New York Online Sports Betting Debut Does Not Disappoint

Dave Schwab Sports Betting Expert

3 minute read

US sports betting industry insiders have been documenting the potential of New York’s legal online market for months. Ever since the Empire State finalized its plans for the launch of mobile sports betting, the anticipation of actually going live has continued to grow.

That all came to a head on Saturday, Jan. 8. The New York State Gaming Commission gave four of nine mobile sports betting operators the greenlight to go live.

At 9:01 a.m. (ET), the first legal online sports bets started to come in through mobile apps launched by FanDuel, DraftKings, Caesars Sportsbook and BetRivers (Rush Street Interactive). While no weekend sports betting figures were released by three of the four operators, the activity was brisk to say the least.

BetRivers did report that it took in $970,381 through its mobile sportsbook app on Saturday alone. More than half of the betting handle was wagered on football. Basketball wagers accounted for another $271,281 in betting volume.

It was also reported that GeoComply’s weekend geolocation volume across New York totaled 17.2 million. This figure is unmatched in the history of the legal US sports betting market.

To put this figure in better perspective, GeoComply’s Managing Director-Gaming Lindsay Slader stated:

“In just 12 hours, New York has become the top state for sports betting in the US. A launch this size is historically unprecedented, with volumes eclipsing the second closest ranked state, PA, by approx. 2.5 times.”

The company went on to release the following tweet on Twitter:

“The first 36 hours of #SportsBetting in New York was legendary, In total, NY saw over 17M checks for their first weekend.”

GeoComply also made note that volumes from New York City’s five boroughs were more than 8 million. This is higher than and other state total in the legal US market.

Actual sports betting volume and revenue figures will be released monthly by the New York State Gaming Commission. This is the governing and regulatory body overseeing legal mobile sports betting in the state.

However, if the betting activity over the first weekend is any indication, this state is bound to rewrite the record books when it comes to an initial launch. It also helps that New York borders the largest legal sports betting market in the country.

New Jersey has been on a tear lately with consecutive billion-dollar plus monthly betting handles to close out 2021. It has been estimated that up to 20% of the Garden State’s monthly sports betting volume can be attributed to New York bettors.

Market expansion is right around the corner. The New York State Gaming Commission confirmed that the other five approved operators are working towards their launch later this month.

That list includes, BetMGM, Resorts World, BallyBet, PointsBet and WynnBET.

Written by Dave Schwab, our US Sports Betting Industry Expert. You can learn more about our author's expertise here.

Dave Schwab

Dave Schwab has been covering the sports betting industry for the past 12 years as the main focus of his specialty marketing company for online content. This endeavor followed a previous career in the field of sales and marketing in the wholesaling sector.Most of his weekly pieces focus on the rapidly expanding legal US sports betting industry. However, he still does extensive work covering betting angles that can provide a competitive edge to avid players. Dave believes that it is always a challenge to take past results and current form to try and correctly determine a future result. Sports brings out the unpredictability in what should be a fairly predictable outcome based on the stats, facts and recent trends in a particular matchup. More from Dave Schwab