Three Best Tennessee Sports Betting Sites & Apps

Three Best Tennessee Sports Betting Sites & Apps article feature image
  • BetMGM, DraftKings, FanDuel, and Action247 became the first four Tennessee sports betting sites over the weekend, which means you can bet Monday Night Football, as well.
  • Tennessee is the seventh state to have full-scale online betting, and the only with no casinos or in-person betting.
  • Here's everything you need to start betting on sports in Tennessee.

Three major sports betting sites and apps went live in Tennessee on Sunday, making them the only three national players in the market. Locally-owned Action247 is also live from the start.

The Volunteer State became the seventh in the U.S. with full-scale online betting and registrations, a must to become a competitive market.

Here are three sites you can use to start betting on sports legally, with some words of caution about sports betting regulations in the state below.

[RELATED: Why You Should Bet at Multiple Sportsbooks]

3 Best Tennessee Sports Betting Sites & Apps

1. BetMGM

You might recognize BetMGM as a casino brand, but it's becoming a major player in the United States sports betting market, with operations in a handful of key states already.

MGM offers an easy-to-navigate website and app, competitive bonus offers and some niche-but-favorable betting rules like ties paid in full for golf finishing position bets.

2. DraftKings

Unsurprisingly, DraftKings has been among the leaders in the U.S. so far thanks to its existing DFS user base and massive marketing arm. The company has expanded as fast as it can, moving into every state possible in the last 18 months.

DraftKings has the most expansive selection of NFL player props, is the first book in most U.S. states to post college football lines for the following week, and has among the best mobile apps in the market.

3. FanDuel

Like its DFS counterpart, FanDuel got out to an early lead in the U.S. and has been building upon it.

Thanks to its massive budget, FanDuel can get into states with high barrier to entry, like Tennessee and Illinois.

FanDuel also recently combined its wallets so you can use the same money for DFS and sports betting.

Its biggest downsides are that it can be difficult to find smaller markets like props because they're buried so far in each game.

Should You Bet at All in Tennessee?

There's a giant elephant in the room when it comes to Tennessee sports betting — the 10% hold. Hold refers to the percentage of money that sportsbooks wins for every dollar wagered.

The state has mandated that sportsbooks must keep 10% or more of the dollars wagered. So for every $1 bet, books should profit 10 cents.

Why is this an issue? Because the costs will be passed onto the consumer. And it's not a situation where books have to pay the state a higher tax, and might eat some of the cost themselves. They have no other choice than to charge customers more per bet than usual. This also prevents an innovative new sportsbook from coming in and undercutting the big players on price.

A 10% hold implies that both sides of an NFL point spread would be -120 or -125, instead of the typical -110. That means you're risking $125 to win $100, instead of $110 to win $100.

Our best guess is that these books try to hide the hold in markets where it's not as apparent to the naked eye that they're unfairly priced, like parlays and futures, and let you bet NFL spreads at -110 or -115.

Here are some possible downstream effects:

  • Caps on parlay and futures payouts so sportsbooks can limit their exposure. If the Tennessee Titans are 25-1 to win the Super Bowl at most books, you could be capped at 20-1 in Tennessee. If you bet a 2-team parlay, you may get paid 2-1 instead of 2.6-1.
  • Even worse odds than -125 on some markets to balance risk
  • Unfair one-way markets

New Jersey has held about 6-7% of all bets. Nevada has historically been in the 5% range, with fluctuations month to month.

It will still make sense for the majority of casual sports bettors in Tennessee to bet through these new legal channels, but it's worth monitoring how books are handling the 10% hold on things you want to bet.

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