888 Online Sportsbook
3.8

888 Online Sportsbook

888 Sports: Get $500 risk-free bonus

888 Online Sportsbook (New Jersey) – Expert Review & Sign-Up Bonuses

888sport is big. Really big. Or more properly, from its headquarters in the European online gambling hub Gibraltar, parent company 888 Holdings runs a massive gambling and sports betting web empire that spans the entire globe.
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Pros
  • Trusted European Mega-Brand. A major online casino provider based in Europe, the 888 brand is trusted and respected worldwide.
  • Outstanding Mobile Platform. The 888sport NJ mobile app is stable, loads quickly, and provides an excellent user experience once you learn the ins and outs.
  • Fast Withdrawal Methods. Withdrawals take less than a week to process.
  • Beginner-Friendly. Newbies will easily find tutorials to get them into the action quickly.
Cons
  • Busy Desktop Browser Website. The tile-based front page browser is not the easiest way to find the bets you want.
  • Few Withdrawal Methods. While the withdrawal processing time is short, only three withdrawal methods are available … and one of them can only be executed in Atlantic City, NJ.
  • No Loyalty Program. While the international and casino products offered by 888 have loyalty rewards programs, the NJ sportsbook only offers daily bonuses.

888  Sportsbook Online New Jersey Highlights

888sport made landfall in New Jersey when it first went live there in 2018, the year sports betting became legal in the US. Their $500 risk-free bet bonus is still live, and the website offers a different take on what a top-tier online sportsbook can offer.

Authorized by the New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement under the Caesars gaming license, the 888sport online sportsbook is powered by Kambi software and complements the land-based 888 sportsbook located at Caesars Atlantic City. The company also offers 888 Casino games in New Jersey.

888 Online Sportsbook NJ offers new users a fairly standard, but still attractive, welcome bonus. In addition to $10 in free bankroll on your first live-sports bet, 888sport will refund up to $500 in losses. It’s called a “Risk Free Bet” promo.

Terms and Conditions apply to the bonus, of course. Free bets expire in seven days, and parlay bets are not eligible.

A $500 risk-free bet promotion puts 888 Online Sportsbook NJ firmly in the middle of the pack in terms of welcome bonuses. Many competitors offer a similar deal, but it’s still a generous welcome offer and likely to get newcomers betting quickly and betting big.

So, what’s it like to bet at 888 Online Sportsbook NJ?

Well, for starters, the desktop user interface is fair. You can find what you’re looking for using quick links and the search bar, but the tile-based three-column body display isn’t the best way to browse betting options. It adds visual jumble to a data-based assessment.

If 888sport wants to appeal to visual learners, this is not the way to do it. An orderly presentation would work better.

The mobile app is honestly better, with its more straightforward approach. When you enter the amount of your bet, the potential winnings display immediately, so you know just how much you can win.

All major sports franchises and special events are available for all the different kinds of wagers that sports bettors know and love, including moneyline, over/under, spread, prop, and parlay bets.

In addition to the sign-up bonus, 888sport runs frequent promotions, including:

  • Pick8: $1,000 free bets on eight results
  • College Party: Daily free $10 bets on college sports
  • Money-Back Monday: Risk-free first bet up to $50 on Mondays.

Sign-Up Process

Signing up for 888 Online Sportsbook NJ is easy and only takes minutes. The “Sign Up” button is in the static header next to the login button. It’s not highlighted with bright colors, but is by no means difficult to find.

When you click the button, the site walks you through a three-page sign-up process:

  • Personal Details. This page asks for your name, date of birth, gender, and social security number. The site takes your SSN to verify your identity, to check your age and determine whether or not you are eligible for a sign-up bonus.
  • Account Details. On this page, you will enter your email address and phone number. You will also create a username, password, and security questions for password recovery.
  • A Few Last Details. This page asks for your residential address, nationality, and passport number. You must also check several boxes to affirm agreement with site Terms and Conditions and attest to the truth of what you have entered.

Ease of Use

Newcomers to sports betting will enjoy the way 888sport loads beginner-friendly content, including a quickstart video and a guide to sports betting.

The tile format on the desktop browser site is not the best way to browse popular betting options at a glance. There are just too many discreet boxes of text in too much of a jumble.

Once you click on a sport, franchise, or other subsection, things get a little more orderly. Betting options are listed in an easy-to-use list format with attractive orange buttons to place your bets.

It’s really cool how your potential winnings are calculated as soon as you enter the desired betting amount, before you place your bet.

Once your bets are placed, your betslip can be accessed in the “Your Bets” link. It would be nice if a static betslip were available from anywhere on the website so you could track your action.

Once you find the event you want to bet on, however, it’s quick and easy to place a bet, as well as to deposit or withdraw money.

888 Online Sportsbook New Jersey Deposit Options

888 Online Sportsbook NJ offers a number of popular deposit options, all of which become available for betting immediately and many of these will be familiar to seasoned online sports bettors.

ACH

Automated Clearing House (ACH) payments link two bank accounts directly in the cloud, using the routing number and bank account. A payment by ACH is sometimes referred to as an “e-check.”

It’s a fast, free method of transferring money between bank accounts and more up-to-date than wire transfers, which use phone lines and incur extra processing time and fees.

Cash at the Counter (Caesars Atlantic City)

If you can make your way to Caesars Atlantic City, 888sport operates a land-based sportsbook on the grounds. You can go to the 888sport counter and deposit cash directly to your online account.

Credit or Debit Card (Visa, MasterCard, Discover)

You can directly deposit funds into your 888sport bankroll using your Visa, MasterCard, or Discover credit or debit card. 888sport currently does not accept deposits from American Express.

Be aware that certain issuing banks may automatically decline transactions with online gambling sites, despite the fact that they are perfectly legal in New Jersey.

PayPal

888 Online Sportsbook NJ supports this venerable mobile wallet, which serves as an effective middleman for transactions on your credit card, debit card, or bank account. You can also use your PayPal balance to fund your bankroll.

PayPal is a convenient option for customers seeking to deposit funds into their 888sport account using their American Express card.

Online Bank Transfer

If you like, you can transfer money directly from a New Jersey-based checking account into your bankroll without bothering to set up an ACH.

PayNearMe (7/Eleven)

7/Eleven convenience stores offer a cash bill-pay system called PayNearMe. You can go to any 7/Eleven location and deposit cash directly into your 888sport bankroll.

It’s a convenient way to make cash deposits even if you can’t make it to Caesars Atlantic City—or the state of New Jersey, for that matter.

888 Online Sportsbook New Jersey Withdrawal Options

888 Online Sportsbook NJ only offers three withdrawal methods, which is pretty limiting. The good news is that all three methods offer fast processing times.

ACH

ACH withdrawals take up to two days to be approved and up to four days to process, for a total turnaround time of up to six days.

Cash at the Counter

Cash at the 888sport counter in Caesars Atlantic City can be withdrawn immediately, although large cash withdrawals may require managerial approval. This can take up to 24 hours.

PayPal

PayPal withdrawals are the fastest to process, though they land in your PayPal balance. Transferring the funds from your PayPal account to your bank account can take several days, though they usually post within a day–and often within a minute or two if you’re a frequent PayPal user. Instant transfers to your bank account are available for an extra fee.

PayPal withdrawals take 3 days to approve by the casino unless you are a VIP Gold member. One of the VIP Gold perks is the one-day PayPal transfer approval. Once approved, the withdrawal takes 1-2 days to process, for a total turnaround time of 4-5 days (or 2-3 days if you are VIP Gold).

888 Online Sportsbook New Jersey Popular Games

On 888 Online Sportsbook NJ, you can bet on just about every sporting event you could imagine. This includes major franchises like:

  • NBA Basketball
  • NCAAB College Basketball
  • NHL Hockey
  • Premier League Soccer
  • Champions League Soccer
  • La Liga Soccer
  • UFC Combat
  • MMA Combat
  • ATP Tennis
  • Major League Baseball
  • Pro Golf
  • Rugby
  • Cricket
  • Boxing
  • Motorsports

Every major sporting event on the calendar is represented, including the Super Bowl, World Series, Final Four, FIFA World Cup, Olympic Games, and more.

Within each sport, players have a range of betting options, including …

Live In-Game Betting

As the name suggests, live in-game bets can only be placed once the game is started. An exciting, fast-paced way to bet, players can bet between quarters, innings, sets, holes, or whatever period they want.

Live wagers allow bettors to enter and exit the action at any time they want, including an early exit for a lower payout if they want to quit while they are ahead.

Due to their time-sensitive nature, live bets need a stable, responsive betting platform to be viable. 888sport makes it easy. Both the website and app are reliable and load quickly. The front page of the website offers tiles featuring many live games in progress.

Additionally, a “Live Right Now” link sits right at the top of the left-hand menu. Click on it and you can see all games in progress, sorted by sport as well as alphabetically. You can jump to a particular sport by clicking the corresponding visual icon (a football, a hockey stick, etc.).

Moneyline Betting

Moneyline bets, also known as “American Odds,” are an easy way to bet on the winner of a game without having to do complex math. Whatever the final point total might be, if you pick the winner, you get paid.

How much you get paid is determined by a form of odds set by the sportsbook, expressed as a positive or negative number and related to the value of $100.

The favorite will have a negative moneyline. This number expresses how much you have to bet to win $100. For example, if you bet $150 on a favored team with a moneyline of -150, you will get an extra $100, taking home $250 if that team wins.

The underdog will have a positive moneyline. This is how much the bettor will win if (s)he bets $100. If you bet $100 on an underdog with a moneyline of +150, you will win $150 and take home $250—same as the previous bet, but with less of your money placed at risk.

In this way, the math of a moneyline bet works out such that the payout is bigger if you bet on the underdog to win, due to the fact that the underdog is considered less likely to do so.

888 Online Sportsbook NJ makes it easy to place moneyline bets. Each competition has two big orange buttons identifying each competitor and listing the appropriate moneyline.

Don’t want to do the math yourself?

No problem; your potential winnings are displayed as soon as you enter your desired bet, giving you a chance to understand what you can win before placing your bet.

Over/Under Betting

Also referred to as “Totals” bets, Over/Under wagers are wagers on how many total points are scored in a game.

The sportsbook sets an anticipated total points scored by both competitors combined. Bettors can “take the over,” to bet that the competitors will collectively overperform (score more points than the anticipated total), or they can “take the under,” i.e. bet on an underperformance (scoring fewer points than the identified total).

You don’t have to identify which team will be “responsible” for performing over or under the total. If the anticipated total on a football game is 35 points and you take the over, you will win if the score is 36-0, 42-3, 35-3, or 24-15, because all of these scores break 35 when the numbers are combined.

Over/Under odds may be expressed as a moneyline, the difference being you are betting on the over/under, not on a team to win.

If the final score matches the predicted total, you get your wager money back. This is known as a “push.”

To make a Totals bet on 888 Online Casino NJ, you usually need to find the desired sporting event and click on “More Betting Options” on its tile. The top-facing tile typically only displays the moneyline to win.

Point Spreads

For most contests, the sportsbook identifies a “point spread,” or a number of points by which the favorite (also sometimes referred to as the “chalk”) will win the game.

Bettors can bet on a team to “cover the spread” or fail to do so. If the spread is +3.5 and the favorite wins by 2, the favorite has failed to cover the spread despite winning the game. If a bettor wagered on the favorite to win in a moneyline bet, (s)he wins. However, if (s)he bet on the winner to cover the spread, (s)he loses that bet.

Odds on spread bets are usually expressed as moneylines, the difference being they are all negative moneylines, meaning you have to bet more than you will win. This amounts to an extra commission to the sportsbook, sometimes called the “juice” or the “vigorish.”

To make a Point Spread bet on 888 Online Casino NJ, you usually need to find the desired sporting event and click on “More Betting Options” on its tile. The top-facing tile typically only displays the moneyline to win.

Parlay Betting

A parlay is one consolidated bet on multiple outcomes. You could bet on two teams to win separate games, for example. You only win the parlay if both teams win their respective games.

You could also bet on two outcomes of the same game, as well. For example, you could bet on the favorite to win, but you could bet that they fail to beat the spread if you expect them to underperform. Alternatively, you could bet on the favorite to win but take the under if you expect a low-scoring game. You only win the parlay if both outcomes come about.

You can build a parlay out of any collection of outcomes you want. Parlay bets tend to pay out big, since it’s much harder to guess two outcomes correctly than to guess just one.

888 Online Sportsbook Loyalty Program

Well, this section is a damp squib since 888 Online Sportsbook NJ currently offers no loyalty program.

Internationally, 888sport offers “Premier Player Rewards” of $50 back for each $3,000 wagered—not exactly earth-shattering, but at least it’s something. Premier Player Rewards, however, are not available in New Jersey.

This is especially frustrating considering 888 Online Casino NJ offers loyalty points in the form of one Status Point for each $10 bet. Even then, you’re only getting 0.1% cash back value, which is pretty slim. We’d like to see something closer to 1% or better.

Even these paltry rewards are not available on the 888 Online Sportsbook NJ. 888sport does not offer Status Points either. 888sport does offer a tiered VIP program. Members get perks such as expedited withdrawals, special gifts, and VIP promotions.

888 Online Sportsbook Website

Perhaps due to its European heritage, 888 Online Sportsbook NJ looks very different from some of its competitors.

For starters, the front page is quite busy … and yet displays very little information. Whereas other online sportsbooks offer detailed lists of betting options or raw data of live games, 888 Online Sportsbook NJ displays trending bets as square tiles in the main site body, with orange clickable buttons to place bets.

This offers the site some visual appeal, but doesn’t do it any favors in terms of UX. This is a data-heavy hobby, and breaking the data up into staggered squares just makes it exceptionally hard and laborious to take in.

When you click to place a bet, a sub-window opens for you to enter your bet. It’s cool, too, that your potential winnings immediately populate when you enter the amount.

Fortunately, it’s fairly easy to find your way around. A large “Search” bar sits at the top of the main page body, allowing you to quickly and easily find what you are looking for.

Still, the tile display isn’t particularly inviting. You want to dive headfirst into the action, but if you have to go searching for what you want to bet on, odds are you won’t make the bet at all.

A static header offers easy links to live betting, promotions, a blog, and a handy start guide, along with a “Sports Betting A-Z” compendium.

A non-static, left-side column displays links to the home page and live games in progress, as well as games starting soon. The column also contains handy links to popular franchises and individual sports.

888 Online Sportsbook NJ stands out in its user-friendliness. A static button on the front page offers instructions on “How to Place Your First Bet,” and the link takes you to a video tutorial on sign-up and betting procedures. This is narrated by a man trying and failing to do a convincing American accent, adding to all the good fun.

On the upper static header, the “Getting Started” link takes you to a helpful and detailed FAQ.

Know what’s missing from the front page, though?

Yes–a betslip. Whereas other online sportsbooks offer a static window where you can track your action from anywhere in the site, 888 Online Sportsbook has no such static betslip.

Instead, you access it from the “Your Bets” link at the top of the page. Not terrible, but not as convenient as a static betslip.

Another thing missing is a “Contact Us” or “Support” link. If you scroll to the footer, one of the links is to “Online Help,” but this takes you to troubleshooting and FAQ, along with a “Contact Us” button that takes you to a contact form, but no support number or direct email. This all gives you the distinct impression that 888 Online Sportsbook would rather you just played and didn’t bother them.

888 Online Sportsbook NJ does offer 24/7 support by phone or email, but to find that contact info–well, you guessed it–you have to go hunting again. Spoiler alert: the phone number and email address can be found at the “Safe to Play” page in the “Getting Started” menu.

888 Online Sportsbook Mobile App

Kambi developed both iOS and Android apps for 888 Online Sportsbook NJ. The app loads quickly, and features all the functions of the desktop browser version of the sportsbook … but in a more stripped-down presentation.

Thereare fewer graphics, bells, and whistles on the mobile version of the sportsbook but this bare essentials version actually serves the sportsbook well for several reasons.

First of all, the app is lightweight, reliable, and loads quickly—all features you want to have when you’re trying to place a time-sensitive, in-play sports bet.

Secondly, the bare-bones approach makes the app more user-friendly than the busy, tile-based desktop browser.

It’s not immediately easy to find everything you need due to the collapsible, mobile-friendly “hamburger” menus … but once you get the hang of it, it’s actually easier and more fun to place bets on the go using the 888sport mobile app than to place them on the desktop browser site.

888 Online Sportsbook New Jersey Contact Information

888 Online Casino NJ offers 24/7 phone support at 800-494-0364.

Email 888 Online Sportsbook NJ at supportNJ@888.com.

Submit questions via the contact form here.

888 Online Sportsbook New Jersey: The Verdict

888 Holdings’ entry in the New Jersey online sportsbook market is professional, stable, and ready for primetime, as you would expect from a multinational conglomerate like 888 and a pro developer such as Kambi.

Unfortunately, it feels like the desktop browser version of the sportsbook borrowed too much from the tile-based interface made popular by online casinos.

It works for a product such as video slots or video blackjack, where flashy colors and graphics can make the difference in a user’s engagement.

For a more cerebral, data-drive process like sports betting, however, this makes for a clumsy and irritating, non-intuitive user interface. It’s hard to take in all the top-line data when it is broken up into tiles and it feels like an especially traumatic Windows 10 nightmare.

A static front-page betslip would be another improvement, as well as the addition of any kind of loyalty rewards program.

However, a strong mobile app, frequent promotions, robust customer support, and a land-based presence at Caesars Atlantic City keep 888 in the game. The absence of any imposed withdrawal limits also helps 888 Online Sportsbook (New Jersey) to win 4 stars (in our view) for the Trust and Fairness criterion–an accolade we don’t often award.

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