Few sports can match Division I men’s college basketball in terms of excitement and sheer volume of games. The regular season is action-packed, conference tournament week is amazing from start to finish, and the postseason in March is simply perfect.

The best sportsbook for college basketball is DraftKings Sportsbook. DraftKings has established itself as an industry leader and continues to grow at a rapid pace.

DraftKings is also extremely gracious with their college basketball promos and offers. You will see some type of parlay boost or a bonus bets offer in your app almost daily during college basketball season.

On top of that, DraftKings has committed to being technological innovators in the industry which can be seen in the simplicity of their app. The app is easy to use and placing bets is simple, whether it’s a straight bet or a parlay that you want to build yourself. Depositing and withdrawing funds is a breeze. 

The industry’s top-tier sportsbooks offer many of these features for college basketball bettors, but none deliver them at the level and sophistication DraftKings does. 

While the impressive offerings from DraftKings push it to the top of these rankings, it is not without competition. There are plenty of worthy competitors with similar offerings and valuable welcome bonus offers around the industry. Let’s explore them. 

FanDuel offers daily promos and boosts to help improve your bottom line. Users can find offers such as a 30% profit boost on any college basketball bet or a no-sweat $10 parlay featuring 3+ college basketball legs. Taking advantage of these promotions is key to finishing in the green.

Their app is a top-notch experience, with a wide variety of markets posted each night across the college basketball landscape.

If you’re betting games on a daily basis, BetMGM can offer a smooth and enjoyable betting experience. They post lines for every game and have the basic markets covered. They will even throw out some promotions for college basketball bettors. These promotions are amplified during postseason tournaments. 

It might not be the most dynamic sportsbook and some markets might be missing or lacking, but in terms of meeting basic needs, BetMGM does an exceptional job. 

If you’re betting on college basketball with Caesars Sportsbook, all of the basic sportsbook features can be found. Lines are posted for every game, and you can build your parlays as you would with any other sportsbook. Caesars also offers daily boosts for bettors to use on college basketball. 

The Caesars app is not quite as fast, and their futures odds are not as competitive as others across the industry. If you’re looking for a casual and low-maintenance betting experience, Caesars is a great option. But when comparing its college basketball betting offerings to the rest of the industry, Caesars sits comfortably in the middle tier.

Fanatics offers daily boosts and promos during their double power hours, which are at noon and 6:00 p.m. ET. In addition, it offers daily profit boosts. During the postseason tournament, Fanatics gave out 10 profit boosts per day during the tournament’s first weekend. This was one of the best promotions across the college basketball landscape. 

Fanatics Sportsbook has odds posted for all games and while some markets might not be offered, the big important ones are available. Its rewards program also takes a percentage of your wager and applies it to your FanCash balance. You can use this balance to redeem bonus bets, or you can use it to buy a new jersey, hat or sweatshirt at Fanatics.com. That’s certainly unique and intriguing. 

BetRivers has one of the strongest rewards programs in the industry. If you bet enough and raise your ranking, you will quickly redeem quality rewards and bonus bets and offers.

You might not be able to bet on outlandish markets or create 10,000-to-1 parlays using BetRivers’ interface, but they have the basics down to a science. BetRivers’ player loyalty program stacks up against most of its competitors, but when comparing the entirety of its offerings, BetRivers sits comfortably in the industry’s middle tier.

Of course, with this, there are some expected growing pains. College basketball in particular is non-existent in Europe, so it might take a bit for it to get everything buttoned up.  That’s not to say they aren’t already offering daily lines and markets for college basketball though. 

You’ll find all of the basics there to begin. Let’s just hope these offerings will grow in the coming seasons. The current status of bet365’s college basketball betting places it in the segment’s bottom tier with plenty of future upside.

We’ve outlined all of the sportsbooks and the pros and cons of each to bet on college basketball. In the following section, we’ll highlight which sportsbooks are best for specific aspects of sports betting. 

BetMGM Sportsbook consistently offers one of the strongest sign-up bonuses in the industry. Previous offers have included offering new users up to $1,500 in bonus bets if your first bet doesn’t win or choosing between a pair of multiple welcome offers.

In comparison to other similar sign-up bonuses, it’s extremely generous in terms of the maximum cap on its offering. While the stake is higher with this type of promo, the reward is much higher as well.

When it comes to the best apps for college basketball betting, one option comes out on top. FanDuel Sportsbook’s app is amongst the smoothest in the industry. Navigating it is a breeze and live streaming is provided within the app as well. 

Finding markets and prop bets across all sports, especially college basketball, is simple. You can withdraw and deposit money in seconds through a multitude of banking options.

Live betting has taken over as one of the top ways to bet on games. Oddsmakers adjust the opening odds based on what has already happened in the game at the time of your bet. It presents betting opportunities in both directions based on how you feel the rest of the game will go. 

All sportsbooks offer live betting on college basketball, but the best live betting platform can be found on DraftKings Sportsbook. It is the quickest to update scores and odds. During stoppages in play, it has a multitude of markets available such as “race to X points” or “next team to score.”

This review has shared the best sportsbooks to use when betting on college basketball, but that information is not as useful if you don’t know the basics of betting on the sport. In this section, we will share the ins and outs of betting on college basketball. 

At times, it might seem subjective as to which sportsbook is the best for betting on a certain sport. Rest assured, we’ve pored over all of the data and numbers in a variety of key categories to help make these rankings as accurate as possible. Factors we’ve included in our evaluation include:

Lucrative sign-up bonuses and frequent daily promotions help sportsbooks by incentivizing potential users with valuable rewards to create accounts, while a lack of offers hurts a sportsbook. 

Are the odds fair when compared to the rest of the market? A sportsbook that sets even or more player-friendly odds has the ability to draw more bets to their sportsbook. But, this can come at a risk to their own profit. Alternatively, if a sportsbook only posts odds that are more beneficial to the house, this can also trigger sports bettors to stay away, lowering the potential profit for the sportsbook. You also want a sportsbook with a large selection of college basketball betting markets. You want the best variety possible with any sport you’re trying to bet on.

How quickly do odds update? How many markets are available? Is it easy to place bets before the lines change?

How many different methods are available to deposit and withdraw money? Can you deposit using debit cards as well as credit cards? What about Paypal and wire transfers? How quickly can you get your money when you withdraw? 

How easy to use is the app? Can you navigate the app quickly and seamlessly? Is it visually appealing yet also functional? These are some of the questions users should think about when analyzing a sportsbook’s mobile app. 

When betting on college basketball, these are the main markets you should be aware of:

For moneyline bets, odds are adjusted based on the probability of each team winning. For example, in last year’s national title game, UConn was a -285 favorite over Purdue.

Those odds would imply that UConn would win the game about 74% of the time. You would have needed to bet $285 to return a profit of $100. On the other side, Purdue was a +230 underdog. A $100 wager on the Boilermakers would have returned $230 in profit if they won.

A point spread bet is picking which team you think will win after applying a handicap to the game. For example, UConn was a 6.5-point favorite over Purdue in the 2024 title game. If you bet UConn to cover the spread, you would have needed them to win by at least seven points (which they did).

If you bet Purdue to cover the spread, your bet would have won if they won the game outright or lost by a margin of six points or fewer. Spread bets usually are juiced around -110 on both sides.

Over/under betting analyzes if the teams will combine to score more or less points than the listed number. The total for UConn vs. Purdue in the 2024 national title game was set at 145.5 points. 

Because the final score totaled 135 points, those who bet the under would have cashed their bets.

A parlay bet is a combination of multiple bets (called ‘legs’) that offers a much more lucrative payout. The downside is that each leg of the parlay must hit, or your bet loses.

If you create a six-leg parlay and five of your bets win, your bet will still lose because one of your legs lost.

Prop bets are bets on whether something will happen in the game that isn’t specifically related to the game’s final outcome.

Popular prop bets include player stats and team totals. Note that college prop betting is only legal in certain states and even this is a subject still rife with debate as the NCAA has officially petitioned to ban player prop bets to keep student athletes safe from sports betting.

Futures bets are wagers placed for upcoming events that are not specific games or props. For example, you could bet on UConn to win the 2025 NCAA Tournament in May 2024 at +1000 odds at FanDuel Sportsbook.

Broadly speaking, the further out the event, the longer the odds. However, in college basketball, the championship winner could be a toss up before the season. As the event gets closer and the picture becomes clearer, odds are adjusted, especially if one of the favorites goes undefeated into March. 

Like most sports, there are certain betting strategies that many bettors use to try and become profitable college basketball bettors. Here are some common ones: 

With over 360 teams playing Division I men’s college basketball, it’s impossible to follow every team and it’s even more impossible to compare teams to each other due to factors such as strength of schedule and level of competition. 

Some smart bettors use tools such as KenPom, NET rating and Bart Torvik, among others, to help assist in their analysis. These tools take every factor into account when grading teams. You can then use their analytics to help form your handicap. Common stats used include offensive and defensive efficiency, as well as tempo of play. 

There might not be another sport where home-court advantage plays as strongly a role as it does in college basketball. Tune into any big conference game or rivalry game and listen to the crowd. The atmosphere is electric. It’s extremely difficult to win at an opponent’s gym.

Even the best teams slip up on the road against inferior opponents. One common strategy is that anytime an unranked home team is favored over a ranked road team, backing the home underdog is a popular strategy. 

Joining a sportsbook might seem like a daunting task at first, but it’s actually a simple process. Most sportsbooks across the industry have similar registration processes, so follow this guide to get started:

Once you’ve done this, you’re ready to get going on your sports betting journey.