The 2024 U.S. presidential election odds culminates with election day on Tuesday, November 5. Election trading site Kalshi has become the first legal and regulated prediction market in the U.S. for the election, and it joins over non-American markets, such as FanDuel Ontario and BetMGM UK, where you can wager in the presidential election.
Here are my best bets for the election.
Arizona Election Odds, Predictions
- Arizona closest state (Kalshi 6%)
- Arizona last state called (Kalshi 21%)
In my Arizona writeup, I talked about how I’d bet Arizona as the closest state at anything below 10%. But another market I really like is Arizona to be the last state called.
Georgia, North Carolina, and Michigan should have near-complete results on election night.
Pennsylvania looks like a similar or even better environment for Harris than it did Biden in 2020. Even if it’s close, we likely won’t have to wait as long on Pennsylvania this cycle as last.
I gave my reasons why I think Nevada is underrated for Harris and even then it should have north of 80% of its vote counted by 6 p.m. ET on Wednesday.
By comparison, Arizona may have only around 70% of its vote counted by the same time, and could be the closest race of them all.
Electoral Vote Counts/Margin Odds, Predictions
- Harris by 65-104 (Kalshi 15%)
Harris sweeping the seven swing states as Biden did in 2020 puts the final electoral vote tally at 319-219, or a 100-point margin. That give her plenty of wiggle room to lose one, or even two states and hit this range.
Here are the permutations where she still ends up winning by this electoral vote margin (with number of combinations in parentheses).
100 – Win all 7 swings (1)
88 – lose NV only (1)
80 – lose WI only (1)
78 – lose AZ only (1)
70 – lose MI only (1)
68 – lose exactly one of NC or GA, or lose WI and NV (3)
66 – lose NV and AZ (1)
Of these, losing just AZ, just NV, or both AZ and NV are very real possibilities based off my state-by-state deep dives.
At 24cast.org, 319 occurs as the plurality result at 45%. While I think that’s far too high, it’s notable that other forecasts like FiveThirtyEight and the Silver Bulleting have this around 13%-14% which wouldn’t make this a good bet. However, I’m betting on these forecasts being wrong based off a systematic polling error overestimating Trump from reading the tea leaves, namely:
- Early voting data
- District level polling
- Recent special election results and statewide primary results
- Favorability ratings
- 24cast’s machine learning forecast
Any sort of polling error underestimating Harris would make these 13-14% estimates too low.
Trump Election Betting Odds, Predictions
- Trump to win NH (18% implied at Kalshi, +500 at BetMGM UK)
- NH as closest state (7% implied at Kalshi)
- Trump to win all 7 swing states (20% implied at Kalshi)
These are small bet investments on what I see as +EV hedges in case polls and early voting data are incorrect and are overestimating Harris. You can take these for sizes that would recoup any losses on Harris-winning oriented bets and maybe churn out a small profit if one or some of these hit.
A swing-state Trump sweep is a correlated outcome, with a national environment favoring Trump more than polls suggest. The machine learning model of 24cast.org has this at around 15%.
However, It makes sense to focus on the polling-based models, given we’re talking about a polling error. The more poll-focused models of Silver Bulletin and FiveThirtyEight each have this above 20%.
Also, as I mentioned in my New Hampshire piece, in a Trump swing state sweep scenario, NH becomes the next most-likely state to fall. Four high-quality models have it at an average of 18.1% to go to Trump. That jumps to 22.8% if we remove the machine learning model of 24cast.org and focus on three polling-based models.
Election Odds in Other Key States
- Arizona: Trump entered Election Day as about a 2-1 favorite, but is that price too steep? Early voting data and district level polling is suggesting statewide and national polling is more likely underestimating Harris in this cycle.
- Florida: Trump is a huge favorite in the Sunshine State, and a Harris win would be the result of a major polling miss nationally.
- Georgia: There's a lot to still be decided in Georgia, a red state shifting blue over the last eight years, with turnout in both red and blue counties already up from 2020 in early voting.
- Iowa: Trump dropped from a massive favorite to a slightly less massive favorite over the weekend thanks to some prominent pollsters releasing their data. There's still some betting value on the board, but you may have to lay a steep price.
- Michigan: Joe Biden took Michigan in 2020 and Harris seems poised for another victory here as a slight favorite entering the day.
- Nevada: Mail-in ballots in Clark County (where Las Vegas is located) will play a huge role in NV — is it enough to give the edge to Harris, who is a small underdog entering Tuesday?
- New Hampshire: Harris is a big favorite here, but in the event of a broad polling miss, there's some betting value on a prop here.
- North Carolina: Trump is favored in the Tar Heel State, but should he be? This race will likely come down to which side goes to the independent voters.
- Ohio: Trump is a massive favorite in Ohio, which has gone red the last two elections after going blue for Barack Obama the previous two.
- Pennsylvania: The most important state in the election, PA is close to 50/50 entering Election Day.
- Texas: Trump is a huge favorite in Texas and only a big polling miss would create any changes there.
- Wisconsin: Joe Biden won Wisconsin in 2020 by just more than 20,000 votes, and WI is setting up for another razor-thin race in 2024.
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