How to Bet on UFC
UFC, and combat sports in general, are designed for betting. Watching two fighters trade blows in an octagon just doesn’t feel complete without throwing some cash on who you think will dominate. Choose correctly and you can bask in the glory of the win with a bigger bankroll (and ego) thanks to Bodog Sportsbook.
Although betting on the winner of a fight is the most popular way to bet on UFC, there are other ways to get in the action too. In this UFC betting guide, we go beyond the moneyline, explaining how to bet on round totals, method of victory, props and fight length through either single bets or high-paying parlays. Read on as we explain how to bet online at Bodog Sportsbook with each of these betting options, followed by some tips on how to win more money, more often.
UFC Moneyline Odds
The moneyline is the best place to begin to learn how to bet on a UFC fight; it’s the standard betting option that involves picking who you think will win the fight. Both combatants have their own set of UFC Vegas odds (expressed as American odds at Bodog Sportsbook), and as the bettor, you choose the fighter you think will win.
The fighter with the shortest UFC odds is considered the favourite, and you’ll be able to tell they’re favoured in the sportsbook by their negative odds. The underdog, on the other hand, usually has positive odds and offers bigger payouts. As an example for moneyline betting, we’ll use the Jorge Masvidal-Nate Diaz bout from UFC 244.
Jorge Masvidal -165
Nate Diaz +110
As you can tell by his positive odds, Nate Diaz was an underdog going up against the more experienced Jorge Masvidal. With +110 odds, supporters would have walked away with $110 off of a $100 bet—had he won. In the third round, however, Masvidal was declared the winner, and his backers pocketed $100 off of $165 bets. Keep in mind, these numbers are used to illustrate the payscale; larger and smaller bets are certainly allowed.
UFC Total Rounds Odds
For major events, a slew of props are available to enhance your UFC betting experience, and none is more popular than the Total Rounds prop, which refers to the total number of rounds reached in a fight. Keep in mind, the number of rounds in a UFC fight depends on whether it’s a championship bout or a regular one.
To create a Total Rounds bet, oddsmakers come up with a mid-way point where it makes sense to divide the bets; this could be 2.5-rounds. Bettors will choose “Over” if they think that the fight will last more than 2 and a half rounds, or Under if they think that the fight will end before that point.
Jorge Masvidal O 2.5 (–110)
Nate Diaz U 2.5 (–110)
As we know, the fight between Masvidal and Diaz ended in the third round due to doctor stoppage, meaning that in this example, all of the Over bets in this example would have paid out at –110.
UFC Method of Victory Odds
There are many ways a UFC fight can end—submission, TKO/KO, decision, disqualification, draw. Betting on how the fight will end is a good way to get some value—especially when there’s a heavy favourite with lots of chalk on the moneyline. The betting options for Method of Victory will connect a specific fighter to a specific type of victory. For example, at UFC 244, you could have taken:
- Diaz by KO/TKO
- Diaz by Decision
- Diaz by Submission
- Masvidal by KO/TKO
- Masvidal by Decision
- Masvidal by Submission
UFC Fight Length Odds
A form of prop betting, the “fight length” wager asks bettors to decide which round a fight will conclude in. If you picked Masvidal to beat Diaz in the third round at UFC 244, you would have won the Fight Length prop.
UFC Parlay Odds
When you want to bet on multiple fights on the same card, you can parlay them together for a bigger payout than what you’d get from individual bets. At Bodog Sportsbook, you can combine up to 12 fights in a single parlay. In order for your parlay to win, each leg of the parlay must come through. A single loss would result in a lost parlay. Let’s say we parlayed together two picks from the UFC 244 card.
Jorge Masvidal –185
Nate Diaz +150
Kelvin Gastelum –500
Darren Till +350
Let’s say you took Diaz for the upset with these theoretical odds, and Gastelum as the favourite over Till. If you wagered $100 on each bet individually and won, you’d net $150 for your Diaz bet and $20 on the Gastelum bet. If you parlay them together, however, that $170 total win would jump to $400 with $200 staked thanks to the power of parlay betting.
UFC Other Bets
In the futures section of our UFC sportsbook, you can find hypothetical fights to bet on. In these scenarios, two big-name fighters that could potentially face off sometime in the future would be given odds to beat each other along with a time deadline for the fight to happen.
UFC Betting Tips
The amount of research that can go into UFC betting is really limitless. Fighting style, disciplines, traditional victory methods, quality of prior opposition, injuries, reach, motivation—they all give clues as to how a fighter will match up against an opponent. Most people aren’t looking to spend days researching their next pick, so to narrow down the legwork, you can simply assess a fighter based on their striking, takedown ability and submissions; try to establish which fighter is well-rounded in these categories, and that will likely be the favourite.
To continue with our Jorge Masvidal-Nate Diaz example, Masvidal is the more well-rounded fighter of the two and adapts to his opponents. A true boxer, he has a strong jab and a killer kick; he’s also excellent with takedowns. On the other hand, Diaz is a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu fighter, also with strong boxing skills. While Masvidal outranks him in most areas, submission is not one of them; that’s how Diaz beat Conor McGregor at UFC 202. Combine submission with Diaz’s excellent stamina, and he’s got a shot at beating Masvidal, but the odds are not in his favour. As we know, Masvidal did win the fight via TKO when a doctor’s stoppage ended the action.
Once you know which fighter you want to back, it’s all about getting as good of value as possible on the moneyline. Sportsbooks are always adjusting odds to balance bets on both sides of the equation, creating opportunities to get either better or worse value depending on how you time your bet. Typically, the bigger the name, the more people back them at the betting window. To try to encourage bets on the other fighter, sportsbooks typically increase the payout of the underdog, while conversely tightening the odds of the favourite. If you can anticipate which fighter will draw more bets, you can try to take advantage of shifting odds, with big-names benefitting from early betting, while fighters with smaller fanbases tend to have the most enticing odds/payouts after the initial wave of money has settled on the favourite.
At the end of the day, the main reason people learn how to bet on UFC is to elevate the experience of the event. When you have something riding on the outcome of a match, every little jab can make you eager with anticipation, or wince with dread; the commitment is real. We all hope to land a payout while getting to celebrate a big win in the octagon.