News

March 2025

Much has been written about the lucrative nature of the Cheltenham Festival 2025 for the betting industry, and this was not confined to the off-course market. Britbet, which is owned by the racecourses and provides the on-course pool betting function, saw a new record high from on-course Tote betting turnover. In total £11.34m was bet into the Tote pools from Cheltenham during the Festival, an increase of c£600,000 on 2024 – an impressive achievement against the backdrop of the attendance reductions.

The comparison against 2024 is helped by the Cross-Country race taking place having been abandoned last year. In addition, the amendments to the race programme were positive and saw average field sizes growing to 16.1 from 13.6 in 2024.

Britbet is a partnership of 55 British racecourses, which was formed in 2018 to help provide racecourses with an on-course betting service. It has an agreement with the UK Tote Group via which Britbet acts as an agent of the Tote and delivers racegoers bets into the pools to be commingled with bets from the Tote’s off course turnover. The Britbet operation allows the racecourses to better control the customer service on-course. At Cheltenham there was an average of 467 members of the team taking bets each day who sold over 570,000 bets across the week.

Britbet Managing Director Nigel Roddis said “It was a very positive week for Britbet and I hope that racegoers enjoyed themselves. We had some notable wins through the week, the most high profile being a £55,000 return from a £5 Placepot bet. Our Lucky Pick wallets also delivered once again, with two racegoers on the Tuesday picking up £16,000.”

The Tote Guarantee was introduced in 2020. This means we pay the higher of the Tote Win dividend or the industry SP on all Win bets, including the win part of each way bets. This offer has resulted in a strong turnover uplift. At the 2025 Festival, an extra £500,000+ was paid out to racegoers in additional winnings from Tote Guarantee – this being the difference between the actual dividend and the SP.

The Lucky Pick product has been offered since britbet launched. It uses an algorithm to choose bets for customers. Lucky Pick ‘wallets’ including a bundle of bets for the raceday, have become very popular with racegoers across the country, and accounted for c3.6% of all turnover during the Festival.

Britbet also recently introduced Multiples, allowing racegoers to place Doubles and Trebles for Win, Place or Each Way bets into Tote pools. This has been well received and accounted for over 5% of all turnover at the Festival.

The Placepot remains a key Tote offering on-course. The various surprises that unfolded on Champion Hurdle day, notably in the feature race itself, led to a dividend of £11,051 to a £1 stake. 

January 2025

Britbet Racing LLP (“Britbet”), a partnership of 55 British racecourses, has today announced an extended commitment from its racecourse partners for the continued delivery of their on-course pool betting service.

A key element to this commitment from racecourses comes from britbet renewing a long-term partnership with the UK Tote Group that will deliver liquidity from the majority of its racecourse partners, including all Jockey Club racecourses and the large independent tracks, to the pools hosted by the Tote on racing taking place at these racecourses.

The renewed partnership will continue to provide a united approach to growing pool betting in the UK, with racecourses controlling the delivery of an on-course service and the Tote providing the recognised brand and the off-course services, combining to create a single pool hosted by the Tote.

The agreement between britbet and the Tote will go live in November 2025 and will be in place until at least the end of October 2030, subject to a range of performance measures being met. The new partnership builds on the existing agreement which has been in place since October 2018. Over this time there has been significant growth and innovation in pool betting, with the launch of a dedicated Tote website and app, combined with more competitive pricing, including the introduction of Tote Guarantee in 2020 which ensures the Tote will always exceed or match the Industry Starting Price on Win bets.

Britbet commenced operating the pool betting service on-course in July 2018. On-course turnover exceeded £72m in 2024, a 26% increase to that achieved in 2018. It has delivered this through a continued investment in its team and the technology used to take the bets from racegoers. The key Tote Guarantee offering provides value back to customers, whilst on-course specific innovations such as Lucky Pick wallets and Multiples, have all helped to drive increased customer engagement.

Under the operation of the UK Tote Group, the overall UK/Irish pool (the two pools were combined via an agreement with Horse Racing Ireland in April 2020) has increased by over 50% with 100,000 online active customers enjoying an ever-improving customer experience at tote.co.uk/ie. Through the existing deal the UK Tote Group has returned over £40 million to Britbet over the last five years, while investing over £100 million in the business to support the future growth of pool betting.

Over the last six years several British racecourses have benefited from the introduction of World Pool which is hosted on some of the highest profile Flat race days. By combining pools from around the globe, World Pool creates huge liquidity for racing fans and a new revenue stream for racecourses via increased media rights. Since its inception by the Hong Kong Jockey Club in 2019, World Pool has contributed in excess of £50 million to British and Irish racecourses making it the most significant new funding stream for the sport in recent years. The new partnership between britbet and the UK Tote Group ensures a continued unified approach for many racecourses, helping to focus on a single pool and working with international partners to benefit from the evolution and expansion of World Pool.

Nigel Roddis, Managing Director of Britbet, said: “We are delighted to receive the continued backing of our racecourse partners and to use that to continue the relationship with the UK Tote Group. The delivery of a daily pool betting service ranges from 500+ staff on each day of the Cheltenham Festival, through to meetings where everyone knows each other on a weekday Winter evening. To be viable it requires a collective approach, sharing resources and spreading costs as widely as possible. Britbet is tangible evidence of the benefits that the customer can receive from racecourses acting together. We look forward to continuing to work with the Tote team to deliver further benefits for racegoers as well as providing the core liquidity to help drive the continued expansion of the pools off course.”

Charlie Boss, Interim Group Chief Executive of the Jockey Club and Britbet Board member, said: “This extended partnership is fantastic news, not only for us and for racegoers but also for the wider industry. We want to offer everyone on our racecourses from regulars to first time visitors the best possible experience, and the pool betting offering delivered by britbet in collaboration with the UK Tote Group offers so many benefits for our customers, from new innovations and products to the service they receive on-course.

"We're also committed to furthering our collaboration with global pool betting partners and, as we have seen with the World Pool initiative, driving growth in this area benefits the sport in a number of ways, not least by increasing media rights which we are then able to reinvest back into British racing.”

Alex Eade, Secretary General of the Large Independent Racecourse Group and britbet Board member, on which he represents Goodwood, Newbury and York, said: “Continuing with britbet and its partnership with the Tote is very important to Goodwood, Newbury and York racecourses. These tracks host internationally renowned race meetings for which World Pool and our relationship with the Hong Kong Jockey Club are critical in generating new revenue and increasing prize money levels. It also ensures that we have access to resources that allow us, and all racecourses across Great Britain, to deliver excellent customer service to racegoers whenever we race.”

Jonathan Garratt, representing the small independent racecourses on the britbet Board, said: “Britbet has succeeded in reversing the previously entrenched decline of pool betting on British racecourses and is an excellent collaboration. While smaller racecourses have no direct access to the benefits of World Pool, our valuable content provides consistency for the pool betting service from day to day and so I’m pleased that this has been recognised through the extended agreement with UK Tote Group.”

Alex Frost, Chief Executive of the UK Tote Group, said: “This is another significant moment in the evolution of the modern Tote as we work with our partners across British racing and around the world to rejuvenate pool betting in the UK and Ireland. We are delighted to have agreed a second long-term partnership with leading British racecourses allowing us to work together to develop the digital and racecourse customer experience to ensure we are offering racing fans a competitive and appealing experience when betting with the Tote. In addition, this new partnership provides the stable platform British racing needs to work with international pool betting partners, including the Hong Kong Jockey Club and members of the World Tote Association. This will allow the sport to benefit from the further evolution of World Pool and further opportunities to grow pool betting on British racing which is a key revenue driver in the years ahead.

“I would like to thank Nigel Roddis and the whole britbet board for their commitment in renewing our partnership and we look forward to working together with all racecourses and stakeholders in the years ahead.”

The new partnership does not include Arena Racing Company racecourses. Discussions about pool betting between Arena Racing Company, britbet and the UK Tote Group are ongoing.

February 2024

We're pleased to announce that Multiples are now available on britbet racecourses.

Multiples allow customers to bet on more than one race via Tote Pools.

Initially racegoers will be able to combine selections from two or three races into one bet. For example, a Win Double, where they pick horses to win two separate races. Or a ‘Treble’ that would cover selections in three races.

With Multiples we place a bet on the first selection into the relevant Tote pool. Then if there are winnings from that bet they get put onto the next selection in the next individual Tote pool. Our technology saves the customer from having to collect their winnings and place the next bet.

Customers can place Win, Place or Each Way bets with Tote Multiples as Double or Trebles to cover two or three races.

Bets can be placed on any UK or Irish race meeting for races taking place at the same course.

All Multiple bets are settled at the official Tote dividends as shown on racecourse screens for Win and Place. Tote Guarantee applies on Win bets and the Win part of Each Way bets.

The number of places offered varies per race depending on the number of runners, but will follow the Tote Place rules for each race.

2024

We are pleased to share that we have opened Tote ‘betting lounges’ at Newton Abbot and Ludlow.

These areas will have an investment in TV screens and provide a dedicated service focused on away betting. We also have Tote Guarantee and Multiples to promote, providing a good value service offering for ‘betting shop’ punters including video previews and tips streamed from our Liverpool office. This will mean that Chelmsford, Ludlow and Fakenham will be ‘Tote only racecourses’ with no traditional betting shop offering at any of these courses.

We have reconfigured other areas at racecourses too, to improve the customer experience and try to grow turnover. Examples of this include the bank of TVs in Quevegas at Cheltenham, which provides a dedicated area for away betting coverage and promotion of Tote betting. Digital form betting screens have also been added to Cheltenham racecourse.

November 2023

We are pleased to share that we have launched a new racecourse app for use by racegoers, called  ‘Raceday Ready’.

This has been built by britbet and in association with the Racecourse Association and is an important project for us and the racing industry.

Raceday Ready is a key part of the raceday experience at all ARC courses and gives our customers:

• Access to the digital raceday tickets (with QR Codes), which can also be saved to a wallet on their phone
• A free digital racecard with tips and previews for every race that will update throughout the day with non-runners, results and dividends
• Guides to the racecourse and racing, for example jargon busters, tips on what see and do etc
• Offers and competitions
• Plus all the information needed to make the most of your raceday!

You can download the app from Google Play or the App Store, just search ‘Raceday Ready’.

2022

We're pleased to share that we are now hosting britbet pools at five different British greyhound tracks - Newcastle, Nottingham, Sunderland, Perry Barr and Sheffield.

We have built full off-course pool betting capability too and also have B2B customers betting into the pools as well as some other larger staking individual customers.

Earlier this year we also released our first multi-leg bet, a Pick6 - which is similar to the Jackpot bet. We have offered some
guarantees to help build up these pools and this has led to some big wins, including a £3,409 payout at Sheffield in March.

We also offer Lucky Pick bets at greyhound tracks, which are increasing in popularity.

2019

At britbet, we recognise that the service we provide forms an integral part of any racegoers day.

That's why our Lucky Pick product is the easiest way to bet, offering customers the chance to win using a computer-generated algorithm. Customers can choose a Lucky Pick wallet that covers a selection of bets at a race meeting, or on any single race giving several chances to win. Wallets are available for different price points, such as £10 or £20. Individual Lucky Picks are also available on any of our bet types such as Win; Each-Way; Placepot or Multiples.

Some of the biggest wins we have seen from Lucky Pick bets include:

• £47,350 from a £2 Placepot at Cheltenham
• £30,013 from a £2 Placepot at Newbury
• £19,753 from a £6 Placepot at Wetherby

As well as being available from all Tote positions on-course, Lucky Pick wallets can also be pre-ordered for hospitality customers for a raceday here