There are few more fun ways to bet than parlays. Waiting out the last couple of legs is characterized by tension broken only by joy or despair that is more or less unparalleled in the betting world, making for an incredibly engaging experience. But what exactly are these bets, and how do they work?
Parlays are multi-component bets that pull together multiple wagers into one, compounding the odds of each individual wager, or “leg,” to give the bettor an elevated potential payout. The catch is that every single one of those legs needs to be the right choice, or else the parlay fails.
Because of the multi-legged nature of parlays, the payout can be higher than just about anything else in sports, other than certain true long-shot futures or props, but they can also be very hard to hit. This article will serve as your introduction and guide to parlay betting, with a description on the mechanics of how they work, how to calculate the odds, different types of parlays, and of course how you can apply them to different sports.
What is a parlay bet in sports betting?
A parlay bet is a collection of individual bets, known as legs, that are combined into one wager. The odds of the parlay bet is based on the compounded odds of the individual bets themselves, and the parlay only wins if all of the individual wagers are successful; if a single bet loses, the whole parlay loses.
For this reason, parlays can be quite challenging to hit reliably, but the payout can be fantastic when they do. That being said, parlays can be as small as two legs, which are of course easier to hit but carry a lower upside, and grow as large as 20+ legs, depending on the rules of the particular sportsbook you’re using.
Traditionally, a parlay pulls together bets from different games, whether they’re spreads, moneylines, or totals. This allows you to grab some extra value on an NFL game day, for instance, or even across several days.
In today’s online betting landscape, same game parlay bets are becoming more common as well. These wagers pull all of their legs from one game, which can include traditional lines like spreads and totals, but it can also involve player, team, or game props in many instances.
Sometimes, you can even make a parlay bet using futures bets, although this isn’t allowed at every sportsbook or with every market, so be sure to check the rules and regulations and try different things to see what works out.
Parlay Betting and Sports Odds
Perhaps the most challenging part of parlays for newcomers is calculating the odds of a parlay. Of course, the sportsbook will do this for you when you make your selections, but it’s helpful to understand how it works so you can have an idea of how the inclusion of each leg will affect the overall odds.
Let’s take a look at a simple example of a three-team parlay. For the sake of simplicity, we’ll assume that all three teams have +100 odds, meaning exactly 50% probability to win. Since the events are unrelated, the odds should equal the compounded probability of the three outcomes. In this case, that would be 0.5*0.5*0.5, which equals .125, or 12.5%. This means there’s a 1 in 8 chance of success, or 7 to 1, which translates to +700 odds.
Naturally, the odds in real life won’t usually be simple and round percentages that are that easy to work with. If you need to calculate parlay odds and don’t want to plug all of the bets into your bet slip, consider using the Action Network Parlay Calculator, a great tool for figuring out where your parlay odds should stand.
When it comes to same game parlays, it’s a bit more complicated, since the events are related. For instance, high passing yardage or touchdown count for a quarterback will usually correlate to a higher team total or win, you won’t quite get fully compounding probability for pulling those two together. Conversely, if you parlay that quarterback’s passing yardage over with his team’s total under, you could get elevated odds from what you’d expect based on the individual probabilities of each wager.
Types of Parlay Bets
With a bet type as complicated as parlays, there are plenty of different categories. We’ve already alluded to some of these versions, but let’s go over some of the key parlay types you’ll run into as you start to bet parlays.
- Moneyline Parlays: Perhaps the simplest and most classic type of parlay; betting on multiple teams to win their games
Round Robin Parlays: A round robin bet is actually a collection of multiple parlays made from a collection of bets. For instace, if you make six individual picks and decide on a length of three picks per parlay, there are 20 parlays that can be placed; a round robin will automatically place all of them for you. - Teaser Parlays: Teasers are parlays made out of alternate lines, each of which is made safer and thus less profitable than the standard line, but pulled together as a parlay, they can provide a solid payout.
- Futures Parlays: This special type of parlay isn’t always available, but when it is, they can have some of the greatest payouts. Futures already often feature long odds, and pulled together in a parlay, the potential profits are hard to realize, but they can be staggering.
Parlay Betting Examples
Now that we’ve learned a bit about just what parlays are and how they work, let’s talk about some examples of parlay bets you could place on your favorite sports and leagues.
Football Parlays
Football games feature such a wide range of different statistics, making them the perfect opportunity to place a same game parlay. Let’s use an example of a successful SGP from the Michigan-Ohio State game this fall.
This bet featured five legs- Michigan moneyline (-162), Cornelius Johnson over 24.5 receiving yards (-194), Cade Stover over 24.5 receiving yards (-280), Blake Corum anytime touchdown (-220), and Marvin Harrison Jr. anytime touchdown (-115). None of these legs was particularly unlikely, but a $10 wager still yielded just a few cents short of $80.
In the NFL, more props are often available to be included in parlays, like first or second half lines, sack and interception markets, and so many more. The options are just a bit more limited in college sports, but big games like Michigan-Ohio State usually come with plenty of value on the table.
Check out our compilation of the best sportsbook bonuses.
Basketball Parlays
An evening in the NBA or a day of March Madness action usually features quite a few games, and in a sport that seems prone to the existence of such dominant teams, the situation can be perfect for a spread parlay of underdogs. Let’s use a March Madness example, with games from the 2024 Sweet Sixteen.
San Diego State is an 11-point underdog against UConn, Clemson is +7.5 against Arizona, and Alabama is getting 4.5 points against North Carolina. Given the standard -110 odds for both sides of a spread, a parlay of these three wagers would produce odds of +596, a really nice payout for some very realistic outcomes.
Baseball Parlays
No sport’s regular season has more games than the MLB, with most teams in action on any given day, creating a great environment for parlays just about any day all summer long. With weather and pitching leading to such variance in scoring output, totals parlays can be a great way to play, so let’s build one using lines from Opening Day 2024.
With cold weather and aces on the mound, let’s look at some unders. For Tigers vs. White sox, we’ll go under 8 runs, for Giants vs. Padres it’s 7.5, and for Guardians vs. Athletics, 7.5 again. Like a spread parlay, the odds will usually be at or near -110 for either side, so the parlay odds will be +596 once more.
Hockey Parlays
With lots of games going on most days during hockey season, the NHL is a great league on which to place some simple moneyline parlays. For instance, let’s take a look at a relatively modest favorites parlay, a three-team parlay featuring the New York Rangers at -180, the Carolina Hurricanes at -175, and the Calgary Flames at -170.
Each one of these individual wagers feels quite safe, and none would yield a spectacular payout, but when pulled together, your parlay odds are +288, a very nice sum to attain without backing a single underdog.
Other Sports with Parlay Bets
While the above sports are seen as the “big four” in the United States, you can place parlays on plenty of others. For soccer fans, a nice parlay can make a great Premier League or UCL matchday even more fun, while UFC fans can parlay several fighters across a card.
In some cases, you can even parlay across multiple sports. If and when the sports equinox comes in October, with baseball, football, hockey and basketball all active, you can place a special parlay that ties together all four major competitions.
Parlay Odds Boosts
Parlays are already known for offering some of the most enticing odds at any sportsbook, but some operators will give you the opportunity to boost the odds even further with existing user promotions.
One such promotion from a very well-known brand is the bet365 parlay boost, which can increase your payout by anywhere from 5% to 70% depending on how many legs are in your parlay. For example, a simple two-team parlay would trigger a boost of 5%, a three-leg parlay would garner a boost of 10%, and so on.
This boost is available daily, but bet365 is far from the only operator with which you’ll find something of this nature. They may not come your way every single day from every sportsbook, but parlay odds boost promotions are a very common method used to keep longtime users engaged. With every sportsbook you regularly use, be sure to check the promotions tab routinely to see if boosts and other offers come your way.
How to Place a Parlay Bet
Placing a parlay bet is a bit more complicated than other types of wagers, but you should be able to do it without too much trouble; most online sportsbooks have made their platforms very parlay compatible, so to speak.
Let’s talk about how you can place these multi-leg wagers. The process starts as it would if you were placing any other bet- searching for the wagers you want. Select each one individually, but don’t send the betslip in just yet.
Once you have brought all of the selections you want to parlay into your betslip, it’s time to place. You’ll notice a box next to each individual wager in which you can enter an amount- if you only intend to play a parlay, do not put anything in this box.
Instead, you’ll want to scroll to the bottom of your bet slip, and if the wagers you’ve selected are all eligible to be parlayed with one another, you’ll see the odds of that parlay, and a box in which you can enter the amount you’d like to risk on the parlay.
If you want to bet some or all of the legs individually as well, you can fill in the boxes next to the specific bets, but this will not affect your parlay at all, so you’ll have to fill out that parlay risk amount at the bottom if you want to place the bets as a parlay.
For same game parlays, most sportsbooks will require you to navigage to the game, click on the matchup, and either click a slider or a tab to enter same game parlay mode.
After that, it works the same way a regular parlay would, except you won’t usually have the chance to bet each leg individually; some same game parlay legs are exclusive to this mode, or have altered odds as compared to their standalone counterparts.
How Parlay Payouts Work
The elevated payouts are of course the main selling point of parlays; if a many-legged parlay hits, it can mean a tremendous amount of profit for the bettor.
Your parlay payout will not hit your account until every game involved is completed, even if all of your individual legs have hit. For instance, in a football game, you might parlay a first half spread, a scoring total, and a first touchdown scorer, all of which are locked in and confirmed to hit by halftime, but you still usually won’t see the funds until the game is over and the full-game wagers settle.
The Risk of Parlay Bets
The reason that parlays have such high potential payout amounts is because they’re so risky. Hitting bets is hard; hitting two at a time is even tougher, three in a row is tougher than that, and so on and so forth. Since parlays combine so many different things into one bet, the risk is higher than placing any combination of those bets individually.
This doesn’t mean that parlays aren’t worthwhile to play- they can provide you with lots of value, and of course plenty of fun- but it’s important to go in with appropriate expectations so that you can have fun and play safely.
Never expect to hit parlays at the same rate at which you hit single bets- it’s just not going to happen that way. They’re designed to hit more rarely, but provide a better payout each time, potentially making them a net positive if you have a strong enough strategy.
Strategies for Parlay Bets
We’ve already talked about how you can place them, but how do you actually win parlay bets? Let’s talk about a few strategies that could help you find more success in this endeavor.
Teaser bets have already come up in this article, but they’re a very common tactic in the world of parlays. It’s a great way to combine the safety of an alternate line with the elevated payout of a parlay, and these plays are usually only two legs, so they’re relatively low-risk compared to other parlays.
This next strategy is usually going to apply to same game parlays. There are some odds adjustments that sportsbooks can do to somewhat protect against this, but correlated legs can help you hit more parlays. For instance, you could bet on Jayson Tatum to score 30+ points and the Celtics to win; a great game from their star forward definitely implies elevated win probability.
Conversely, you usually don’t want to bet legs that have a negative correlation to one another; if you bet on Aaron Judge to hit three home runs in a game, you probably don’t want to parlay it with the under, or with the Yankees’ opponent’s moneyline.
Lastly, let’s talk about hedging as it applies to parlays. If you’re only a leg or two away from hitting a big parlay, you might want to bet against one or both of your final legs in order to guarantee a profit. Of course, this will decrease your upside to a degree, but it can be a great way to extract value from a parlay that comes close but ultimately does not hit.
Responsible Gambling Tools
As fun as parlays are, they can quite literally become addictive, so it’s always important to be mindful of responsible gambling practices when you’re betting, parlays or otherwise. This is a highly important topic, as a gambling addiction can harm bettors’ social, family, and professional lives, so it’s key to be educated on all of the available resources.
Responsible gambling means to never bet more than you can reasonably afford, and always walk away when it stops being fun; “digging yourself out of the hole” can feel like it’s just a few bets away, especially with big parlays, but this is not a safe or healthy way to play.
Most online sportsbooks offer some form of responsible gambling features to help you maintain a healthy habit, such as limits on session time, wagering and depositing, as well as account time outs.
If these resources are not sufficient, consider calling 1-800-GAMBLER for 24/7 support from the National Problem Gambling Helpline, visiting a Gamblers Anonymous meeting, or heading to GamTalk for some online support groups and other digital resources.
FAQs About Parlay Betting in Sports
While we hope that the above sections have left you more informed about parlays than you were when you started reading, you might still have a few questions about these complicated bets- we’ve compiled some of the most frequently asked questions, and answered them for your convenience below.
What is a parlay in sports betting?
A parlay is a special type of wager that pulls together multiple individual bets to provide the bettor with an elevated potential payout, but the parlay loses if any of the individual bets or “legs” loses.
What is an example of a parlay?
Let’s say you bet on the Jaguars, Chargers, and Dolphins all to win, each at +100 odds. Your parlay would have +700 odds, and you’d need each team to win in order for it to hit.
Are parlays good bets to make?
Statistically, parlays often produce negative value over time, but this can be due to bettors not thinking academically when they place parlays; well-researched, conservative parlays, such as teasers, can be a very good investment.
Is it smarter to place parlays or straight bets?
“Smarter” all depends on your goals and strategies. Some bettors find a tremendous amount of fun and value in betting parlays, but others are best served sticking to straight bets for the most part. Of course, a blend of both can be a good way to keep some balance in your betting habit.
How much do parlays pay out?
It depends on how many legs there are, and the odds of each individual leg, but the compounding nature of parlay odds means that these bets can pay out quite handsomely.
Is parlay betting legal?
Just about everywhere sports betting is legal, you can legally place parlays on the available sports betting platforms.
