Last year saw over 40 million people in the U.S. bet on sports. It’s projected that even more will do the same in 2026, so the demand for free sports bets is at an all-time high. And the good news is that it’s much easier than you think to bet on sports without having to use your own cash. 

So, if you’re one of the many bettors out there who prefers no-deposit sports betting over anything else, this is the spot to be in. 

How to Bet on Sports for Free: Available Methods 

Use ‘Social Sportsbooks’

■ Bet on your favorite sports markets for free using Gold Coins 

■ Compete for prizes with Sweeps Coins 

■ Thrillzz, Fliff, and other sites let you bet on all the major leagues 

Social sportsbooks, ranked and reviewed on the OddsPlays site, are widely available all across the U.S., but they function a little differently than regular sportsbooks. Instead of betting actual money on the NBA, NFL, and other popular sports leagues, you use Gold Coins (GC) and Sweeps Coins (SC). Think of them as virtual credits. 

If you use GC, you get to bet on any sporting event completely for free. Then there is SC, which can be redeemed for prizes. For instance, if you placed a late bet on the Seahawks to win Super Bowl LX earlier this year using 100 Sweeps Coins, you’d have received around 150 SC in return depending on the odds you locked in, and those 150 SC would then have been redeemable for prizes. 

On average, 1 SC converts to $1 in any social sportsbook. If you’ve got 500 Sweeps Coins, you’re entitled to $500 worth of prizes if those coins have been played through. The prizes typically include gift cards or cash transfers. 

What smart sports bettors do with social sportsbooks is never deposit their own money. Instead, they just wait and take advantage of free SC offers before then using these coins to bet on different games. When you place winning bets, it then opens up the opportunity to redeem prizes, all without ever depositing a thing. 

Take Advantage of Free Bet Offers 

■ Sportsbooks like FanDuel and DraftKings regularly hand out free bets 

■ Use these bets to bag rewards 

■ Free bets and cash bonuses are usually available all year round

If you prefer traditional sportsbooks, it’s sometimes possible to get free bets and cash bonuses from them. This way, you don’t have to worry about staking your own money. All of the leading U.S. sportsbooks, including BetMGM and DraftKings, are known for offering these types of deals. The only slight downside to this is that some of the offers do require a deposit, such as DraftKings’ recent ‘Deposit $5 and get $100 in Bonus Bets’ promotion. And if you want to avoid deposits entirely, you can do things like use the FanDuel Free2Play offers, which are different free-to-enter prediction games, including Weekly NFL Pick’Em and Hi-Lo, where you can get no-deposit cash prizes which can then be used for placing bets. 

Prediction Markets

■ Prediction markets let you place ‘trades’ on sporting events

■ Free trades and deposit bonuses are fairly frequent 

■ There are no odds and you simply bet YES/NO on potential outcomes 

Over the past couple of years, prediction market sizes have absolutely exploded in the US. Already, 15% of Americans say they have placed a bet on a sporting event using a prediction market platform, such as Polymarket or Kalshi. These platforms let you place ‘trades’, which are technically bets, on pretty much any real-world event imaginable, from who the next President will be to the weather in Las Vegas. You can also bet on sports, too, with many of these prediction market sites running occasional promotions where users can get free trades. Naturally, you’ll want to use them on available sports markets, where you can bet on ‘YES/NO’ for specific teams to win or lose. 

Play Daily Fantasy Sports 

■ DFS isn’t like typical betting but you can still win prizes

■ You’re predicting how individual players will perform in real games

■ It’s also fun to play with friends 

You can also use Daily Fantasy Sports (DFS). Across FanDuel, DraftKings, and other major sportsbooks, simply enter contests by creating your own player lineups and earn prizes based on real-game performances. Essentially, you’re betting on how well you think the players you pick, whether it’s NBA or NFL, will perform in their respective games each week of the season. It’s not like traditional betting, but it’s still a fun free-to-play alternative, made even more fun when you join DFS leagues with friends.

Are Free Bets Worth It? 

Any free bet you can get your hands on is absolutely worth it. 

U.S. sports betting is huge at the moment, with 63% of bettors admitting to having bet at least $100 in a single day, but a fast-growing portion of sports fans much prefer to stake for free. 

In other words, they want to bet on all their favorite sports leagues and teams without the risk of putting their own money on the line, and it’s certainly possible to do so. 

Social sportsbooks allow you to place free bets all year long using Gold Coins, although this is purely for entertainment. 

At the same time, you can switch to using any free Sweeps Coins and potentially redeem prizes off the back of those. 

Then there are other options as well, such as using free cash bets supplied by regular sportsbooks or using modern prediction market sites where ‘trades’ replace traditional bets. 

Follow the advice given here and you’ll be able to save money while still placing bets on the sports you like.