The UEFA Euro 2024 has recorded the highest betting margins among important football tournaments this year. SOFTSWISS, an iGaming solutions provider unveiled that it surpasses the UEFA Champions League 2024 by nine percentage points.
The tournament has a betting margin of 17.3%. This is according to insights shared by the team of SOFTSWISS Sportsbook, a sports betting software. Key categories like match winners and total goals scored have shown notable activity. The latter carries a margin of 15.5%.
Head of SOFTSWISS Sportsbook, Alexander Kamenetskiy said that this suggests that bettors are primarily interested in straightforward, outcome-based wagers and performance-based metrics. These metrics are likely attractive to bettors because they are simple and easy to understand. However, despite their straightforward nature, the high margins indicate that predicting the outcomes can be challenging.
So far, the top five margin matches have been Netherlands vs France, Belgium vs Slovakia, Austria vs France, Denmark vs England, and Netherlands vs Austria.
Three of these matches also ranked among the top five by the number of bets. These are Austria vs France, Netherlands vs France, Germany vs Hungary, Spain vs Italy, and Belgium vs Slovakia.
Likely due to the popularity of the teams, star players, or historical rivalries, this suggests these fixtures had high public interest.
Most bets, around 77%, are placed through mobile devices. This indicates a strong preference for mobile betting among users, as well as confirming the trend toward smartphones and tablets.
Combo bets account for 40% of all bets but have a margin four times higher than single bets. In spite the average single bet being twice the amount of a combo bet, the higher margin on combo bets makes them critical for profitability.
Kamenetskiy said that the difference between tournaments of this level and others is the high number of new players, who bet only on the Euro and then stop until the World Cup. That is why operators carefully design their intro bonus programs to show new players all the available features. Since combo bets have higher margins, encouraging them through special offers or loyalty rewards could be very profitable.
