The 12 Australian Bookmakers I Actually Use: An Honest Tier List
Every bookmaker review in Australia is written by an affiliate. This one isn't. Twelve AU bookmakers ranked on the criteria that actually matter if you're betting for value.
James Whittaker
Senior Market Analyst
14 min read·Published 1 July 2025
Every “best online bookmakers Australia” article you've read was written to route you to an affiliate link. The rankings are bought. The reviews are written by copywriters who've never placed a bet. The methodology, to the extent one exists, weights the bookmakers' own promotional materials against themselves. It's a dishonest genre top to bottom.
This isn't one of those. I've had live accounts at all 12 bookmakers below for between 18 months and 4 years. The ratings come from observable behaviour: how competitive the prices are, how aggressively they limit winning customers, how usable the interface is, how good the promos are for a value-seeking bettor. No affiliate links. No sponsored tiers. Some of the ratings are unflattering.
How I'm rating
Five axes, scored roughly out of 10:
Price competitiveness - how often this book has best-available odds in the AU market on H2H, lines and props.
Limit tolerance - how long winning accounts survive before restriction.
Promo value - real EV of available offers, not headline dollar amounts.
Withdrawal friction - how annoying it is to get your money out.
S-Tier
Betfair Exchange
The only S-tier book in Australia for serious bettors, and the most reluctantly-earned one on this list. Betfair isn't a bookmaker in the usual sense - it's an exchange where you bet against other users. The interface is worse than every corporate on this list. The 6.5% commission stings on every winning bet. The premium charge system will find you if you become consistently profitable.
None of that matters, because Betfair is the only AU-accessible account that doesn't restrict winning customers conventionally, offers genuine in-play markets, allows lay betting, and typically posts best-available prices on liquid AU markets. For any serious arbitrage operation or +EV strategy, Betfair is structurally non-negotiable.
Price: 8/10. Limits: 10/10 (premium charge is a different pain but not conventional limiting). Promos: 2/10. Interface: 4/10. Withdrawals: 7/10. Use case: lay betting, in-play, reference pricing, exchange arbitrage. Full Betfair defence here.
A-Tier
Bet365 Australia
The sharpest corporate book in Australia by some distance. Prices are reliably tight, the sports coverage is deep, the interface is excellent, and the mobile app is the best in the market. Limit aggression is middling to high - the book moves quickly on sharp activity, but accounts tend to survive longer than at Sportsbet or BlueBet if you mix in normal-looking behaviour.
Price: 7/10 (sharp, so less dispersion to exploit). Limits: 5/10. Promos: 6/10. Interface: 9/10. Withdrawals: 8/10. Use case: main-market H2H betting, live score viewing, tennis and international markets.
Betfair Sportsbook (the corporate side)
Not to be confused with the exchange. Betfair's corporate sportsbook in AU has reasonably competitive prices, moderate limits, and inherits some of the exchange's data in how it prices liquid markets. Strong on horse racing, average on sports.
Price: 7/10. Limits: 6/10. Promos: 5/10. Interface: 7/10. Withdrawals: 7/10. Use case: complement to the Betfair Exchange account.
B-Tier
Sportsbet
The largest AU bookmaker and the one most people start with. Prices are middling - Sportsbet is reasonably sharp on main markets, fairly soft on some props. The promo volume is enormous but quality is mixed (see the Sportsbet promos breakdown). The interface is the best-designed in the AU market.
Limit aggression is the worst on this list. Sportsbet's monitoring is notably sharp - sharp accounts get flagged within 50-100 bets in my experience. The window for extracting value before restriction is narrower than at most other books.
Price: 6/10. Limits: 3/10. Promos: 8/10 (volume), 6/10 (quality). Interface: 9/10. Withdrawals: 8/10. Use case: promotional offers, first bets, occasional sharp plays accepting a short account lifespan.
Ladbrokes
Owned by the same group as Neds. Prices are competitive, promos are frequent and decent quality, interface is solid. Limit aggression is moderate - faster than Bet365, slower than Sportsbet. The welcome offer (“Bet Back” free bet credit) is one of the better structured sign-up bonuses in the AU market.
Price: 7/10. Limits: 5/10. Promos: 7/10. Interface: 7/10. Withdrawals: 7/10. Use case: general-purpose corporate account, solid on AFL and NRL markets.
Neds
Essentially a rebranded Ladbrokes with different UI. Same pricing engine, same limit behaviour, different promo rotation. The “Early Payout” feature on Neds (pays out if your NRL/AFL team goes eight points ahead) is genuinely good value when selected carefully. Worth having alongside Ladbrokes because the two run independent promo calendars despite sharing a parent.
Price: 7/10. Limits: 5/10. Promos: 7/10. Interface: 7/10. Withdrawals: 7/10. Use case: sibling account to Ladbrokes to diversify promo access.
PointsBet
The most interesting pricing book in the AU market. PointsBet's differentiator is their namesake product - betting on margin spreads where the payoff scales with the size of the result. Niche but genuinely useful for value bettors who understand variance.
Their prop coverage is broader than most AU corporates, prices on NBA and NFL are consistently competitive, and limit aggression has eased noticeably in the last 18 months following their U.S. exit. Accounts survive longer than they used to.
Price: 7/10. Limits: 6/10. Promos: 6/10. Interface: 7/10. Withdrawals: 7/10. Use case: NBA/NFL props, PointsBetting product, long-leash AU corporate account.
C-Tier
TAB
Australia's oldest bookmaker and the one with the strongest racing coverage. The sports pricing is consistently soft compared to the newer corporates. TAB's limit tolerance is unusually high - accounts tend to survive longer than they should, which makes up for the inferior pricing.
The interface is dated. The mobile app is functional but not polished. Withdrawals are reliable but slow. Best used for racing and as a long-lasting spare corporate.
Price: 5/10. Limits: 8/10. Promos: 4/10. Interface: 5/10. Withdrawals: 6/10. Use case: horse racing, long-lasting value on softer sports lines.
Unibet
Kindred Group-owned, reasonably sharp pricing, middling limits. Solid on EPL and European football where their parent company has pricing expertise from UK operations. Less competitive on AU-specific markets. Interface is solid, withdrawals are fast.
Price: 6/10. Limits: 5/10. Promos: 5/10. Interface: 7/10. Withdrawals: 8/10. Use case: European football, diversification for multi-account operators.
BlueBet
Soft pricing in their own markets, especially props. Limit aggression is brutal - BlueBet moved first to cut me in my own arbing journey, and the pattern seems common. You get maybe 40-80 sharp bets of activity before the hammer falls.
For those first 40-80 bets, the edge can be excellent, especially on NBL and NRL props where BlueBet's lines dispersion is among the widest. Extract quickly, move on, accept the account isn't long-term.
Price: 7/10 (for what it's worth). Limits: 2/10. Promos: 5/10. Interface: 6/10. Withdrawals: 6/10. Use case: short-duration prop hunting.
BetRight
Similar profile to BlueBet - softer pricing, faster limits. BetRight has been around longer and the limit cycle is slightly more forgiving (maybe 100 sharp bets rather than 50). Their niche-market coverage is better than their size suggests.
Price: 7/10. Limits: 3/10. Promos: 4/10. Interface: 5/10. Withdrawals: 6/10. Use case: prop value hunting before the account gets capped.
TABtouch
Western Australian-licensed bookmaker, legally permitted to offer products that eastern-states-licensed bookmakers cannot (some in-play racing products, some pool betting). Pricing is soft, limits are middling, promos are WA-heavy. Worth having primarily for the product access and as a geographic diversifier.
Price: 5/10. Limits: 5/10. Promos: 5/10. Interface: 5/10. Withdrawals: 6/10. Use case: WA racing, pool betting products.
Dabble
Newer AU entrant with a social-betting UI (you can see other punters' tips and tail them). Pricing is sometimes soft, sometimes not - the social-tip element seems to influence how the book sets lines. Limit aggression has ramped up over the last year; accounts that survived two years ago are now getting cut in six months.
Palmerbet, Picklebet, Crownbet (now BetEasy, acquired by Sportsbet), BoomBet, ConnectBet: not part of my current working portfolio. Have had accounts at subsets of these at various points. Nothing I've seen at any of them has made them compelling additions over the twelve listed above. Sizes are smaller, pricing is generally worse, and account survival isn't materially different.
How to actually use this list
If you're starting an AU advantage-betting operation, open accounts at all twelve of these. Yes, all twelve. Price dispersion across the AU market is the entire basis for arbitrage and +EV betting. The more surfaces you have, the more opportunities appear.
Fund modestly - $200-$500 per book is typical. Claim every deposit match. Then spread your turnover across all twelve so no single account carries more than 10-15% of your activity. This is the pattern most resistant to the limiting dynamics described in the AU corporate business model.
Rotate as accounts get capped. Every gubbing is expected and built into the plan. The goal is extracting value during the useful life of each account, not extending any one account indefinitely. Twelve accounts with 12-month average lifespans produces an operation that can run for years if you stay disciplined on anti-gubbing behaviours.
And ignore every other “best Australian bookmaker” article you see. They exist to route you to a single affiliated book, not to help you build a portfolio. A portfolio is the only useful thing.
About the author
James Whittaker
Senior Market Analyst
James covers the AU bookmaker market — pricing mechanics, line movement, promotional structures, and how the corporate books actually operate. Previously worked in financial markets before moving to sports analytics.
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