The total known sports betting handle in the United States in the post-PASPA era surpassed $400 billion Thursday when Maryland and Kansas reported a combined $781.7 million worth of accepted wagers for September.
The 34 states with commercial sports betting and known figures available reached the benchmark in six-plus years since New Jersey and Delaware became the first states outside Nevada to begin taking bets in June 2018. Multiple factors have contributed to reaching this milestone, most notably the widespread availability of mobile sports betting across the country and professional sports leagues embracing legalized wagering and striking partnerships with multiple operators.
In the past 20 months, large-market states Ohio, Massachusetts and North Carolina have entered the sports betting ecosystem, while the January 2022 introduction of New York into the mobile landscape to become the nation's top market also contributed mightily to reaching $400 billion in handle in 76 months of betting.
The known handle doesn't include figures from the state of Nebraska, which doesn't collect handle figures from its casinos conducting retail sports wagering and Florida, where Hard Rock has been operating as the sole mobile and retail operator since early December and figures have not been made public. Full handle figures also aren't available from Puerto Rico.
2024 Set to Produce Another Record Handle
With Maryland and Kansas' figures, the year-to-date handle is $88.2 billion and well on its way to eclipsing last year's total of $121.1 billion with three of the heavier action months yet to come. Sports betting accelerated in late 2020 after the COVID-19 pandemic when a flurry of states legalized as a means of generating some of the gaming tax revenue that was lost when casinos were shuttered.
While the NBA, through commissioner Adam Silver's 2014 op-ed in the New York Times, supported legalized betting and was the first to embrace the idea, it wasn't until April 2021, when the NFL made FanDuel, DraftKings and Caesars official betting partners for different gaming verticals, that sports betting became part of mainstream America.
While all four major professional sports comprise the bulk of wagering action in the U.S., the NFL moves the proverbial needle unlike the other three and also has the largest single event for wagering every February with the Super Bowl.
Additionally, product innovations by sportsbooks have contributed to the rise in the popularity of sports betting, none more than the same-game parlay. FanDuel was the first mover in the industry with the product, and the ability to make multiple wagers within a single game has proven to be both wildly popular and wildly profitable.
Parlays have a hold multiples higher than single-event wagering, and as parlays have risen as a percentage of handle over the -ast few years, revenues have also risen — evidenced by the current nationwide hold of nearly 9.6% on gross revenue in 2024 from states with known handle and revenue figures.
The Northeast Nexus and a Rise in the West
As one of the original states outside Nevada to offer sports wagering, it is not a surprise that New Jersey has the highest handle among all states offering commercial betting. But New York's rapid rise over the past two-plus years has positioned the Empire State to overtake its neighbor at some point in 2025.
New York will become the second state to surpass $50 billion handle when it publishes its September figures, and it wouldn't be surprising to see it top $2 billion handle for any or all of the final three months of 2024.
What has been surprising, though, has been Arizona's relatively rapid rise in the desert. It has cracked the top 10 for all-time handle despite not accepting its first wagers until September 2021, and its expansive mobile presence provides a stark contrast to Nevada, where in-person registration is still required for access to digital betting. Arizona is poised to cross $20 billion and has regularly surpassed $600 million in monthly handle during the busier parts of the year.
Arizona has twice topped Nevada in monthly sports betting handle this year, but the real challenge for the Grand Canyon State is to do so during the NFL season, when Las Vegas continues to be a top-tier destination for sports bettors, more so after reinventing itself as a sports city in recent years with the presence of the Raiders and Golden Knights.
