
Parlay betting is a high-risk, high-reward style of betting. It allows you to combine multiple bets into a single otakparlay wager to try to multiply your winnings. The more bets you include, the bigger the potential payout. That said, you need to win each individual wager in order to win the bet. If just one leg of your parlay loses, the entire bet is graded as a loser.
These bets are typically frowned up by most professional gamblers because they will eat up your bankroll if you aren’t careful. Your win rate on combination bets is obviously going to be lower than on individual bets, so parlays shouldn’t make up a large portion of your betting portfolio.
How to build a parlay
Parlays can be built using as few as two individual wagers or as many as 15. These bets can include spread bets, moneyline bets, or over/unders. Some sportsbooks will even allow you to include player prop bets in a parlay.
The most common parlay sizes are just two or three teams. Once you get to a four-team parlay or greater, the house starts to gain a substantial edge on the player. This can be quantified using some simple math.
Common parlay odds
Let’s look at a simple two-team parlay. These will generally be paid out at +260 — or 2.6 to 1 — on two standard -110 wagers. This means a $100 wager will net you a profit of $260 if you win both bets, leaving you with a total bankroll of $360.
That’s pretty appealing on the surface, but how does it compare to rolling the same $100 over into two separate bets? If you took your $100 and bet it on the first half of the wager, a win would increase your bankroll to $191.90. You could then roll your increased bankroll over to the second bet, and if that wager wins, you would wind up with a total bankroll of $364.43. That puts the parlay in the same ballpark as the individual wagers, with a slight benefit to the “rollover” method.