Where football bets in New Zealand can actually be placed in 2026

Updated October 2026

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Since the Racing Industry Amendment Act 2025 took effect on 28 June 2025, New Zealand has run the most concentrated sports-betting market of any country most readers will ever bet in. Section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020 makes TAB NZ the only operator that may lawfully offer racing or sports betting to a person in New Zealand, regardless of where that operator is incorporated. TAB NZ’s two online brands — TAB and Betcha — sit on either side of the same wallet, run under a 25-year Entain partnership that hands TAB NZ at least $150m a year for the first five years. The legal picture is unusual, and so are the things that flow from it: no licence register exists for betting because there is nothing to register; an offshore bookmaker serving a New Zealand address is breaking New Zealand law even if it holds a Curaçao, Anjouan or Tobique licence; a player placing a bet offshore cannot be convicted of that offence. That is the frame, and everything on this page sits inside it.

Current as of 26 October 2026 and verified against the Department of Internal Affairs’ published guidance on the Racing Industry Act 2020 and section 74AAA.

What football is, when its matches run, and why those rules matter for betting

The Laws of the Game of association football are maintained by the International Football Association Board (IFAB), which has done so since 1886. Each team fields a maximum of eleven players, including a goalkeeper; the goal is 7.32 m wide and 2.44 m high. A standard adult match is two halves of 45 minutes each, with stoppage time added at the referee’s discretion. A tie that has to be broken goes to extra time — two further 15-minute periods — and some competitions then run a penalty shoot-out. Those are not trivia: they are the units the betting slip is denominated in. A 90-minute match-result market at TAB NZ settles on the score at full time, not on the result after extra time, unless the market name says otherwise. A “to lift the trophy” market on a knockout fixture will include extra time and penalties; a “match result” market will not. Knowing which rule a market settles on is the difference between a winning slip and a losing one that looked flat when you placed it.

New Zealand’s calendar of football is split by hemisphere. The A-League Men, the country’s top-flight men’s league, plays an autumn-to-spring season so its finals land in late May or June. The National League and the Football Ferns programme sit underneath it. European club football — the Premier League, La Liga, the Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1 — runs on its own schedule from late August to late May. The Premier League’s 2026–27 season opens on 21 August 2026 and runs through to 30 May 2027; Coventry City, Ipswich Town and Hull City come up as the three promoted clubs, and Arsenal are the defending champions. The FIFA international calendar fills the gaps. The 2026 FIFA World Cup was won by Spain, who beat Argentina 1–0 after extra time in the final on 19 July 2026. The cycle most punters actually bet in is not the New Zealand league season at all; it is the European club season, with a generous fixture list every weekend from August to May and a heavy midweek programme in the cup competitions. That is the calendar TAB NZ’s football markets are built around.

The European Championship and the Copa América sit between World Cups, in the even years; the African Cup of Nations runs in odd years from 2025 onwards. FIFA’s expanded 48-team World Cup, in place since 2026, widens the qualifier programme and lengthens the year-by-year list of sides that appear on a betting slip. None of those competitions are New Zealand’s by heritage; all of them are now available on TAB NZ’s football menu, because the operator’s own terms define football betting as any match played under IFAB rules, regardless of where it is held.

What New Zealand’s market looks like to a punter choosing where to bet

The legal structure: one operator, two faces

Section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020 states that no person other than TAB NZ may offer racing betting, sports betting or other racing or sports betting to a person in New Zealand, regardless of where that person is resident or incorporated. The Department of Internal Affairs told unlicensed providers to withdraw with immediate effect when the section came into force. There is no licence to apply for, because there is no regime to apply under; there is no register of bookmakers, because there is no class of bookmaker to register.

TAB NZ’s two online brands are TAB and Betcha. They share a wallet, a responsible-gambling framework and a betting-rules page; they differ in presentation. TAB carries the full racing product — horse, harness and greyhound — alongside sport, with Trackside live race streaming built into the app, racing form tools, Blackbook and Jockey Challenge, and a simplified deposit and withdrawal wallet. Betcha launched on 6 August 2024, runs under Entain New Zealand Limited as publisher, and is positioned as the sport-led brand, with racing available but the visual weight on rugby, NRL, NBA, NFL, tennis, cricket, football, motorsports and esports. The two are the same operator group, not rivals; the choice between them is presentation, not regulation, and switching brands does not change the tax treatment, the levy or the safer-gambling tools an account carries.

The Entain partnership matters because it explains the depth of the markets on offer. TAB and Betcha run on Entain’s sportsbook engine, which means they carry the multi-leg bet builder, the same-game multi, live markets on football and a range of outrights on the major European leagues and the World Cup. The depth is the same depth a UK or Australian Entain customer sees on a different label.

The offshore brands a New Zealand address meets anyway

Anyone in New Zealand who has searched for a bookmaker online has met the second tier: brands licensed in Curaçao, Anjouan, Tobique, the Comoros, or in no recognised jurisdiction at all. Thunderpick, Winz, Rooster, Roobet, RoyalistPlay, Glorion, BillyBets and BetNinja all appear on a comparison page for the simple reason that their marketing reaches New Zealand. None of them is licensed in New Zealand. Each one names a non-NZ licence; none of those licences gives the holder any right to take bets from people in New Zealand, and section 74AAA says the act of taking such a bet is itself the breach. The Department of Internal Affairs’ published warning is that overseas operators may be in jurisdictions with minimal consumer safeguards, may not return unspent credits and may not pay out large wins. None of the eight has a New Zealand complaints route or a New Zealand harm-minimisation framework, because none of them answers to a New Zealand regulator.

The legal position for the punter is narrower than the marketing suggests. Section 19(4) of the Gambling Act 2003 (inserted in 2025) says an individual may not be convicted for placing a bet with an offshore betting operator in breach of section 74AAA. There is no published penalty for a player. The liability sits on the operator. The honest framing is not “offshore betting is illegal” or “offshore betting is legal” — it is “offshore betting is unlawful for the operator to take from a New Zealand address, and the punter carries the operator-side risk that goes with an unregulated relationship: no New Zealand dispute resolution, no guaranteed payout, no harm-minimisation framework that the New Zealand regulator can enforce.” For a punter who wants to bet on football and stay inside a regime with consumer protection, TAB NZ is the only option the law offers.

A snapshot of the wider landscape

The table is one column of brand, one column of site and one column of what the operator’s own terms state on the licence and product. It is not a recommendation and not a ranking. TAB and Betcha share the lawful status; the other eight do not.

How the law treats the player, the operator and the bet

The Racing Industry Act 2020, as amended in 2025, draws a hard line at the operator. Section 74AAA says no person other than TAB NZ may offer racing betting, sports betting or other racing or sports betting to a person in New Zealand. The penalty for an operator breaching the section is not stated in the section itself, and no prosecution of an offshore bookmaker under it has been published. The Department of Internal Affairs’ role, set out under the Gambling Act 2003 and reinforced by the 2025 amendment, is to monitor compliance and to require providers serving New Zealand to withdraw. New Zealand does not block bookmaker sites. The player side is governed by section 19(4) of the Gambling Act 2003, which says a person who places a bet with an offshore operator in breach of section 74AAA cannot be convicted of that offence. The whole structure puts liability on the operator and leaves the punter carrying the consumer risk the operator must absorb under a domestic regime.

Advertising sits inside the same framework. The Advertising Standards Authority’s Gambling Advertising Code applies to betting advertisements in New Zealand: ads must not target children (under 14) or young people (14 to under 18), must not encourage harm, and must be truthful with terms available. The code’s audience threshold is 25 per cent — if 25 per cent or more of the audience for an ad is under 25, the ad is taken to target young people where accurate audience data exists. New Zealand has no equivalent of the United Kingdom’s “whistle-to-whistle” ban on betting ads around live sport, so football broadcasts in New Zealand carry no statutory advertising restrictions beyond the ASA code.

The tax position for the punter is straightforward. Inland Revenue guidance says recreational gambling winnings are generally not taxable, and prize money from TAB horse, dog and trotting races is not taxable. A person who bets as a business — for whom gambling is the main source of income — is a different case, and the general advice is to consult Inland Revenue or an accountant. The operator side carries a Problem Gambling Levy of 0.74 per cent, in force from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2028, payable by TAB NZ. Offshore operators supplying New Zealand residents pay online gambling duty — 12 per cent of profits since 1 July 2024, rising to 16 per cent from 1 January 2027 — but paying duty is not a sign of legality. The point-of-consumption charge that used to apply to offshore racing and sports bets ceased on 30 June 2026.

Greyhound racing is closing in stages from 1 August 2026, and from that date offshore operators may not take bets on greyhound races either. The online casino market has its own regime: the Online Casino Gambling Act 2026 licenses online casino gambling only and does not extend the betting monopoly. TAB New Zealand’s right to apply for a casino licence, when granted, will let it run an online casino product; it does not change the sports and racing monopoly.

Safer gambling in a market with one operator

A single-operator market changes what player protection looks like. The gambling-harm framework is not optional; it is the only one in the country. TAB NZ’s app carries deposit limits, time-outs and self-exclusion as built-in tools. A self-exclusion applies across the TAB NZ group, which means an exclusion taken out on TAB also blocks the same account on Betcha. The age for TAB NZ betting is 18 (betting under 18 is an offence under section 89 of the Racing Industry Act 2020); land-based casinos in New Zealand are 20, and that 20 does not extend to TAB or Betcha. New Zealand’s app stores carry a 17+ age rating on the TAB NZ app while stating that customers must be 18 or over to bet. Account opening at TAB NZ requires a verified New Zealand address and ID.

There is no single national online-betting exclusion register. The register the Online Casino Gambling Act 2026 will require is for online casinos only. A punter who excludes themselves from TAB and Betcha has, in practice, no further online-betting channel inside New Zealand — because there is no other lawful channel. That is a structural difference from markets where excluding from one brand leaves twenty others open.

Help. The free Gambling Helpline (0800 654 655, text 8006) and Safer Gambling Aotearoa are the two national services. TAB NZ lists the helpline inside its app. The free 0800 number and the 8006 text line are both open 24 hours. A punter who finds themselves chasing losses, betting beyond a budget or hiding bets from family or partners can do worse than to call the helpline before the next deposit.

The Problem Gambling Levy funds treatment and harm-minimisation work. At 0.74 per cent it is a small slice of TAB NZ’s gross profit, and it is the only levy that funds the harm framework attached to sports and racing bets in New Zealand.

What “bonus bets” and offers actually cost at TAB NZ

Because only TAB NZ may offer betting here, the offer landscape is, in practice, a one-brand market. TAB NZ runs “bonus bets” promotions; no New Zealand rule governs the size of a bonus bet or the wagering terms attached to one, so what a TAB NZ offer actually costs is what TAB NZ’s own terms state. The advertised headline — a 100 per cent bonus, a $50 bonus bet, a “deposit match” — does not say what the offer costs once the small print is read. Two numbers decide that cost: the wagering factor (how many times the bonus amount has to be turned over before a withdrawal is allowed), and the minimum odds the wagering bets have to be placed at. A high wagering factor at a tight minimum odds turns a $50 headline into hours of betting at thin margins.

The way to read any “bonus bet” promotion is the same regardless of the headline. First, the wagering factor — a 1x bonus bet needs only one bet of the bonus amount before the winnings become withdrawable; a 5x wagering factor means the bonus amount has to be bet five times. Second, the minimum odds — if the wagering bets must be at odds of 1.50 or higher, that excludes a chunk of the favourite-heavy football menu and forces the bettor into longer-priced markets where the bookmaker’s margin is also higher. Third, the expiry — bonus bets with a 7-day clock behave differently from those with a 30-day clock, and a tight expiry is a real cost on a market that doesn’t list many fixtures throughout the week. Fourth, the markets on which the bonus bet is allowed — some promotions exclude same-game multis, some exclude live markets, some exclude outrights.

The market margin is the part of the offer that does not appear in the terms but eats the bonus anyway. Every odds board carries it: the margin is the slice of every dollar wagered that the bookmaker keeps, on average, over a large number of bets. A 5 per cent margin on a market with $1,000 of bonus turnover keeps, on average, $50 of the bonus. The way to see the margin is to invert the odds: the payout share of a market is the sum of one over each price across the outcomes, and the margin is one minus the payout share. A football match-result market at decimal odds of 2.10, 3.40 and 3.60 — home, draw, away — gives a payout share of about 91.3 per cent and a margin of roughly 8.7 per cent, with the result varying a point or two depending on the snapshot date. That is the slice of any wagering turnover the bonus is being lost through.

How the arithmetic works: at decimal odds 2.10, 3.40 and 3.60, the implied probabilities are 47.6, 29.4 and 27.8 per cent, which together sum to 104.8 per cent. The excess over 100 per cent — 4.8 per cent across three prices — is the margin, and a normal reading of a 1X2 football book sits in the 4 to 10 per cent band depending on the league, the day of the week and whether the fixture is on the main menu or buried. The narrower the band, the harder the bookmaker has worked to keep prices sharp; the wider the band, the more the punter is paying for the menu.

Live betting and the cash-out question

TAB NZ lists live betting inside its apps. Live football is the product where the punter’s edge — if there is one — shows up, because the in-running odds move on goals, red cards and substitutions before the average viewer has registered the change. A red card last-minute is a sharp move; a goal in the 88th minute is a sharp move; the in-running odds at TAB NZ try to keep pace with what is on the screen, and a punter who has watched the match already has a faster read on the change than a punter who has just opened the app.

Cash-out is the second live product, and TAB NZ offers it on a long list of football markets. Cash-out is the bookmaker’s offer to settle a bet early, at a price the bookmaker has set using its in-running model. The price is, by construction, slightly worse than the live odds on the same selection at the same moment, and that gap is the bookmaker’s cut of the cash-out. A punter who takes a cash-out before the final whistle is paying the bookmaker a fee on top of the original margin; a punter who waits for the natural settle pays only the original margin. The cash-out earns its fee when the in-running move is large enough that the early-settle price is genuinely worth more than holding — a 2-0 lead with ten minutes to play, a red card for the team ahead, a penalty awarded in added time. Outside those windows, cash-out is a bookmaker-friendly trade dressed as a punter-friendly tool.

Live betting also exposes the markets that the law treats as settled at full-time. A “next goal” market settles when the next goal is scored; a “match result” market at TAB NZ settles on the 90-minute score, with extra time and penalties counted only on the explicitly named “to lift the trophy” or “to qualify” markets. A live bettor who treats a 1-1 in regulation as still-live for the result market is treating the wrong market.

Reading predictions, statistics and the strategies punters chase

The prediction market around football is large and not always honest. The products on offer fall into three bands: paid tipster services, free prediction sites, and model-driven statistics platforms. Paid tipsters charge a subscription, advertise a strike rate, and rarely publish a full P&L that lets a punter check whether the strike rate is on level stakes or on each-way stakes, whether it includes voids, whether it survives closing-line value checks. A 55 per cent strike rate on 10-unit stakes at 1.80 prices is profitable; a 55 per cent strike rate at 1.20 prices is ruinous; the headline number means nothing without the prices and the staking.

Free prediction sites range from outright aggregators — which copy fixtures and prices from elsewhere — to statistical dashboards that publish expected-goals-by-match, shot-based xG, and team-level finishing-quality numbers. The useful ones are the ones that publish a model description and a calibration score. The less-useful ones are the ones that publish a tip with no model and no track record.

Statistics that survive a sceptical read are: expected goals (xG), shot-based expected goals, big-chance conversion, set-piece xG, and pressure-event data (passes and pressures in the final third). xG is the expected number of goals a team scored from the chances it created, given the quality of each chance; the gap between goals scored and xG is finishing over- or under-performance, which tends to regress to the mean over a season. Pressure-event data is what professional clubs use internally and what a few statistical platforms publish for free; it shows where a team is winning the ball back and how high up the pitch it is doing so, which is a leading indicator of chance creation in the next 10 to 15 minutes.

Strategies built around those numbers — the “fade the public” strategy, the “live bet after a red card” strategy, the “bet the overs when a strong favourite plays an open match” strategy — are not systems that win. They are framings that help a punter structure a bet. The bankroll side of those framings is more important than the prediction side: flat staking, a fixed unit size, no chasing losses, a hard stop on a daily or weekly basis. The punter who reads a prediction site and bets the bank on the next tip loses regardless of the strike rate; the punter who reads a prediction site and stakes 1 per cent of the bank on a shortlist has a chance.

The bet types a TAB NZ football slip carries

The TAB NZ football menu opens with the standard match-result market — home, draw, away — and the totals market — over a set goal line, under a set goal line. From there it widens into Asian handicap, both-way handicap, goal-line Asian handicap, both teams to score, correct score, half-time result, half-time/full-time, double chance, draw no bet, and the outright markets — league winner, top-four finish, relegation, top scorer, group winner, to qualify from a knockout group, to lift the trophy.

Same-game multis are the headline product on a TAB NZ football coupon. A same-game multi is a single bet whose legs come from one event — a typical Premier League SGM might combine the match result, both teams to score, total goals over 2.5, and a player to score. The legs multiply into one price, and the slip pays only if every leg wins. The friendly alternative is a multi across separate events — a Premier League result combined with a Bundesliga result combined with a La Liga goalscorer market — which is the older accumulator structure and which pays the same way. The two have the same multiplier mechanics; the difference is variance and the way the prices are correlated. Same-game legs are correlated by design — a 3-0 home win makes “home win”, “over 2.5 goals” and “home team to score over 1.5” all win or all lose at once — which is why SGM prices look generous and why they are easier to lose in a streak.

Handicap markets — both the European and the Asian variant — are how a bookmaker handles a heavy favourite. A -1.5 handicap on the favourite means the favourite has to win by two clear goals for the bet to win; a +1.5 handicap on the underdog means the underdog wins the bet if it draws or wins, and loses by one goal, and pushes if it wins by two or more. The Asian handicap variant removes the push by using 0.25 and 0.5 increments, splitting the stake across two lines. Spread betting — a separate product, common in the United Kingdom — works against a points or goals line set by the bookmaker, with the punter’s stake multiplied by the margin of victory or defeat. New Zealand does not have a TAB NZ spread-betting product on football; spread betting is outside TAB NZ’s sports-betting definition.

Each-way betting is a racing term carried into football on outright markets. An each-way bet is two bets: a win bet on the outcome and a place bet on the outcome at a fraction of the original odds. On a 10-team outright market, an each-way bet at 1/4 the odds pays if the selection finishes first, second or third; the stake is doubled because two bets are placed. Outright markets at TAB NZ carry each-way terms because the league season is long enough for place finishes to mean something.

The arithmetic of any single bet is the same. A winning single bet returns stake multiplied by decimal odds. A $10 stake at odds of 2.60 returns $26 — the original $10 plus $16 of profit. A $10 stake at odds of 1.40 returns $14, including $4 of profit. The leg-by-leg multiplier on a multi is what makes a four-leg multi at average odds of 1.80 carry a combined price of about 10.5; the payout on a $10 stake is about $105 if every leg wins. The risk is that every leg has to win; a four-leg multi at 1.80 average odds wins roughly one time in fourteen if the legs are independent, and the bookmaker’s margin on each leg reduces the payout share below 100 per cent.

The arithmetic of a margin, written through one match-result market

The illustrative match-result market is the Premier League fixture between two mid-table sides, priced at decimal odds of 2.10 for the home win, 3.40 for the draw and 3.60 for the away win. The implied probability of each outcome, if the market were “fair” (i.e. no margin), is one over the decimal odds: 47.6 per cent, 29.4 per cent and 27.8 per cent. Summed, those three implied probabilities come to 104.8 per cent. The bookmaker’s margin is the slice above 100 per cent — 4.8 per cent in the example, sitting in the typical Premier League 1X2 band of roughly 4 to 6 per cent for a top-flight fixture priced a day or two out from kick-off. The payout share is the inverse — about 95.4 per cent — meaning that on every $100 wagered across the three outcomes in the right proportion, the bookmaker keeps about $4.80 on average and returns about $95.20.

The result is a band rather than a single figure because the margin of a 1X2 football market depends on the league, the day of the week and the time-to-kick-off. A Champions League knockout fixture priced 48 hours before kick-off typically sits in the 3 to 5 per cent band; a lower-division English fixture priced midweek sits in the 7 to 10 per cent band; a same-day kick-off in any league carries a wider margin because the bookmaker has less time to balance the book. The arithmetic above uses 2.10 / 3.40 / 3.60 as an example, not as a quoted price, and the 4.8 per cent that comes out of it is one figure inside a band — useful as a reading of what the bookmaker keeps, not as a contract about what a specific Premier League fixture carries on a specific Tuesday.

The margin does not appear in the terms and conditions. It appears in the spread of the prices. A bookmaker with a 3 per cent margin produces prices that, summed across the outcomes, total about 103 per cent; a bookmaker with an 8 per cent margin produces prices that sum to about 108 per cent. The punter who learns to read the margin from the prices alone has a sharper tool than the punter who reads the marketing.

The reviewed bookmakers, and how each one sits inside this market

TAB and Betcha sit inside New Zealand law. The other eight sit outside it. Each one is named below, with what it actually offers, what its licence actually says, and the verdict a New Zealand punter walks away with. The two halves are not the same product; the reviewed brands are not ranked against each other. They are described on their own terms, and a New Zealand punter reading them reaches the verdict the operator’s own profile supports.

TAB

TAB is one of two online brands of TAB NZ, the only provider lawfully offering racing and sports betting to people in New Zealand since 28 June 2025 under section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020. The TAB app — first released on 8 September 2014, published under the seller name New Zealand Racing Board — covers horse and harness racing, rugby union and rugby league, and a full sport menu, with pre-match and live markets, same-game multis, racing form tools and Trackside live race streaming built into the product. The app carries a 17+ age rating on the App Store while stating that customers must be 18 or over to bet. The sportsbook depth runs on the Entain engine: Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1, the A-League Men, the Champions League, the Europa League, the FIFA international calendar, and the major cup competitions. The safer-gambling tools — deposit limits, time-outs and self-exclusion — are built into the account, and a self-exclusion applies across the TAB NZ group. The “TAB NZ app covers horse and harness racing, rugby union and rugby league and other sports” footnote in the App Store listing is the public statement; the deeper depth is what the Entain partnership delivers.

For a New Zealand punter who wants football betting inside the New Zealand consumer-protection framework, TAB is the operator. The breadth of the football menu, the same-game multi product and the live markets are the features a UK or Australian punter expects from an Entain sportsbook. The limit is the menu, not the depth: TAB NZ runs one sportsbook, and a punter who wants to compare the football menu across three or four brands has only one brand to compare.

Betcha

Betcha is the second online brand of TAB NZ, launched on 6 August 2024, published on the App Store by Entain New Zealand Limited. The product is sport-led, with rugby, NRL, NBA, NFL, tennis, cricket, football, motorsports and esports ahead of racing in the visual ordering. The depth on football is the same Entain sportsbook that TAB carries, with the same multi and same-game-multi product, the same live markets and the same outright depth. The horse, greyhound and harness racing product is present but is not the headline. Betcha’s selling point is presentation: a sport-led feed, a racing feed that is fully available rather than the main event, and the same Entain betting rules underneath.

For a New Zealand punter who wants TAB NZ’s product with a sport-led framing rather than a racing-led framing, Betcha is the operator. The two brands are not rivals; they are the same operator group on different visual frames, and a punter who wants to switch from one to the other moves money inside the same wallet rather than between two competing houses. The one genuine difference between TAB and Betcha is the App Store publisher: TAB carries the racing product with Trackside live streaming at the front; Betcha carries the sport-led product with racing available but not at the front.

Thunderpick

Thunderpick is esports-first and offers a sportsbook on top. The licence is Curaçao (OGL/2024/677/0722), held by Paloma Media B.V., which gives no right to take bets from people in New Zealand. The esports product covers CS2, League of Legends, Dota 2 and Valorant, and the sportsbook carries a cash-out feature and markets from the Champions League to the NFL. The product is real, and the cash-out feature is a live product, not a marketing claim.

For a New Zealand punter, Thunderpick is an offshore bookmaker. Section 74AAA makes the act of taking a New Zealand address’s bet unlawful on the operator side; the punter carries the consumer-side risk of an unregulated relationship. The esports depth is the genuine strength: a punter who wants CS2 and Dota 2 markets at a depth TAB NZ does not run will find them at Thunderpick. The price for the depth is no New Zealand complaints route, no New Zealand harm-minimisation framework, and the operator’s right to refuse payouts the operator judges outside its terms.

Winz

Winz.io runs a sports betting bonus promotion with its own Sportsbook T&C, Sports Rules and Bonus Terms. The licence is Anjouan and Tobique, held by Novatrix SRL — neither gives a right to take bets from people in New Zealand. The product is a sportsbook and casino under one wallet, with the sportsbook carrying the same depth on football as a mid-tier offshore operator.

For a New Zealand punter, Winz is an offshore bookmaker operating under a similar unregulated model to Thunderpick — unlawful for the operator to serve a New Zealand address, and no domestic route for a dispute. The bonus promotion is a marketing product; the wagering factor and the minimum odds on the bonus are in the operator’s terms, and a punter who claims the offer is bound by them.

Rooster

Rooster.bet’s sportsbook has Live, Sports Promotions, Results, Schedule, E-sports and Predictions sections, and the odds display runs in six formats. The licence is a Tobique Gaming Commission e-gaming licence (No. 0000002), held by Novatrix SRL. The product carries a Predictions tab, which is a feature TAB NZ does not run, and the six-format odds display is a depth feature that lets a punter move between decimal, fractional, American, Hong Kong, Indonesian and Malaysian prices.

For a New Zealand punter, Rooster.bet is an offshore bookmaker. The Tobique licence does not extend to New Zealand addresses. The Predictions tab and the six-format display are useful, but they sit inside the same unregulated relationship as every other offshore brand on this list.

Roobet

Roobet covers soccer, basketball, tennis, Counter-Strike, FIFA, baseball, ice hockey, MMA and table tennis. The licence is Curaçao (OGL/2024/687/0427), held by Raw Entertainment B.V. The terms require players to be 18 or older, which is the same age threshold as TAB NZ, though the enforcement mechanism is the operator’s own rather than the New Zealand regulator’s. The product is a sportsbook and a casino under one wallet, and the brand carries a crypto-friendly image.

For a New Zealand punter, Roobet is an offshore bookmaker with the same status as the rest. The 18+ threshold is real, but the regulator behind it is not New Zealand’s. The product is broader than some of the other offshore brands on the list, and the crypto-friendly image is the genuine difference in positioning.

RoyalistPlay

RoyalistPlay’s sportsbook offers live betting, sports promotions, results and a schedule, with football, basketball, tennis, handball, ice hockey, volleyball and table tennis among the top sports, and separate e-sports and Predictions sections. The licence is a Tobique Gaming Commission e-gaming licence (No. 0000002), held by Novatrix SRL.

For a New Zealand punter, RoyalistPlay is an offshore bookmaker with the same status as Rooster.bet — the same Tobique licence, the same Novatrix SRL holder, the same unregulated relationship. The product carries a similar mid-tier depth on football and a similar Predictions section.

Glorion

Glorion offers pre-match and live betting, virtual sports, horse racing and esports, with markets grouped into popular, niche, indoor and outdoor sports and entertainment events such as award shows and elections. The brand names no licence that applies in New Zealand.

For a New Zealand punter, Glorion is an offshore bookmaker with no published licence at all. The product breadth is interesting — award-show and election markets are unusual — and the absence of a stated licence is itself a fact. A punter who claims any offer from Glorion is operating without any of the protections a domestic regulator requires, and the absence of a New Zealand route for a complaint is the limit of that position.

BillyBets

BillyBets runs a casino and a sportsbook under one account, with the sportsbook covering football, tennis, table tennis, basketball, ice hockey, American football, baseball, combat sports, esports, virtual sports and live betting. The brand names no licence that applies in New Zealand.

For a New Zealand punter, BillyBets is an offshore bookmaker with the same status as Glorion — no published licence that applies to New Zealand addresses, no domestic route for a complaint, and the consumer-side risk that comes with that. The product breadth is wide; the regulatory floor is the floor of an unregulated operator.

BetNinja

BetNinja advertises a casino welcome of EUR 1,000 and 100 free spins, and a sports offer of a 100 per cent match up to EUR 100 on the first deposit. The licence is from the Union of the Comoros, which gives no right to take bets from people in New Zealand.

For a New Zealand punter, BetNinja is an offshore bookmaker with a casino welcome and a sportsbook offer. The Comoros licence is one of the thinnest in the offshore market, and the lack of a domestic route for a complaint is the limit. The EUR pricing places the offer outside New Zealand dollars, and the foreign-currency settlement is another cost a New Zealand punter carries on every stake and every payout.

How to read this market in 2026

For a punter in New Zealand who wants to bet on football, the choice is binary at the structural level. TAB NZ, through TAB and Betcha, is the only lawfully available bookmaker. The offshore brands listed on this page are not licensed in New Zealand, do not have a New Zealand complaints route, and operate under jurisdictions the Department of Internal Affairs has warned about. The punter who chooses TAB NZ gets the Entain sportsbook, the New Zealand harm-minimisation framework, the safer-gambling tools, and the regulatory protection of a domestic regime. The punter who chooses an offshore brand gets a different football menu, a different set of bonuses, and an unregulated relationship with the operator.

The next decision is product. A punter who wants same-game multis, live betting and the standard 1X2 / totals / Asian handicap menu is well-served at TAB NZ. A punter who wants esports depth, prediction tabs and six-format price display will not find that at TAB NZ and will find it at one of the offshore brands — at the price of the unregulated relationship.

The third decision is staking. A punter who stakes 1 to 2 per cent of a fixed bankroll on each bet, on markets whose margin they have read from the prices, has a chance of surviving a bad run. A punter who stakes a fixed dollar amount on every bet, regardless of the price, or who chases losses by raising the stake, loses regardless of the menu.

The arithmetic of the margin is what makes the third decision possible. A 5 per cent margin across a season of betting means $5 of every $100 wagered goes to the bookmaker on average. The punter who picks a 5 per cent market and stakes 1 per cent of the bank on each bet is paying $5 per $100 of bank in expectation across the year; the punter who picks an 8 per cent market is paying $8. The choice of market — the choice of margin — is the choice that determines the year.

Frequently asked questions

How does spread betting work in football?

Spread betting is a separate product from fixed-odds betting. The bookmaker sets a line — say 2.7 goals for a Premier League fixture — and the punter bets “over” or “under”. If the fixture finishes 3-1, the over bet wins by 0.3 goals times the stake unit; if it finishes 1-0, the under bet wins by 1.7 goal units. The size of the stake unit is set per market. TAB NZ does not run spread betting on football — spread betting is outside TAB NZ’s sports-betting definition — and New Zealand has no domestic spread-betting bookmaker on football.

How does a punter bet against the spread in football?

Betting “against the spread” is the American term for handicap betting. A -1.5 handicap on the favourite means the favourite has to win by two clear goals for the bet to win; the underdog, at +1.5, wins the bet if it draws, wins, or loses by a single goal. The Asian handicap variant removes the push by using 0.25 and 0.5 increments and splitting the stake. TAB NZ carries European and Asian handicap markets on its football menu.

How does a punter bet on football matches correctly?

A correct-score bet is a single bet on the exact final score of a football match. TAB NZ’s correct-score market runs from 1-0 through to 4-4 or wider, with prices that compress sharply on the common scorelines (1-0, 2-1, 2-0) and lengthen on the rare ones (5-4, 6-0). The market is one of the highest-margin markets on the menu because the payout shares are tight and the stake-to-return ratio looks generous; the implied probability of any one scoreline is small, and the bookmaker’s margin sits higher than on the 1X2 market.

Which bookmaker may lawfully take sports and racing bets in New Zealand?

TAB NZ, through its two online brands TAB and Betcha, is the only operator that may lawfully take sports and racing bets from a person in New Zealand under section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020, in force since 28 June 2025. There is no licence register for betting because there is no class of bookmaker to register; offshore brands licensed in Curaçao, Anjouan, Tobique or the Comoros do not have a New Zealand licence because none is available to apply for.

How is the return on a bet worked out from the stake and the odds?

A winning single bet returns stake multiplied by decimal odds. A $10 stake at odds of 2.60 returns $26, including $10 of stake and $16 of profit. A multi bet multiplies the prices of each leg into a combined price; a $10 stake on a four-leg multi at average odds of 1.80 returns about $105 if every leg wins. The result of each leg has to be settled for the multi to pay.

What is the bookmaker’s margin and how can it be seen in the odds?

The margin is the slice of every dollar wagered the bookmaker keeps on average. For a three-outcome market priced at 2.10, 3.40 and 3.60, the implied probabilities are 47.6, 29.4 and 27.8 per cent — summing to 104.8 per cent. The excess above 100 per cent, 4.8 per cent in the example, is the margin. A 1X2 football market typically sits in the 4 to 10 per cent band depending on the league and the time-to-kick-off. The narrower the band, the sharper the bookmaker has priced.

Prepared by the Nzsoccerodds editorial staff.