Esports Betting Sites

Esports Betting in Australia in 2023

Esports are a form of competitive video gaming that is watched by millions of people around the world. In recent years, Esports have exploded in popularity, with tournaments being held in hugely popular games such as League of Legends, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and DOTA 2.

Originally, Australia was primarily a Riot Games territory (League of Legends, Valorant), unlike much of the rest of the world where Valve reigned (CS:GO, DOTA 2). Riot Games seriously invested in Australia and created the Oceanic Pro League for League of Legends (LoL). But in 2020, the company closed its Australian offices and abolished the Oceanic Pro League. This put the brakes on the industry's development in the country, as most Esports clubs were founded as LoL teams.

But the biggest blow to Esports in Australia was the banning of in-play betting in 2016. The government decided that betting sites were constantly pushing the idea that it's pointless to watch the game without betting and banned online Esports betting services. Betting sites were only left with the option of accepting bets by phone. However, they adapted quickly and automated the system of quick betting on Esports online by phone. There were plans in the government to close this window as well. Nevertheless, it is still allowed to accept live bets by phone. Still this is a significant discomfort compared to the quick wagering on Esports betting websites that everyone is used to. Pre-match betting is quite difficult in Esports: in LoL and DOTA, a lot depends on the draft, the first leg of the battle.

Thus, Esports betting options in Australia has been greatly stifled by the regulation: for most betting sites, the market has simply become uninteresting. In 2023, it will not be easy to find about 10 Aussie bookmakers taking Esports bets. In our review, we'll describe all these Esports bookies that diligently go against the tide.

Riot Games is now operating in Australia again. Perhaps, thanks to this fact, Australian Esports will get a second wind. The company is actively promoting Valorant, its new first-person shooter. Tactically, the game is similar to CS:GO and just as geared towards a competitive format. In this shooter, even beginners immediately start playing in a tournament format: 5x5, with a limited number of rounds (25).

LoL still remains the most popular among Esports titles in Australia. It is followed by CS:GO and DOTA 2. Next in line are Overwatch (from Blizzard) and Valorant for now considered the "second tier". The number of competitions and their popularity cannot be compared with the top three.

Those interested in CS:GO can participate in a number of tournaments of varying levels. The biggest of these is the ESL Intel Extreme Masters (IEM) tournament, which had its finals run in Sydney until 2019 inclusive. No tournament has been held since then.

The Esports tournament bracket is similar to championships in real sports, it goes like this:

Accordingly, from level to level the amount of prize money and popularity of the matches increase, also among Australian punters. If you want to bet on Esports in Australia, you're likely to have no problem finding an Esports match in any of the top disciplines.

As well as these games, you can bet on Starcraft 2, Rainbow Six Siege, King of Glory, FIFA and the NBA in Australia.

How We Ranked Esports Betting Sites in Australia

Our criteria for picking the best Esports betting sites in Australia are broadly similar to our criteria for choosing online betting sites best for real sports betting.

The only exception is live streaming. In real sports betting, the availability of live streams on the bookmaker's website is important because a user may not be able to watch a match for free. In Esports, by the winter of 2023, all tournaments are still streamed for free and almost any Esports event can be watched on Twitch or YouTube. In addition, Esports live betting is banned in Australia.  That's why we consider the factor of live streaming to be less important for the final evaluation of recommended Esports betting sites.

The main criteria for our evaluation of betting sites for Esports are as follows:

How to Bet on Esports at an Australian Bookmaker

William Hill never dreamed how easy it would be to make a bet in the 21st century. Thanks to the internet, you no longer have to go to the bet shops. There's something nostalgically enchanting about looking through a list of bets printed on multiple sheets, picking up a bet slip at the betting shop, and then walking back to cash it in... Now you can make an Esports bet in a few taps.

In some cases, the bookmaker will write that the bet is not accepted because the betting odds have changed. You can either accept this and bet anyway, or choose another option. Usually Esports bookies allow you to tick the "automatically accept when odds go up" box in the settings.

Bet Types on Esports in Australia

Most Esports have a roughly similar scenario: two teams compete on one of the maps included in the game's official map pool. The number of maps played may vary. This is the scenario used in DOTA 2, CS:GO, League of Legends, Overwatch, Valorant and Rainbow Six Siege.

Based on this, the betting options for these disciplines are also about the same. Apart from the range of markets, which is usually wider for the three most popular games: DOTA 2, CS:GO and LoL.

Here are the markets you can bet on:

Match winner

This is the easiest Esports betting market – on who will win the whole game.

Map Winner

It’s a similar betting market, only on a particular map. Often teams play more than one map in a match, and you can bet on each map. If there is more than one map in the game, be sure to consider how the team plays on that particular map: for each, there are locations where they play excellent, and locations where they are less strong.

Totals

There are bets on totals by the number of maps played, individual team totals on a particular map, and in CS:GO  - totals by the number of rounds in a particular map.  A customer bets on the total over/ under 2.5 maps played in a match. In fact there will be either 2 or 3 maps , and one of these bets will win and the other will lose. An individual team total is a bet on whether a team will win, for example, more or less than 13.5 rounds on one map.

These bets are also available for the vast majority of popular Esports matches.

Handicaps

These are bets that will make the game more interesting if the strengths of the opponents are clearly unequal. You can bet on the favourite to win with a negative handicap, or on the outsider  with a positive handicap. A handicap is the difference you must add to the actual score to find out if your bet wins.

You can even win with a negative handicap on outsiders (CS team). In real sport, handicaps can be both fractional and integer. If you bet on an integer handicap and the game ends up with a draw, the Esports betting site returns the bet - meaning you didn't win and you didn't lose. Integer handicaps are not yet widespread in Esports due to the limited range of betting markets - the sphere is still developing.

Betting on special rounds. CS:GO and Valorant have pistol rounds at the start of the game for each side, when players do not yet have money for rifles. Winning a pistol round allows the team to gain an economic advantage over their opponent, which often leads to winning then the second and sometimes third round.

In CS there is also at times a knife round. It is used to determine the side the team will start playing for on the deciding map (called the decider) if the score is even.

Outrights

Betting on the tournament outcome even in real sport is not as popular as other bets, because the you have to wait a long time for the bet to be settled. Besides, if you really believe in the winner of a tournament, it almost always will be more profitable for you to bet on the win of that team or player in every single match.

Best Games & Tournaments for Australian Esports Betting

There are different Esports games to choose from on Australian Esports betting sites. This chapter will tell you what tournaments are being held on the most popular ones.

Locally there have been OPL - Oceanic Professional League - tournaments - from 2015 to 2020. After the closure of Riot Games' offices in Australia, the league was abolished.

Now regional League of Legends tournaments take place under the LCO series. Winners of the regional stages qualify for the bigger tournaments. Namely:

The Mid-Season Invitational. This is a separate large tournament, which is considered an opportunity to prepare for the World Championships, though it is a status tournament in itself. It is an international competition. Riot Games oversees regional leagues around the world, including in Oceania. Each year the Mid-Season Invitational takes place in a new region. In 2022 it was held in South Korea. The tournament has a prize pool of over $200,000 with the winner of 2022, China's Royal Never Give Up, receiving $75,000. Australia's ORDER team finished 7th-8th.

League of Legends World Championship. It is similar to football championships. The 16 teams are divided into 4 groups, with 2 teams in each group advancing to the playoffs.

Apart from that, you can also bet on matches in other tournaments, which are run by different organisations. The Hitpoint masters series and the LVP Superliga, for example.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive is one of the most popular Esports games in betting world/ It also offers a large variety of tournaments starting with numerous regional leagues.

Then there are the regional and international minors and majors. Lately, major esports tournament takes place twice a year, also there are more minors. CS:GO tournaments are most often named after the organiser. Major Esports tournaments are organised by ESL, PGL, BLAST. ESL tournaments may start with IEM - Intel Extreme Masters.

Some CS:GO matches take place every day, there is always something to bet on.

DOTA's major and minor tournaments structure is similar to CS:GO. There are tier 1 competitions where the best teams compete. These include PGL, ESL and regional DOTA Pro Circuit tournaments. Speaking of major tournaments, The International has the biggest prize pool in cybersport, it is presented on many betting sites, even if they can't be called Esports-oriented. Tier 2 - lower level regional tournaments and tier 3 - tournaments through which young players will progress to the top leagues. One or the other Esports matches of these tournaments are played daily.

The biggest FIFA tournament is the FIFA eWorld Cup. The GT series (organised by GTSports Leagues) is also considered a major tournament. There are also many other tournaments that look like amateur competitions. Information on them is hard to find on the internet and the system of these tournaments is difficult to understand. There is probably no point in trying to keep track of such leagues. In GT series games, you can bet on players based on their ranking - it's available on the GTSports Leagues website.

Overwatch from Blizzard  is not the most popular discipline in Esports today. Nevertheless, you will be able to bet on individual games at the best Esports betting sites.

Overwatch has four tiers of leagues.