Illinois sportsbooks were not an exception to the rule and set new monthly records in October like those in most other US jurisdictions.
Sports betting handle hit $840.4 million for October, up pretty significantly over three key periods:
- Up 93.4% from last October’s $434.6 million.
- Up 40.9% from September‘s $596.5 million.
- Up 32.6% from the previous record of $633.6 million set in March.
Not all US sports betting jurisdictions saw revenue grow with handle because of bettor-friendly results, but Illinois did. Sportsbooks reported a record $48.3 million in sports betting revenue for a 5.7% hold.
The results from Illinois sportsbooks pushed total US sports betting handle past $7 billion in October. That’s up from a then-record of $5.3 billion in September with reports for both months still due from Arizona sportsbooks.
A fifth full Friday through Sunday weekend in October helped push the US market to new heights.
Illinois sportsbooks crushed on football bets
Those bettor-friendly football results bit hard in Illinois.
Of the $330.1 million bet on football in October, sportsbooks kept just $6.4 million for a hold of 2.0%. The reports do not break out the difference in NFL betting and college football betting, but much of October’s college betting tends to come on football. There was $127.3 million bet on college sports in October.
Basketball also came in lower than usual with $3.3 million in revenue on $93.3 million in bets, or a 3.5% hold.
Parlays helped right the revenue ship for Illinois in October. Operators kept $24.5 million of the $118.7 million bet for a 13% hold.
DraftKings rules handle while FanDuel takes top revenue spot
There’s a pretty big disparity between the top two handle and revenue generators in the state.
DraftKings Sportsbook far and away took the most bets in October with $308.8 million in online handle, or 38.4% of the $803.4 million bet online.
That’s compared to $235.4 million, or 29.3% of online handle share, for FanDuel Sportsbook.
But FanDuel led the state with $22.3 million in total revenue compared to $11.7 million for DraftKings.
Rush Street Interactive‘s BetRivers Sportsbook is third in both. It took $119 million in online bets for 14.8% online handle share and recorded $8 million in total revenue.
