What Are Bonus Bets? How Sportsbook Bonus Credit Pays Out
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A bonus bet is a stake a sportsbook gives you to bet with. It works like a cash wager in every respect but one: when it wins, you keep the profit and the sportsbook keeps the stake. That single rule explains why a $150 welcome offer is not $150 in your pocket, and why the odds you choose matter more with bonus credit than with your own money.
Bonus bets are how most US welcome offers pay out. FanDuel’s current offer pays them directly. Hard Rock Bet issues them when a protected bet loses. Fanatics pays FanCash, which you can convert into bonus bets. British bookmakers call the same thing a free bet. The names differ; the arithmetic below applies to all of them.
The Stake-Not-Returned Rule
Place a $50 cash bet at +200 and win, and the sportsbook returns $150: $100 in profit plus your $50 stake. Place a $50 bonus bet at the same price and win, and you receive $100. The $50 bonus stake disappears whether the bet wins or loses.
FanDuel puts it in its own terms: only the profit from a bonus bet is paid as cash. Its example is a $25 bonus bet at +200, which returns $50, not $75. Hard Rock Bet’s terms say the same: a winning $50 bonus bet at +200 pays $100.
The profit from a winning bonus bet arrives as cash in your account balance. At FanDuel, Hard Rock Bet and Fanatics there is no further wagering on that money, so it can be withdrawn like any other winnings once your account is verified.
What $50 in Bonus Bets Is Worth at Different Odds
Because the stake never comes back, the price you choose decides how much of a bonus bet survives a win. The table shows what a winning $50 bonus bet pays at common US odds.
| Odds | Winning $50 bonus bet pays | Winning $50 cash bet returns | Share of face value kept on a win |
|---|---|---|---|
| -200 | $25.00 | $75.00 | 50% |
| -110 | $45.45 | $95.45 | 91% |
| +100 | $50.00 | $100.00 | 100% |
| +200 | $100.00 | $150.00 | 200% |
| +400 | $200.00 | $250.00 | 400% |
| +1000 | $500.00 | $550.00 | 1,000% |
A win at long odds pays several times the bonus, but long odds win less often. The fairer way to compare is the expected value: what a bonus bet is worth on average, before the sportsbook’s margin. At fair odds, that equals the stake multiplied by one minus the implied probability of winning.
| Odds | Implied chance of winning | Expected cash from a $50 bonus bet (fair odds) |
|---|---|---|
| -200 | 66.7% | $16.67 |
| +100 | 50.0% | $25.00 |
| +200 | 33.3% | $33.33 |
| +400 | 20.0% | $40.00 |
| +1000 | 9.1% | $45.45 |
Real prices include the sportsbook’s margin, so the true figures are a little lower. The pattern holds: the longer the odds, the more of a bonus bet’s face value you keep on average, and the wider the swing between winning big and getting nothing. On these numbers, a bettor who plays prices between even money and +200 can expect, over time, to turn bonus credit into cash at roughly half to two-thirds of its face value, and a little less once the margin is counted.
How Long Bonus Bets Last
Bonus bets expire, and unused credit simply disappears. Expiry is set per offer, not per sportsbook, so check the terms of each.
| Operator | What you receive | How long it lasts |
|---|---|---|
| FanDuel | $50 in bonus bets per qualifying day | 7 days after each day’s credit |
| Hard Rock Bet | Bonus bet equal to a losing token stake, up to $50 | 7 days; the No Sweat tokens themselves lapse at 11:59pm on the day issued |
| Fanatics (FAN2026) | FanCash equal to the day’s stake, up to $100 | 11:59pm ET, 7 days after it is issued |