What Is Evens Betting? – A Guide To Betting At Evens In Sports

Evens represents the actual odds of a bet placed. If a bettor takes odds of evens with a sportsbook, then the potential winnings are equal to the stake, meaning a successful $10 bet would return $20 to the bettor.

Learning more about odds, such as evens, and how they work is a great way of improving your understanding of betting. So, get ready as we share some tips and strategies to help discover ‘what is evens betting?’

What is Evens in Sports Betting?

The meaning of evens betting is simple, but the strategy behind it goes a bit deeper. Interestingly, it is one of the most common and popular betting strategies, and refers to even odds. Sportsbooks use the following three formats for displaying evens:

• Decimal odds: 2.00
• Fractional odds: 1/1
• Text: EVS

Odds of evens are common across most sports categories, making this one of the most popular betting strategies.

How Does an Evens Bet Work?

Despite the rapidly growing interest and engagement in sports betting, it’s surprising how many bettors aren’t familiar with basic betting strategies and odds terms, such as evens. And, with the global sports betting market expected to be valued at $155.49 billion by 2024, there is a thirst for knowledge when it comes to learning about betting.

Interestingly, betting at evens is potentially lucrative, which explains its popularity. As explained, evens odds are set at 2.00, meaning that your potential winnings are double your stake – so as an example, staking $50 on a bet selection with 2.00 odds returns you $100 ($50 x 2.00) .

It is also worth noting that evens odds are more common among toss-up games. This means that the probabilities of winning or losing are usually very close, albeit not always.

How is an Evens Bet Calculated?

Understanding how to calculate the potential payout for an evens bet is essential. Fortunately, it is based on a simple formula:

Potential Payout = Evens Odds x Stake

Using an example is the best way of illustrating the meaning of evens betting. As such, consider the following bet based on a soccer match between Union Berlin and Darmstadt:

Bovada, one of the top 12 best offshore sportsbooks, gives Union Berlin odds of 2.00 to win the soccer match. Based on these odds, your potential payout for a bet on Union Berlin would be double the stake. For example, a $10 wager would yield a $20 payout.

Betting on Evens Odds

Understanding the meaning of evens is one thing, but making it work to your advantage is different. To this end, understanding the potential risks and rewards of betting at evens is essential.

Overall, betting at evens is potentially safer and more profitable than other betting strategies. This is because the potential payout is usually double the stake, considering that evens odds are 2.00. However, betting is risky, so you need a reliable betting strategy to maximize your likelihood of winning.

How to Spot an Evens Favorite

The favorite teams/players win more often than underdogs in betting. To this end, success in betting depends on your ability to spot a favorite team/player. The favorite team/player in a bet always has lower odds than the underdog. As in the earlier example, Union Berlin is the favorite team in the following bet:

Darmstadt has higher odds (3.80) than Union Berlin (2.00), meaning that the bookie thinks that the latter has a higher likelihood of winning. However, it is worth noting that the team with the evens odds isn’t always the favorite, as shown in the following example:

Overall, researching the teams/players in a match is the best way to determine the favorite and underdog. As such, research each team’s or player’s form, injuries, and head-to-head histories before making a selection.

Evens Does Not Mean a 50% Chance of Winning

Technically, odds and probabilities are interdependent and correlated. To this end, odds of 2.00 are equal to a probability of 50%. However, this doesn’t imply that all sports/teams with evens odds have a 50% probability of winning.

As we have seen in the examples provided, teams with evens odds can be either the favorite which would give them a higher than 50% chance of winning the match, or the underdog, giving them less than 50% of winning the match. Therefore, evens odds do not equate to a 50% chance of winning.

A team’s actual probability of winning or losing doesn’t depend on the odds set by the sportsbook. Instead, it depends on the team’s performance compared to the opposing team’s performance. This further emphasizes the importance of doing your own research and analysis on each team’s performance.

Best Sports for Evens Betting

Evens odds are common across numerous betting markets and sports categories. Overall, betting at evens applies to virtually all sports categories, including soccer, basketball, American football, hockey, and more. Interestingly, this also means that evens bets are plenty and easy to find, making it ideal for an active basic evens betting strategy that works in the same way across all sports categories.

Even Money Bets on Parlays

Even bets can be lucrative, considering that the returns are double the stake amount. Moreover, you can increase your payouts by boosting the evens money odds using parlay bets. Parlay bets double the odds with every single bet selection. The formula is simple, as shown below:

Parlay odds = Bet A odds x Bet B odds x Bet C odds…

Consider a same game parlay bet comprising three single evens bets. The evens odds are set at 2.00, so the total accumulator’s odds will be:

2.00 x 2.00 x 2.00 = 8.00

Staking $10 on the accumulator bet would yield $800, a significantly high profit from a relatively small stake.

Tips for Evens Betting

Using evens in betting can be a lucrative strategy. However, betting involves some risk, and making accurate picks and predictions is the best way to win. To this end, you need an effective betting strategy. Here are five betting tips and techniques to incorporate into your strategy:

• Stick to Players/Teams with Something to Play For – Stick to the teams/players with an extra jolt of motivation to beat the other. A team that needs more points to advance to the next round would pull all the stops to win against one that is already assured of advancing.

• Look for Evens Bets in Opening Rounds of Tournaments for Parlays – Opening rounds of tournaments usually feature many evenly matched teams/players looking to advance to the next rounds.

• Watch the Market for Odds-On Shots that Drift and Become Value – An odds-on bet can turn into an evens bet over time, making it more profitable and appealing. As such, bide your time and look out for odds-on shots that change into evens bets. You can track these changes easily using the best live sports betting sites.

• Research & Analyze your Bet Selections – Knowing everything about a team/player can help you gauge their performance, which you can then compare with the opponent’s performance, such as an injury.

• Open More Than One Betting Account – Give yourself every chance of finding an evens bet by checking out new sportsbooks, as one sportsbook may be fractionally shorter than another, which openly offering evens.

• Record Bets – Learning from your mistakes is one of the best ways to become a better bettor – review your evens bet history and try to identify common mistakes that cost you.

Pros & Cons of Evens Betting

Betting on even shots have many advantages, especially when compared with other betting strategies. However, it also has a few shortcomings, like every other betting strategy. Here is an overview of the pros and cons of c:

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