New Jersey Sportsbooks Beat Nevada for First Time Ever in May

For the first time ever, more money was legally bet on sports in a state other than Nevada.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board reported Thursday morning that $317.4 million was bet on sports for the month of May. Operators in New Jersey, in their 11th month of being in business, took in $1.5 million more.

New Jersey, in its first full year, will pull in just more than $3 billion in bets. Nevada is still significantly larger at around $5 billion.

New Jersey is essentially growing the pie and not necessarily taking from Nevada’s share. In fact, the $317.4 million is Nevada's biggest May ever, breaking the $315.8 million handle set in May 2015. Nevada also set its all-time record for a month in March when, on the heels of college basketball, the state took $597 million in bets.

New Jersey has benefitted, and will continue to benefit from the fact that neighboring New York will not have mobile betting until at least 2020. New York will have four upstate casinos taking bets by football season.

New Jersey, which took in more than 80 percent of its bets through mobile, also benefited from Pennsylvania taking its time getting into mobile. As of this week, three Pennsylvania sportsbooks are offered online compared to 14 operators in New Jersey.

DraftKings, the first to the mobile betting market in New Jersey, opened up a new satellite office in Hoboken this week. The company has said it has taken more than 20 million bets and paid out more than $500 million in winnings so far.