Mobile app sports betting in New York is red hot.
After launching with four apps on January 8, (a fifth was added soon after) sports wagering apps raked in over $150 million in bets in the opening weekend, according to LegalSportsReport.com. Caesars Sportsbook, DraftKings, FanDuel, and Rush Street Interactive kicked off the frenzy on day one with BetMGM NY arriving on January 17. More apps are expected to launch soon.
Geocomply, a company that provides fraud prevention and cybersecurity solutions to detect location fraud and help verify a user’s true digital identity, said that 1.2 million accounts were created in New York, with 878,000 unique users in the first week.
“The momentum of New York’s sports betting launch has continued and it is mostly home-grown,” said Lindsay Slader, Managing Director of Gaming at GeoComply in a press release.
Slader said that a majority of users are brand new to regulated sports betting in the U.S., coming from illegal sites.
“The data tell us that New Yorkers are dumping illegal sportsbooks for the new legal options and operators are also excelling at attracting first-time bettors,” she said.
The competition for betting money is fierce with many apps offering thousands in sign up bonuses and matching cash funds. A rundown of the incentives was published by amny.com recently. Players can sign up for multiple betting apps and ESPN gave new bettors six tips on how to start off.
In 2018, New Jersey legalized mobile sports betting and the thinking was that that state would lose revenue after New York went live but that doesn’t seem to be the case just yet. Geocomply says that only 9.3% of New York players have placed wagers in both states. New Jersey actually saw an increase in the number of average bets in the state. In the two weekends before the New York launch, the Garden State averaged 12.6 million transactions there and 13.1 million the two weekends since. Online sports betting shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
“New York hasn’t failed to dazzle us, but we are also impressed by the sustained growth of the overall sports betting industry,” said Slader.