with the £10 stake restored. The free bet is the wager minus the recovery of capital.
• Minimum odds. Place the free bet on a price below the floor and the bet may be settled at minimum stake or voided entirely. The rule exists because the bookmaker cannot give away stake-not-returned value on long-odds shots, where the implied advantage to the bettor is highest.
• Expiry. A free bet left unused until its expiry is removed from the account. Seven-day credits are tighter than they sound: a working week, two or three fixtures, one missed event.
• Wagering requirement. A bonus is multiplied — the Commission’s cap is 10x since 19 January 2026. A £10 bonus at 10x requires £100 of qualifying bets before the bonus and any winnings move to cash. Whether the cap reaches wagering-free free bets is not settled in the published rules.

What the Commission’s January 2026 rulebook actually changed

Two changes reshaped British betting offers from 19 January 2026 onwards. The first is the 10x cap on wagering requirements for bonuses — the upper bound on how many times the bonus must be turned over before withdrawal. The second is the ban on mixed-product promotions: an offer that requires gambling on two or more product types (such as betting and casino together) is no longer permitted. Both are LCCP social responsibility code provisions, enforced by the Commission against licensed operators only.

The rule also settles a question the marketing copy has long dodged. “Free bet” no longer means an unencumbered credit on its own — it sits inside a tight frame of qualifying conditions, expiry windows and stake-not-returned statements. That frame is what this guide reads.

The landscape: how today’s free bets are structured

British bookmakers use a small set of structures, and recognising them is the first step in working out what any individual offer clears into. Each structure carries a known answer to four questions: what triggers the credit, how the credit is sized, what the credit can be spent on, and how long it lasts.

Structure 1 — Bet-and-get on the first deposit

The single most common sign-up form is “bet £X, get £Y in free bets”. The qualifying wager must be placed at a stated minimum price, settled, and the free bet is then credited. The free bet itself usually carries a minimum price of its own and an expiry shorter than the qualifying window. BetUK, Coral and Unibet all run variants: BetUK issues four £10 free bets (two football accumulators, two multiples of two or more selections), Coral issues £40 in free bets on a £20 qualifying wager, and Unibet issues £40 in free bets on the same opening stake.

Structure 2 — Stake-back on a losing first acca

The bookmaker refunds a losing first wager as a free bet rather than cash. Hollywoodbets pays a stake-matched free bet of up to £30 on a first losing accumulator of three or more legs, settled within seven days, with the original stake required to be £10 or more and at combined odds of 4/1 or greater. The mechanic looks generous in headline form — the wager itself is also refunded — but the refund is in free bet form, and the free bet runs through the stake-not-returned rule.

Structure 3 — Risk-light qualifying bet

The operator throws in spread bets or extra credits to reduce the friction of an opening wager. Sporting Index issues three £10 fixed-odds free bets, three £5 Total Goals spread bets, three £5 Winning Favourites spread bets and a £1 Race Index spread bet after a qualifying fixed-odds wager at minimum odds of 1/2 (1.50 decimal). Spreadex issues £60 in free bets (across fixed odds and spread betting) after a qualifying fixed-odds wager of £10. Each is designed to show the bettor the spread-betting product while issuing a familiar-looking free-bet bundle.

Structure 4 — Enhanced odds on a flagged event

The bookmaker offers a price boost on one specific event or selection as the headline, with a small free-bet sweetener. This is rarer as the only sign-up mechanic and more often sits beside one of the first three. Betfair’s 90 Minute Payout, 888sport’s daily boosted odds and Kwiff’s Supercharged odds all live near this category. The free-bet portion here is usually minor, and most of the marketing weight rides on the boosted price.

Structure 5 — Bonus cash with a turnover

A bonus is credited to the balance rather than as a free bet, and the entire bonus carries a wagering requirement before withdrawal. This structure is rarer in British sports betting than in casino offers, partly because of the 10x cap. Where it appears, expect a tighter menu of eligible markets, a longer expiry and a minimum price on every turnover wager.

What the structures tell you about value

Every structure moves money from one pocket to another inside the operator’s terms. A “bet £10, get £10” deal moves £10 of qualifying turnover from your pocket into theirs and sends £10 of free-bet stake back. The free bet, because stake is not returned, clears at the lower value the maths will produce below. A stake-back moves the loss of a losing wager into the free-bet frame, where the same stake-not-returned rule applies. The enhanced-odds structure moves the betting margin into the boosted selection, sometimes with a price that, after the margin is netted, is no better than the standard line.

What the numbers say: the arithmetic of a free bet

The instrument needed to read a free bet is a single ratio — the value of a winning wager divided by what the same price would have paid in cash — multiplied by the bookmaker’s payout share on the market the free bet is spent on. The result is the average value of the free bet, expressed as a fraction of its face value, under the assumption that it is spent on a market where the bookmaker holds a typical margin.

Inputs. A £10 free bet, stake not returned, placed at illustrative two-way odds of 1.90 (9/10) on each side. The illustrative price is not a quoted line — it is a neutral choice that exercises the stake-not-returned rule without leaning on either side.

Value if it wins. £10 × (1.90 − 1) = £9.00 in profit, plus no returned stake. A cash wager of £10 at the same price would pay £19.00.

Payout share. 1 ÷ (1/1.90 + 1/1.90) = 1 ÷ (0.5263 + 0.5263) = 1 ÷ 1.0526 = 0.9500, or 95.00 %.

Value of the free bet. £9.00 × 0.9500 = £8.55, which is 85.5 % of the £10 face value. State the result as a band, not a single figure — between roughly 80 % and 90 % of face value for an even-money selection on a typical British sports margin, with shorter prices lifting the band higher and longer prices pulling it lower.

Two caveats are part of the band, not extra to it. The first is that the calculation assumes the bet is placed on a market where the bookmaker is taking a 5 % margin, which is a middle band for British football and horse racing but not universal. The second is that the bet is on average placed at a price the bettor chooses freely within the eligible set — not at the cheapest market on the book or the most expensive, both of which would skew the average.

What shifts the band

A free bet placed at minimum odds of 1.50 carries far less downside than one at minimum odds of 2.50, because the shorter price reduces the volatility of the outcome. A free bet placed at longer odds carries greater upside on a win but a lower chance of converting at all. The minimum odds rule is, in effect, an implicit cap on what the bookmaker is prepared to give away.

Free bets on accumulators add the same stake-not-returned rule plus the compounded margin of each leg. The compounded margin means the value ratio is the same band but applied to a smaller gross payout per unit stake; an acca free bet is generally lighter in real value than a single at the same minimum odds, because each leg gives the bookmaker a cut.

Expiry alters what fraction of free bets gets converted at all. A seven-day expiry leaves most free bets unconverted in industry measurements, with the average value pulled well below the band quoted above once unused credits are netted in. A seven-day window is short. A thirty-day window is short in a different way — short enough to force a wager on a market the bettor would not have chosen unprompted.

Payments and payout speed: where free bets move into cash

The conversion of free bet winnings into a balance the bettor can withdraw depends on the same payment rails as any other withdrawal. Identity verification before the first deposit is itself a Commission requirement, in force since 7 May 2019: name, address and date of birth are checked before a customer can deposit or gamble, including with a free bet. The practical effect is that the documents and the verification happen before the offer is claimed — not after winnings accrue.

The standard payment picture

British licensed operators pull from a common set of rails: debit cards (Visa, Mastercard, Visa Electron), bank-based payments (instant bank transfer, Trustly, TrueLayer, Earthport), e-wallets where the operator supports them, and wallet-style services such as Apple Pay, Google Pay and Revolut Pay. The Commission’s published register lists the brand and the licence account but not a payment-menu snapshot.

Where payments cut into the maths of a free bet

• Withdrawal methods. Free-bet winnings generally follow the operator’s standard withdrawal routes; the rail is not normally restricted by the offer. Coral’s site lists Apple Pay, Visa, Visa Electron, Mastercard, Revolut Pay, Google Pay, TrueLayer, Earthport and Trustly across its deposit and withdrawal menu, with the welcome offer qualifying on debit card or instant bank transfer specifically.
• Bonuses on top-ups. E-wallet top-ups are accepted by some operators and excluded by others. A bonus offer limited to debit card or bank transfer means an e-wallet deposit usually does not qualify — the qualifying condition is on the funding rail, not on the amount.
• E-wallet restrictions on bonuses. A small number of offers state that deposits via particular e-wallets are excluded from the promotion. The cleanest reading is to qualify the offer on a debit card or an instant bank transfer, both of which are uncontentious across the licensed set.
• Credit cards. Banned for gambling in Great Britain since 14 April 2020, including via an e-wallet funded from a credit card. The ban is irrelevant to the wagering-only question of a free bet but relevant to how the qualifying deposit is funded.

Payout speed

Payout speed is a property of the payment rail and the operator’s processing window. A free bet does not change that window, and no free bet in the British market was found to be paid faster than a regular withdrawal. What changes with a free bet is the documentation — operators often re-run a lighter source-of-funds check when a customer withdraws for the first time, particularly after a larger bonus conversion.

Strategy, bankroll and what the bettor actually does

A free bet only realises its average value if it is converted. The mechanics above are the frame around that conversion; the strategy section is what the bettor does inside that frame.

The default plan

Start with a free bet at minimum odds of 1.50, on a single selection in a market the bettor would have backed with cash anyway. The conversion ratio runs closer to the top of the value band at this price, and the choice of selection is one the bettor already considers live. The expiry window — seven days for most British credits — is short enough that placing the bet in session one or two is the practical path.

For multi-leg free bets, treat each leg as its own wager from the value perspective. An acca with a free bet at the top and a single qualifying leg at the base does not compound the maths in the bettor’s favour — it dilutes it, by adding margin on each leg. Convert the free bet on a two-leg double or a singles structure at minimum odds where the offer permits, and the rest of the wager sits in cash.

Bankroll under a free-bet regime

A bankroll is built across hundreds of decisions, and a free bet is one decision inside that series. The conversion ratio of the free bet is small relative to a long bankroll, but the qualifying-bet loss is not — the qualifying wager is a real bet at real odds, lost or won on its own merits. Treat the qualifying bet as the real cost and the free bet as a small hedge against that cost, and the offer’s place in the bankroll is in proportion.

The minimum-odds rule is not a suggestion

Free bets placed below the minimum price are typically settled at minimum stake or voided, both of which lose the bet the credit. The rule exists because a bookmaker can only afford to give away a stake-not-returned credit on prices at which the operator still holds a margin edge; below that floor the offer is unprofitable for them. The rule is enforced in the operator’s terms, not in marketing.

What the bettor checks before claiming

Three things on the operator’s terms page decide whether the offer is worth the time. First, the expiry date — seven days is the British standard and is the rough floor for any withdrawal decision. Second, the eligible markets — a free bet on football accumulators only is a different offer from one usable across sports. Third, the minimum odds — the longer the floor, the more value the credit extracts from the wager, and the more carefully the selection has to be chosen.

Sports and tournaments: what the free bet actually buys

A free bet does not change what sports or tournaments a British operator offers — that is a property of the licence and the bookmaker’s trading team — but it changes how the bettor spends the credit. Some tournaments attract most of the free-bet menu because the minimum-odds rule and the eligible-markets list are easiest to satisfy on mainstream events.

Football

Football dominates the British free-bet menu. The Premier League is the densest market on which to convert a free bet in Britain: deep liquidity, a wide range of prices, daily fixtures through the season, and minimum odds of 1.50 met by most short-priced favourites. The Championship, the FA Cup, the Scottish Premiership and the EFL fill in around the Premier League. World Cup and European Championship tournaments compress the calendar into four-to-six-week windows where the eligible-market list narrows to outright, match and goals markets.

Horse racing

Horse racing is the second pillar of the British free-bet menu, and the structure of racing bets adds a wrinkle. Each-way free bets, where the wager is split into a win and a place bet at equal stakes, double the stake against the expiry window and put both halves through the stake-not-returned rule. Best Odds Guaranteed — where the operator pays the starting price or the taken price, whichever is higher — applies to cash wagers but generally not to free bets; the offer’s terms usually exclude free bets from the BOG.

Other sports

Tennis, cricket, golf, boxing, rugby and American sports (NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL) appear on most British operators’ menus, with free-bet eligibility usually sitting at minimum odds of 1.50 to 2.00. Esports and virtual events are widely offered and frequently carry a separate eligibility line — a virtuals-only free bet is excluded from a sportsbook menu by the offer’s terms.

Tournaments that compress the window

The Cheltenham Festival and the Grand National are the two meetings where the British free-bet market briefly inverts — a free bet expiring inside the meeting is more valuable because the eligible-market list is dense and the prices move with public money. Two practical notes: minimum-odds floors of 2.00 are common over the four days of Cheltenham because favourites are short, and each-way place terms are different from the standard flat-rates elsewhere on the calendar.

The top 10 ranked: how the set compares

This section closes the comparison the rest of the page opens. Ten licensed operators, ranked by what each offers a British bettor claiming the welcome offer and converting it under typical conditions. Every operator holds a Gambling Commission remote licence for general betting on real events; every operator is a GAMSTOP member; the brand-and-licence mapping is the one on the Commission’s public register.

The headline numbers at a glance

The map above is what the Commission’s register states. The decision about which operator suits which bettor sits in the write-ups below.

BetUK — the plain bet-and-get

Four £10 free bets after a £10 qualifying wager covers most of what the British welcome offer is structured to do. The bonus comes as two football accumulators of four or more selections and two multiples of two or more — i.e. it is pre-allocated by sport and bet type, with no single-bet option. Verdict. The pre-allocated split is the constraint: a bettor with a strong singles preference will leave credit unused, and the conversion ratio of acca free bets sits below single free bets on the same minimum odds. Good for a bettor who already plays football multiples; weak for a singles-first reader.

888sport — the product-dense sportsbook

888sport layers pre-match and in-play markets with Cash Out, Bet Builder, racing streams, BetFinder form tools, a live bet feed and daily boosted odds. The welcome offer sits inside that product set, with details surfaced in the app. Verdict. A reader who wants a sportsbook they will use past the welcome offer is the right fit — the daily boosted odds and the in-play product offset the modest free-bet credit. A reader who only wants the welcome credit will find cheaper paths on the list.

Hollywoodbets — the stake-back on the first acca

Up to £30 in free bets on a first losing accumulator of three or more legs at combined odds of 4/1 or greater, settled within seven days. The mechanism reads as a refund of the qualifying wager; the refund is a free bet, so the stake of the refund is itself not returned. Verdict. Worth it for a bettor whose first wager would in any case be a multi-leg acca — the hedge is built into the offer’s structure. A bettor whose first wager would be a single faces a forced acca that adds margin on each leg; not worth it for that reader.

BetVictor — the offers-in-the-app

BetVictor runs regular price boosts, acca offers and free bets on selected events, with welcome offers shown inside the app and governed by the customer terms. Verdict. A long-standing British operator with a deep in-play product and a strong horse-racing grid. The welcome offer details are not always surfaced on the public homepage and live behind a login — a reader who likes to read the terms before signing in will find fewer details than on brands that publish them upfront.

William Hill — the football acca infrastructure

The Football Acca Boost gives an acca boost from 3 % on a double up to 200 % on twenty or more legs, with each selection at 1/5 or bigger, a maximum boost of £10,000 per online bet, in force until 30 May 2027. The welcome offer sits inside that product alongside price boosts and free bets on flagged events. Verdict. The right fit for a bettor whose play is built around football multiples; the per-bet boost cap and the run-date limit (the boost ends in May 2027) are the constraints to read before placing any number of legs at the threshold.

Betfair — the exchange plus sportsbook

Betfair’s sportsbook carries in-play markets, Bet Builder, free live streaming of UK and Irish racing and football in the app, and a 90 Minute Payout market on selected football fixtures. The exchange sits on a separate betting intermediary licence under the same licensee. Verdict. A bettor who compares exchange prices to sportsbook prices will find the most value on this brand. A sportsbook-only bettor will find the welcome offer smaller than the headline-heavy offers above the line.

Sporting Index — the fixed-odds-plus-spread welcome

A qualifying fixed-odds wager at minimum odds of 1/2 (1.50 decimal) triggers three £10 fixed-odds free bets, three £5 Total Goals spread bets, three £5 Winning Favourites spread bets and a £1 Race Index spread bet. Verdict. The right fit for a reader who is curious about spread betting — the welcome offer is engineered to expose both products. A reader with no interest in spread bets leaves the £5 and £1 credits unused; the structure is part-incentive, part-product-tour.

Spreadex — the spread-betting principal

Spreadex is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority for spread betting and by the Gambling Commission for fixed-odds betting, and it states that spread betting losses can exceed the deposit. The welcome offer is £60 in free bets for a £10 fixed-odds wager, with the free bets usable across fixed odds and spread betting. Verdict. A reader who reads the spread-betting risk and accepts it gets the largest fixed-odds free-bet credit on the list. A reader who does not read it finds the same risk on a product they never intended to use.

Ladbrokes — the British mainstay

Ladbrokes runs odds boosts on horse and greyhound, Best Odds Guaranteed on UK and Irish racing, in-play betting and acca boosts, all governed by the customer terms. The welcome offer sits on top of the in-house price boost product. Verdict. A reader who plays horse racing weekly will find the BOG and the acca boosts paying for themselves; the free-bet credit is supplementary to those, not the headline value.

Bar One Racing — the Irish independent

Bar One Racing (rebranded to BAR 1 Betting) is an Irish independent bookmaker with shops across Ireland and horse-racing sponsorships at Dundalk, Fairyhouse, Navan, The Curragh, Curraheen Park and Cork. Verdict. The right fit for a reader who follows Irish racing closely and values a smaller-operator relationship; weaker for a reader whose play is built on Premier League football, where the menu is shallower than the multi-product operators higher on the list.

Overview: what an offer actually clears into

The arithmetic in the section above provides a clear estimate of what a free bet is worth. A £10 free bet at illustrative 1.90 lands between 80 % and 90 % of face value — £8.00 to £9.00 — and the band narrows or widens according to the minimum-odds rule, the eligible-market menu and the expiry window. The headline number a reader should hold onto: a typical British free bet converts at roughly 85 % of face value on an even-money selection, before the expiry window is factored in.

The expiry window is the second-order effect. A seven-day credit is short; most free bets in industry measurements do not get placed. The ones that do not get placed are worth zero, and that pulls the average well below the band quoted above. The reader who converts the credit in session one or two captures the top of the band. The reader who leaves it on the account captures closer to the floor.

Legality: the frame around every offer above

Every operator in the comparison holds a Gambling Commission remote licence for general betting on real events; every one is a GAMSTOP member; every one verifies identity before the first deposit. The framework below sets the boundary each licence operates inside.

The licence and its limits

The Gambling Commission licenses the British commercial betting market under the Gambling Act 2005, which covers Great Britain. Northern Ireland sits outside the Act under older law. The 2005 Act (as amended by the Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Act 2014) requires any operator whose remote facilities are used in Great Britain to hold a Commission licence, irrespective of where the operator is based. A Curaçao, Maltese or Gibraltar licence is not a substitute for a GB licence; that point is settled in sections 33 and 36 of the Act.

There is no state monopoly and no cap on the number of licences. The Commission’s public register is searchable by business name, trading name, domain or licence account number — the four identifiers — and is the definitive test of whether a brand holds the licence. A licence listed for one operator does not extend to a related brand under a different trading name; each brand is checked individually. Several brands can run under one licensee — Ladbrokes and Coral under LC International Limited, Paddy Power and Betfair under PPB Counterparty Services Limited — and the comparison above keeps that structure intact.

In-play, marketing and what may be bet on

GB bookmakers offer in-play betting under their licence condition and customer-protection duties. No statutory list of permitted bets or markets exists; operators offer markets under their own rules and the LCCP. Esports are treated like any other event; virtual events are a separate licence category. Bets on politics, TV shows and novelty markets are offered by some operators and no statutory prohibition was found.

The marketing frame sits in two places: the ASA’s CAP Code (non-broadcast) and BCAP Code (broadcast), and the LCCP’s social responsibility code. CAP Code section 16: marketing must be socially responsible, must not be of strong appeal to under-18s, and no one who is or seems to be under 25 may be featured gambling or play a significant role. Since 1 August 2019 betting advertisements are not shown on TV from five minutes before a live sporting event to five minutes after it, before the 9 pm watershed — horse and greyhound racing excluded. The rule concerns who appears in advertisements, not who may bet.

Promotion rules in force since 19 January 2026

The Commission published two rules on 19 January 2026 that touch every welcome offer on the list above. Wagering requirements on bonuses are capped at 10x — the same £10 bonus at 50x requires £500 of qualifying bets; under the cap, no more than £100. Mixed-product promotions — an offer that requires gambling on two or more product types such as betting and casino together — are banned; “bet on football to get free spins” is the example the marketing drafts keep returning to. Whether the 10x cap reaches free bets that carry no wagering condition, and whether a money-value cap applies to bonuses, are not settled in the published rules.

Tax, age and the duty split

The player pays no tax on betting winnings in Great Britain (general information, not tax advice; a professional gambler should ask HMRC or an adviser). General Betting Duty is the operator’s tax on gross profits, currently 15 %; from 1 April 2027 a new remote betting rate of 25 % applies within it, while remote bets on UK horse racing, pool betting and in-person betting stay at 15 %. Until 1 April 2027 the remote rate stays at 15 %. Financial spread betting carries its own rates — 3 % financial, 10 % other.

The minimum age is 18. Identity verification (name, address and date of birth) is run before the first deposit, in force since 7 May 2019. Free bet or bonus, the verification sits ahead of the qualifying wager.

Offshore brands: what the protection is lost

Providing gambling facilities in Great Britain without the licence the Act requires is an offence under section 33 of the Gambling Act 2005 — on summary conviction up to 51 weeks’ imprisonment, a fine up to level 5, or both (six months in Scotland). The offence is aimed at the operator, not the customer; no offence aimed at a customer who merely bets on an unlicensed site was found. The customer’s loss is the protection, not the legality: no GAMSTOP coverage, no Commission complaints route, no approved dispute-resolution body, no British consumer redress if funds are withheld, not bound by the 10x bonus cap or the £150 financial vulnerability check. The honest framing is licensed = checks, limits, GAMSTOP, bonus cap, but also verification before the first bet; unlicensed = none of those protections and possible loss of funds. Neither is the safe choice by default.

Responsible gambling: where help sits when an offer stops being entertaining

The mechanics of a free bet assume the bettor is choosing to play. The Commission’s safer-gambling frame assumes the operator has a parallel duty to keep the offer within the bettor’s means. The two are not symmetric; the bettor’s controls run through the licence and the operator’s voluntary set of tools.

What the operator must offer

• GAMSTOP. The national multi-operator online self-exclusion scheme is a mandatory licence condition for online operators since 31 March 2020. Periods run six months, one year, five years, or five years with auto-renewal; after the minimum period, the exclusion stays in place for a further seven years unless the customer asks GAMSTOP to remove it. GAMSTOP covers online sites and apps; betting shops use a separate service.
• Financial vulnerability check (LCCP 3.4.4). In force since 30 August 2024, applicable since 28 February 2025. A public-record check (bankruptcy, county court judgments) runs once a customer’s deposits minus withdrawals cross £150 in a rolling 30 days. It is not an income check and not a credit reference check.
• Deposit limits. Operators must offer a gross deposit limit on a fixed time frame (RTS 12). The first changes applied from 31 October 2025; a second phase was postponed to 30 September 2026. No state-set deposit or loss ceiling for betting exists; limits are the customer’s choice.
• Loss limits. DAZN Bet documents deposit, loss and wagering limits as safer-gambling tools. The offering is operator-by-operator.
• Wagering limits. Documented on DAZN Bet; standard on the licensed set.

What sits outside the operator’s frame

The “affordability checks” of the press — the financial risk assessments the Commission announced on 7 July 2026 — are on a staged plan with no start date. Write “announced, staged, no start date”, not “in force”. Until they apply, the £150 public-record vulnerability check is the operator’s primary check; the deeper affordability work sits ahead.

Where the bettor gets help

• GamCare (National Gambling Helpline). 24/7 support for anyone affected by gambling in Britain — bettor, family, professional. The line is the first port of call.
• GambleAware. Information, signposting and funding for treatment services across Great Britain.
• NHS gambling clinics. Specialist NHS provision in regions across England, free at the point of use.
• Gamblers Anonymous. Peer-support meetings across the UK and online.

The self-exclusion decision is bigger than a single bookmaker, and GAMSTOP is the route that scales across operators.

Frequently asked questions

What are free bets?

A free bet is a credit a bookmaker loads onto an account after a qualifying wager has been placed and settled, usually a first deposit and an opening bet at a stated minimum price. The credit can be spent on a new selection; winnings accrue to a withdrawable balance, but the stake itself is typically not returned with the win. The difference between “free bet” and a cash wager is the recovery of the stake on a win.

How does free bets work in practice?

Place a qualifying wager at the stated minimum odds, wait for it to settle, and the operator credits the free bet — usually within minutes for events that settle quickly, longer for events that settle later in the day. The free bet is spent on a second selection at or above its own minimum odds, often 1.50 or 1.75 in decimal form, before the expiry — most commonly seven days. A winning free bet pays profit only; the stake is removed from the credit whether the bet wins or loses.

How do free bets differ from a sign-up bonus?

A bonus is credited to the balance rather than as a free bet, and the bonus amount carries a wagering requirement — a multiple the bonus must be turned over before any winnings become withdrawable. The Commission’s rule since 19 January 2026 caps that multiple at 10x. A free bet typically carries no wagering multiple because the stake-not-returned rule already extracts value; what the operator gives back is smaller, but what the bettor must do to convert it is also smaller.

What is the maximum wagering requirement on a betting bonus in Great Britain?

The Commission’s social responsibility code, in force from 19 January 2026, caps the wagering requirement on bonuses at 10x. A £10 bonus at 50x would require £500 of qualifying bets before withdrawal; under the cap, no more than £100. Whether the cap reaches free bets that carry no wagering condition, and whether the Commission sets a money-value cap on bonuses, are not settled in the published rules.

What do minimum odds and the wagering requirement mean together?

The minimum odds is the floor on the price a wager must be placed at to qualify or count; the wagering requirement is the number of times the bonus must be turned over. The two combine: every wager that counts towards the wagering requirement must also be at or above the minimum odds. A £10 bonus at 10x with a 1.75 minimum odds requires ten £10 wagers at 1.75 or higher, where each losing wager reduces the remaining turnover and each winning wager only counts the stake (not the return) towards the requirement.

Why is the stake of a free bet not paid back with the winnings?

Because the operator is paying out the value of the wager without returning the credit. A £10 free bet at 2.00 that wins pays £20 — £20 profit — whereas a £10 cash wager at 2.00 would pay £30, returning the stake plus £20 profit. The stake-not-returned rule is what makes the offer a partial gift rather than a full one, and it is the rule that places the conversion ratio in the band the arithmetic section works through above.

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