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CL Claudia_1983 DE 📗 Student 💬 2 answers ⚑

Basically odds work pretty straightforwardly. The bookmakers look at how likely an outcome is, and then they factor in their profit margin. If an odds is at 2.0, that roughly means the bookmaker estimates the probability at about 50% (1 divided by 2.0 = 0.5). At 3.0 it would be around 33%, at 1.5 about 67%. The lower the odds, the more likely the bookmaker thinks the event is.

The thing is though: if you add up all the odds for all possible outcomes of a match (so converted as probabilities), you always get more than 100%. The difference is the bookmaker's profit margin - something like 5-10% or more, depending on how competitive they are. That's basically their insurance that they make money no matter how the match goes. Plus, bookmakers also adjust their odds depending on how much money flows to which side. If everyone's just betting on Team A, they lower the odds for Team A and raise them for Team B to balance out the bets.

FI fischer1983 AT 🌱 Newbie 💬 1 answer ⚑

The bookmakers just look at how likely they think an event is and then add their margin on top - if a quote is 2.0, that roughly means the bookmaker thinks there's a 50% chance, but in reality they always give you slightly less than the actual probability because they gotta make their profits, right! If you take the quote and divide 1 by it you get roughly the probability, so with a quote of 2.5 that would be like 40% or something.

SP Spieler DE 🌱 Newbie 💬 5 answers ⚑

Oh yeah, so it's actually pretty interesting once you get your head around it. So basically bookmakers look at how likely an event is, and then they set their odds so they always make money - no matter how the game turns out. If you see odds of 2.0 for example, that roughly means the bookmaker thinks there's a 50% chance of that outcome. At 3.0 it'd be about 33%, at 1.5 around 67%. You can kind of calculate it like this: 100 divided by the odds gives you the implied probability. I didn't understand it myself for ages, until I started comparing odds from different sites - then you quickly see how differently they value things.

But the tricky part is that the odds are always a bit lower than the "real" probability, because the bookmaker has to take their cut. If you add up all the probabilities for one quote (so like for a three-way bet converting 1.5 + 2.5 + 3.0), it always comes to over 100% - that's the "overround" or the bookmaker's margin. That's why most people lose money betting in the long run, even if they've got good tips. Bookmakers also use live data, betting patterns and their own analysis to adjust the odds. When lots of people bet on a favorite, the odds get worse, because the bookmaker wants to balance out their risk.

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