Betting Apps With Sign-Up Bonuses in Great Britain

Updated October 2026

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A sign-up offer is the cheapest way a bookmaker introduces itself. The catch sits in the terms: a free bet carries expiry and minimum odds, a deposit bonus carries turnover, and the Commission’s rules since January 2026 capped that turnover at ten times the bonus amount. This page works through what each of those promises looks like once the marketing language is stripped off: the qualifying stake, the qualifying odds, the expiry, and whether the stake comes back if the free bet wins. Ten brands sit beneath that frame, all licensed by the Gambling Commission for remote betting in Great Britain. The page compares the kinds of headline each book uses to win attention, then walks through the regulation every one of them answers to, and the responsible-gambling tools a licensed book must offer. The final section gathers five questions punters most commonly ask before they commit money to any of these apps.

Data current as of 27 October 2026; licensing and offer terms verified against the Gambling Commission’s public register and the bookmakers’ own terms.

What a Sign-Up Offer Actually Promises

A sign-up offer is a free bet, a stake-matched free bet, a deposit bonus, or a combination of the two, offered once a new customer registers and meets a small qualifying condition. The shape of the offer tells the reader what the bookmaker wants from the customer: a sportsbook chasing a high-engagement punter gives free bets; a sportsbook chasing a deposit-heavy punter gives matched bonuses; an exchange chasing a trader gives commission-free windows. Two of the ten brands featured here, Coral and Unibet, both name their headline “Get £40 in free bets when you bet £20”, and they land in the first camp.

Free Bets, Stake-Matched Free Bets, and Bonus Cash

A free bet is a token: stake it, collect the profit if it wins, lose the stake if it does. A stake-matched free bet is the same shape, with the stake the customer actually pays carrying the same terms as the bonus. A deposit bonus credits cash to the account that can be withdrawn only after a turnover clause is met; the bonus stays separate from the deposit and is released by wagering.

The Commission (see the regulation section below) capped wagering requirements on bonuses at ten times the bonus amount from 19 January 2026. Before the cap, a £10 bonus could carry a 50x wagering requirement, asking for £500 of qualifying bets; under the cap, that same £10 bonus needs £100 of qualifying bets. Free bets with no wagering condition sit outside the cap, by virtue of carrying no turnover clause: whether the cap also applies to free bets whose terms impose a wagering condition has not been established by Commission guidance.

Minimum Odds and Qualifying Bets

Minimum odds on the qualifying bet, typically 1/1 (2.00) or longer, protect the sportsbook from a customer washing the offer with a close-to-even-money bet that essentially splits the risk. Where an offer requires acca or bet-builder combinations, the minimum applies per leg. Betboro’s £25 free bet, for instance, needs three selections at 3/5 (1.60) or higher; Unibet’s £40 free bet needs a single at 2.00. The shape of the qualifying condition is the page-level signal that tells the reader what kind of punter the offer is built for.

Expiry and Settlement Windows

Every free bet expires. Coral’s £40 in free bets runs from issue to expiry in seven days; Unibet’s £40 in free bets runs the same window; Sky Bet’s £30 in free bets, issued as three £10 tokens, carries the same window implied across the welcome offer. The short expiry matters more than the headline number: a customer who opens the account, places the qualifying bet, and does not return within a week forfeits the bonus. Spreadex is the outlier at twenty-eight days for the qualifying fixed-odds bet.

How the Top Ten Rank

The ranking below orders ten licensed bookmakers by the structure of their welcome offer, not by a pick of which is “best” — every one of them holds a remote general betting standard licence from the Gambling Commission, and every one carries its own terms. The headline currency each uses matters: free bets, profit boosts, commission-free periods, and deposit bonuses mean different things to a customer weighing an offer.

Coral: £40 in Free Bets for £20

Coral’s sports welcome offer pays £40 in free bets after a qualifying £20 bet at minimum odds of 2.0 (1/1), the full bundle issued within seven days and expiring another seven days after that, and reserved for new Great Britain customers who opt in. Coral stacks recurring value on top: a free daily Reward Shaker, an Odds Booster on hundreds of markets, and free-to-play games including Football Super Series with a £10,000 jackpot. Qualification needs a debit card or instant bank transfer; the site lists Apple Pay, Visa, Visa Electron, Mastercard, Revolut Pay, Google Pay, TrueLayer, Earthport and Trustly among its payment options. The headline number is generous, and the seven-day expiry is the tighter end of the market. Verdict: Coral suits a customer who already bets on sport at the weekend and intends to place the qualifying bet the same day the account opens.

Unibet: £40 in Free Bets for £20

Unibet’s headline is identical in cash terms to Coral and identical in qualifying terms: £20 stake at minimum odds of 2.0 (1/1), with the free bets expiring within seven days of issue. The brand’s edge sits elsewhere. Unibet has operated since 1999, and its UK site is run by Platinum Gaming Limited, Gibraltar, under Gambling Commission account 45322. The product carries Bet Builder, daily Uniboosts, live streaming through Unibet TV, in-play betting, Best Odds Guaranteed on horse racing, and Cash Out on thousands of markets. Verdict: Unibet fits a customer who will use the welcome offer as a doorway to a deeper product, not as a one-off.

Sky Bet: £30 in Free Bets for 5p

Sky Bet’s welcome offer for new customers is £30 in free bets, credited as three £10 free bet tokens after a deposit of at least £5 and a first single or each-way bet of at least 5p at odds of 1/1 or greater. The 5p minimum is the lowest in the featured set: a customer can complete the qualification for a fifth of a pound. The £30 bundle is the smallest headline; the three-token split is the structural quirk, since it forces three separate stakes at potentially different expirations. Verdict: Sky Bet rewards a low-stake customer well; the headline dollar-for-pound value is lower than Coral or Unibet, and the qualifying bet is easier.

Betway: £40 in Free Bet Tokens for £10

Betway’s welcome offer for new UK and Ireland customers is £40 in free bet tokens (4 × £10) credited on settlement of a first bet of at least £10 at minimum odds of 2.0, with a seven-day expiry and debit card deposits only. The four-token structure differs from Coral’s two-token or Unibet’s two-token: a 4 × £10 bundle lets the customer spread the bonus across four bets, useful for staking across separate weekends inside a seven-day window. Debit card deposits only is the qualifying constraint that excludes Apple Pay and Pay by Bank. Verdict: Betway suits a customer who has a debit card ready and wants a smaller stake on each token.

BoyleSports: £20 in Free Bets for £10

BoyleSports’ sports welcome offer for UK players is £20 in free bets when a £10 bet is placed (€30 in free bets for a €10 bet for Irish players). The qualifying stake is modest, and the bonus-to-stake ratio is 2:1 — lower than Coral or Unibet’s 2:1, lower than Sky Bet’s 6:1, higher than Betway’s 4:1. BoyleSports layers an Acca Insurance product that requires opt-in, a £5 minimum stake, minimum odds of 1/2, and pays a maximum refund of £20 as a free bet expiring in seven days, with bets placed and settled on the same day. The Acca Loyalty product stacks alongside, requiring opt-in, a £5 minimum stake, combined odds of 3/1, and five or more settled legs, with a free bet expiring after seven days. Verdict: BoyleSports rewards an acca punter whose typical weekly stake covers the qualification.

BetGoodwin: £15 in Free Bets for £10

BetGoodwin’s sports welcome offer is “Bet £10 & Get £15 in Free Bets”, made up of a £5 sports bet, a £5 acca, and a £5 Sub-Cover bet. The split into three tokens by bet type is unusual; Sub-Cover is a BetGoodwin product specific to football. The headline is the lowest among the full-time welcome offers above £10, and the qualification is the standard £10. Verdict: BetGoodwin is a tight welcome whose real value surfaces for customers who already use Sub-Cover markets.

Bet Ahoy: £10 in Free Bets for £10

Bet Ahoy’s welcome offer is “Bet £10 & Get £10 in Free Bets”, split as a £5 sports bet and a £5 acca. The bonus-to-stake ratio is 1:1, the lowest of the featured full welcome offers. The split forces the customer to engage with both sportsbook and acca products to extract full value. Verdict: small headline, useful for a customer new to both product types who wants the full token over the full ratio.

Betboro: £25 Free Bet Match for £10

Betboro’s sports welcome offer is a 100% matched free bet of up to £25 on the first qualifying wager, requiring a debit card deposit of at least £10 and a first bet of £5 to £25 with at least three selections each at 3/5 (1.60) or higher. The structure is a stake-matched free bet, capped at £25, requiring an acca-style qualifying bet. Verdict: suited to a customer whose first bet already meets the three-selection acca shape, otherwise the qualification does not match.

Matchbook: 110 Days Commission-Free

Matchbook’s new-customer offer is 110 days of commission-free betting from registration for customers who register with the code shown in the listing and make a deposit; standard commission applies afterwards. Matchbook is a betting exchange, licensed under a remote betting intermediary licence rather than a remote general betting standard licence, which makes it a different product: back and lay pricing, customer-to-customer matching, commission in lieu of margin. The welcome offer is paid in time, not in free bets. Verdict: a trading customer who plans to back and lay inside the four-month window extracts the most.

Spreadex: £60 in Free Bets for £10

Spreadex’s new customer offer is £60 in free bets for a £10 fixed-odds bet, with the free bets usable across fixed odds and spread betting; the qualifying bet must be placed within twenty-eight days of opening the account. The qualifying odds need only be 1/2. Spreadex is regulated by the FCA for spread betting and by the Gambling Commission for fixed-odds betting, and it states that spread betting losses can exceed the deposit. Acca Boosts give a cash boost from 5% up to 100% on football accumulators of three or more selections, depending on the number of legs. Verdict: Spreadex suits a customer who already understands spread betting or is willing to learn it before using the bonus.

How a Welcome Offer Plays Out on the Page

The welcome offers above share two structural pieces that determine what a customer gets: a qualifying condition and a free-bet bundle. The qualifying bet is the spend a customer makes to unlock the bonus; the free-bet bundle is what they get back. The free-bet value versus the qualifying spend, multiplied by what the bonus typically wins at minimum odds, is what tells the reader whether the headline is worth the headline. Coral and Unibet’s £20-qualifying-stake headlines sit in the upper band; Spreadex’s £60-bonus headline is the headline most often mistaken for the highest, which is the marketing term “free” doing its job.

The Bonus Stake Usually Does Not Come Back

When a free bet wins, the customer collects the profit at the stated odds, not the stake. A £10 free bet at 3/1 pays £40 in profit, not £50 in return. The profit lands as cash, withdrawable subject to any further conditions; the stake is gone. Bookmakers price this explicitly: free-bet tokens are not bets with refundable stake. A deposit bonus, where the customer pays a real stake and the book matches part of it, is a different structure: a £25 stake-matched free bet at Coral terms can carry refundable terms in some products and non-refundable terms in others. The page’s section on bonus economics makes this concrete.

Minimum Odds and the Wagering Requirement

Every welcome offer above carries either a minimum odds on the qualifying bet, a minimum odds on the free bet, or both. Where the offer carries a wagering requirement (a turnover clause on bonus cash), the Commission’s cap of 10x the bonus amount, in force since 19 January 2026, means a £10 bonus cannot ask for more than £100 of qualifying bets before withdrawal. Coral’s offer carries no wagering requirement on the bonus cash because the bonus is paid as free bets, not as withdrawable bonus money; Unibet’s structure is identical; Betway’s structure is identical. A deposit bonus, by contrast, carries the turnover clause and is subject to the 10x cap.

Free-Bet Expiry Defines When the Offer Pays Out

Seven days is the modal expiry across Coral, Unibet, Sky Bet, Betway, and BoyleSports. Spreadex is the only featured book with a longer-than-30-day qualification window for the qualifying bet at twenty-eight days, though the free-bet bundle carries its own expiry. Betboro’s £25 free bet carries its own implied expiry in the operator’s terms. A customer who opens an account, places the qualifying bet, and does not return within seven days forfeits the bonus.

Mixed-Product Promotions Were Banned in 2026

The Commission banned mixed-product promotions from 19 January 2026. A welcome offer that offered free sports bets alongside free casino spins, free bingo tickets, or free lottery entries is no longer permitted for customers in Great Britain. The featured ten brands offer either pure-sports welcome offers (the modal shape) or non-sports offers (Matchbook’s exchange-only commission-free window).

The Landscape: What the Ten Brands Look Like

The featured set breaks into three loose shapes. Sportsbooks with free-bet welcome offers dominate: Coral, Unibet, Sky Bet, Betway, BoyleSports, BetGoodwin, Bet Ahoy, and Betboro all fit here. Spread and fixed-odds combined books make up a second shape: Spreadex, with its split regulatory perimeter. Betting exchanges make up the third: Matchbook, where the welcome offer is a commission-free window rather than a free bet.

The table below summarises the headline shape, the licence holder as named in the Commission’s public register, and the operator’s own terms on the welcome offer’s headline product.

What the Spread Looks Like

Coral, Unibet, and Betway head the bonus-to-stake ratio table, each paying out £40 on a £20 or £10 qualifying bet. Spreadex pays the largest single bundle, £60, against a £10 fixed-odds bet — but that fixed-odds qualification is a spread-betting brand’s gateway into its fixed-odds product, and the bonus carries restrictions on withdrawal. The seven-day expiry is consistent enough across the featured set that a customer weighing offers can treat seven days as the planning window.

What the Data Stops Telling the Reader

The bonus-to-stake ratio is the headline metric; the free-bet bundle’s expiry is the operational metric. Where the operator’s own terms do not specify the expiry, the rule is that the offer is short: weekly structures are the modal pattern across this set of bookmakers. Where the operator’s own terms do not specify a minimum-odds requirement on the free bet itself, the rule is that the free bet is restricted to minimum-odds markets, typically 1/2 (1.50). A customer reading the table above should walk into each app expecting a short window and a minimum-odds restriction, and the specific values live in each brand’s own terms.

The Regulation Behind Every Bookmaker on This Page

Every bookmaker named on this page operates in Great Britain under a remote licence issued by the Gambling Commission. The Gambling Commission is a non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, and it is the regulator established by the Gambling Act 2005 to license commercial gambling in Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales). Northern Ireland is outside the 2005 Act and has its own older law; a Great Britain licence does not extend to Northern Irish regulation.

The Act and the 2014 Amendment

The Gambling Act 2005 is the primary statute. The Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Act 2014 amended it so that an operator whose remote facilities are used in Great Britain needs a Commission licence wherever it is based, under sections 33 and 36 of the 2005 Act as amended. A Curaçao, Maltese, or Gibraltar licence is not a substitute. The Commission issues several licence types; the relevant type for sports betting apps is remote general betting standard (real events), which is the type held by ten of the featured brands. Betting exchanges operate under a remote betting intermediary licence, which is the type held by Matchbook. Spread betting on financial markets is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, which is the body Spreadex answers to for its spread-betting product.

The Public Register and What Proves the Licence

The Commission’s public register can be searched by business name, trading name, domain, or account number. The register is the test of whether a brand holds a licence. Coral’s licence number appears under Ladbrokes Coral Limited; Unibet’s under Platinum Gaming Limited. Operators may use either a.co.uk or a.com domain — the domain does not prove the licence, only the register does. The table above lists each featured brand’s Commission account number, drawn from the register, which is what the customer should check against the register before depositing.

Identity, Age, and Credit Cards

Minimum age is eighteen. Identity verification — name, address, and date of birth — is required before a first deposit, and since 7 May 2019 the verification must be in place before any deposit or any stake, including a free bet or a bonus. Credit cards are banned for gambling in Great Britain since 14 April 2020 under LCCP condition 6.1.2, including credit-card-funded payments through an e-wallet; debit cards and bank-based payments are not covered by that ban. Two of the featured brands’ qualifying conditions specify debit card or instant bank transfer (Unibet and Coral), and the reason is the credit-card ban.

The 10x Wagering Cap and the Mixed-Product Ban

Promotion rules in force since 19 January 2026 set a maximum wagering requirement on a bonus of ten times the bonus amount. A £10 bonus at 50x wagering required £500 of qualifying bets before the cap; the cap reduces that to £100. Mixed-product promotions are banned: a welcome offer that requires gambling on two or more product types — for example, a sports bet to unlock free casino spins, a sports bet to unlock free bingo tickets — is no longer permitted at a Commission-licensed operator. Whether the 10x cap applies to free bets whose terms impose a wagering condition is not established by Commission guidance as of the date of this page. The featured brands’ welcome offers are pure-sports, so the mixed-product ban does not affect them directly; the customer should check that any subsequent promotion they accept does not mix products.

Financial Vulnerability and Risk Assessments

A financial vulnerability check (LCCP condition 3.4.4, in force since 30 August 2024) applies to licensed remote betting when a customer’s deposits minus withdrawals exceed £150 in a rolling thirty days, with the threshold live since 28 February 2025. The check is a public-record check — bankruptcy, county court judgments — and is not a credit reference check. Financial risk assessments (the affordability checks of the press coverage) were announced in a staged plan from 7 July 2026, with no start date. The Commission has not imposed a state-level deposit ceiling at the betting-product level: limits remain the customer’s choice. The future of deposit ceilings under RTS 12 is stage-managed: phase one since 31 October 2025, phase two postponed to 30 September 2026, whether phase two is live is not established.

Offshore

A Great Britain licence is compulsory at the point of consumption. 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 fifty-one weeks’ imprisonment, a fine up to level 5, or both — six months in Scotland. The offence targets the operator, not the customer. A customer who bets at an unlicensed site does not commit the offence; the cost is loss of protection — 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, not bound by the £150 vulnerability check. The ten brands featured here are licensed; no unlicensed brand is included.

Safer Gambling Tools and Where to Get Help

Every bookmaker on this page participates in GAMSTOP, the national multi-operator online self-exclusion scheme. GAMSTOP is a mandatory licence condition for online operators since 31 March 2020; periods are six months, one year, five years, or five years with auto-renewal, and after the minimum period the exclusion stays in place for a further seven years unless the customer asks GAMSTOP to remove it. Betting shops use a separate service, and online betting apps fall under GAMSTOP.

Deposit Limits

Customers may set a deposit limit on a fixed time frame under RTS 12, and operators must offer that limit option to customers during onboarding and on the account page. The first changes under RTS 12 applied since 31 October 2025; a second phase was postponed to 30 September 2026, with whether that phase is live not established. DAZN Bet’s platform explicitly lists deposit limits, loss limits, and wagering limits among its safer gambling tools. The standard pattern across the featured set is a deposit limit, a loss limit, and a reality-check prompt at intervals, all configurable by the customer.

Where to Get Help Outside the Bookmaker

GamCare runs the National Gambling Helpline. GambleAware funds treatment and education. The NHS runs gambling clinics. Gamblers Anonymous runs peer-support meetings. A customer who feels their betting has moved outside what they want it to be should reach out, and self-exclusion through GAMSTOP is the right move at the point of needing a structural break.

Spread Betting and the FCA-Regulated Customer

Spread betting on financial markets is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, not the Gambling Commission. Spread betting losses can exceed deposits, which is a different risk profile from fixed-odds betting. Spreadex carries both products: fixed-odds betting under the Commission, spread betting under the FCA. The FCA’s regulated customer protections differ from the Commission’s safer-gambling regime.

What a Bonus Actually Costs to Clear

The Commission’s 10x cap on wagering requirements came into force on 19 January 2026. The cap applies to bonuses whose terms impose a wagering requirement, meaning the customer must wager the bonus base a number of times before the bonus cash converts to withdrawable cash.

Worked Example: A £10 Bonus at 10x Wagering

A £10 bonus at the maximum permissible wagering factor of 10x requires £100 of qualifying bets before the bonus cash converts. A £10 bonus at 50x — the rule before the cap — would have required £500 of qualifying bets. The cap reduces that to one-fifth.

The Qualifying Stake and the Number of Bets

The number of bets required depends on the stake per bet. At a £5 stake per qualifying bet, clearing a £100 turnover requires twenty bets; at a £10 stake per qualifying bet, it requires ten. Many bonuses specify a minimum stake per qualifying bet; where they do not, the customer’s own stake determines the round count.

The Cost of Clearing the Turnover

Each qualifying bet costs the customer the bookmaker’s margin on the market they bet on. A market with a 5% margin — typical of major football 1X2 — costs the customer £5 on every £100 wagered, on average, before the wagering completes. A market with a 10% margin costs the customer £10 on every £100 wagered, on average. The cost sits below the headline; the bonus cash, once cleared, returns to the customer’s withdrawable balance.

Why a Free Bet Without Wagering Is Different

A free bet whose terms impose no wagering requirement is not part of the cap, because the cap applies to a bonus that asks for wagering. The most common shape of a sign-up offer is a free bet with no wagering, paid as a token whose stake is not refunded with a win. Coral, Unibet, Sky Bet, Betway, BoyleSports, BetGoodwin, Bet Ahoy, Betboro, and Spreadex all use this shape. Matchbook’s offer pays in commission-free time, which is also outside the cap.

Band the Offer Costs, Not a Single Figure

Clearing a £10 bonus at the maximum permissible factor at a £10 stake across ten bets against a 5% margin market costs roughly £5 in expected margin, give or take. Cleared against a 10% margin market, it costs roughly £10. The band sits between those figures; the specific cost depends on the markets the customer actually bets on.

Mid-Article Practical Pointers

A customer who has decided which bookmaker’s offer they want to claim should treat the welcome offer as a four-step flow: register the account, complete identity verification, deposit and qualify, place the bonus. Each step carries a friction point that costs time.

Identity Verification Comes First

Identity verification — name, address, date of birth — must be in place before the first deposit. Two of the featured brands, Coral and Unibet, restrict the qualifying payment method to debit card or instant bank transfer, which speeds verification because the payment rail carries verified bank details. Other brands accept a wider range of payment methods, in which case the verification step is slower because it leans on document upload.

Qualifying Bet Then Qualifying Free Bet

The qualifying bet is the customer’s paid bet, which unlocks the bonus. The bonus arrives as free bets on settlement of the qualifying bet in most cases. A customer who waits on the qualifying bet to settle before staking the bonus loses the seven-day window. A customer who settles the qualifying bet the same day they place it leaves the full seven days for the free bets.

The Free-Bet Bundle Splits Need Planning

Coral’s £40 and Unibet’s £40 arrive as bundles of tokens. Betway’s £40 arrives as four £10 tokens. Sky Bet’s £30 arrives as three £10 tokens. The bundle structure means the customer chooses where to stake each token, and the choice matters because the free-bet bundle expires as a whole. A customer who uses one token today, one tomorrow, and one the day after uses the bundle over three days of the seven-day window.

What a Customer Should Check Before Claiming

Identity verification, qualifying bet settlement, qualifying payment method, minimum odds, free-bet bundle size, free-bet expiry, free-bet minimum odds, deposit methods accepted, withdrawal methods available, and the operator’s complaint route through the Commission-approved dispute resolution. Each of these sits in the operator’s terms and on the Commission register; each is a check worth doing before the qualifying bet is placed.

When the Offer Is the Right Move

A welcome offer pays the customer for moving their normal betting volume through that bookmaker’s app for the duration of the offer. If the customer’s normal volume does not match the qualifying conditions, the welcome offer costs more than it returns, because the qualifying bet is a bet the customer would not otherwise place. The Commission’s 10x cap and the mixed-product ban are designed to keep offers honest; the rest of the calculation is between the customer and the markets they actually bet on.

Method Behind the Comparison

The featured ten brands were drawn from the Commission’s public register, restricted to remote general betting standard and remote betting intermediary licences held by operators with a sports-betting app on a British app store or a GB-facing website. The headlines in the welcome offers table are the offers each operator advertises to a new customer in Great Britain, captured on the operator’s own homepage or app store listing on the date of the data snapshot. The bonus-to-stake ratio in the table is the headline only; the terms that govern the offer sit beneath the headline in each operator’s own terms.

Why a Commission Account Number Sits Beside Each Brand

The Commission’s register carries an account number for each operator; the table above lists each featured brand’s account number, which is what a customer uses to verify the licence against the register. The register is the test: a licence account number exists on the register, the operator holds a remote licence; the same number is missing, and the operator does not. The register can be searched publicly.

What Was Outside the Comparison

Comparison-shopping commissions, payout speeds, market depth, and in-play features are outside the welcome-offer frame. The featured brands’ broader product line — Coral’s Odds Booster, Unibet’s Bet Builder and Uniboosts, Betway’s acca products, BoyleSports’s Acca Insurance and Acca Loyalty, Spreadex’s Acca Boosts, Matchbook’s exchange structure — runs beyond the welcome offer. A customer who treats the welcome offer as the only consideration is missing the long-tail product the bookmaker offers.

How the Data Was Captured

Each licence entry was pulled from the Commission’s public register; each welcome-offer entry was pulled from the operator’s own homepage or app store listing on the date of the data snapshot at the top of this page. Where the operator’s own terms publish the headline, the headline is rendered as published; where the headline appears only on the app store listing, the listing is the source, and the listing’s last-updated date stamps the entry.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I sign up for a betting site?

Pick a bookmaker from a list of operators licensed by the Gambling Commission (the Commission’s public register lists every one of them by name, account number, and licence type). Download the app, register an account with your name, address, and date of birth, and complete the identity verification before depositing — that step is required by Commission rules since 7 May 2019 and applies even to free bets. Make a deposit using a debit card or bank-based payment (credit cards are banned for gambling in Great Britain). Place the qualifying bet named in the welcome offer, settle it, and the bonus lands as free bets or tokens.

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

The Commission’s promotion rules, in force since 19 January 2026, cap a bonus’s wagering requirement at ten times the bonus amount. A £10 bonus can ask for no more than £100 of qualifying bets before withdrawal; before the cap, a £10 bonus could ask for £500. Free bets that carry no wagering condition are outside the cap; whether the cap extends to free bets whose terms impose wagering has not been confirmed.

What do minimum odds and the wagering requirement mean in a sign-up offer?

Minimum odds on the qualifying bet are the lowest price at which the bet counts toward the offer — a Coral £20 qualifying bet needs minimum odds of 2.0 (1/1), Unibet’s £20 qualifying bet carries the same minimum. The wagering requirement is the volume of bets the customer must place before the bonus cash converts; under the Commission’s 10x cap, a £10 bonus cannot require more than £100 of qualifying bets. The two rules work together: a high wagering factor multiplied by the bonus amount sets the betting volume, and the minimum odds prevent the customer from minimising that volume with near-certain bets.

Why does the stake of a free bet not come back with the winnings?

A free bet is a token: the bookmaker pays the profit at the stated odds if the bet wins, and forfeits the stake if the bet loses. The stake is not returned because the free bet is paid by the bookmaker, not by the customer’s own balance — the bookmaker has not lost the stake in the first place, so it cannot refund it. A Sky Bet £10 free bet at 3/1 pays £30 profit on a win, not £40 in cash return. Deposit bonuses work differently: a deposit bonus credits cash to the withdrawable balance subject to a wagering requirement, and the customer’s own stake is not at risk during wagering in the same way.

Can a sports bet be tied to a casino bonus under the Commission’s promotion rules?

No. The Commission banned mixed-product promotions from 19 January 2026. A welcome offer that requires a sports bet to unlock free casino spins, free bingo tickets, or free lottery entries is no longer permitted at a Commission-licensed operator. Pure-sports welcome offers remain permitted, and every brand featured on this page runs a pure-sports welcome offer or a pure-exchange welcome offer.

How can I check that a bookmaker holds a Gambling Commission licence?

Use the Commission’s public register, searchable by business name, trading name, domain, or account number. Find the brand in the search, open its licence page, and confirm the licence type (remote general betting standard for sportsbooks, remote betting intermediary for exchanges), the licence holder’s name, and the licence status. The table earlier in this page lists each featured brand’s account number, which speeds up the lookup. A brand that does not appear on the register does not hold a GB licence, even if it accepts a British customer and processes a sterling deposit.

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