Full Tote.co.uk Bookmaker Review
I’d heartily recommend Tote as an account that you should have in your betting arsenal because it does something that is pretty rare in sports betting and that is to offer something that is completely unique. Now, it is possible to do tote betting in a few other places, but Tote is by far and away the best place to do it.
The downside is that there is a real lack in terms of promotions and odds boosts, which means that it may struggle to attract users for other sports specifically, but that’s not its USP. Those are an addition to its main product and that main product is incredibly good.
Tote Review Summary
An almost completely unique betting product.
Advantages and Disadvantages
All explained in greater detail in this review, these pros and cons allow users to scan and understand where the strengths lie quickly.
Pros
- Tote Ten to follow
- Placepot app
- Unique betting options
Who are Tote?
Tote have been around since the 1920s. The ownership of the brand has changed hands a couple of times over the years, but Tote remains a fairly unique bookmaker and the country’s largest pool betting operator.
First Impression of Tote
My First Impressions
Tote’s focus remains racing. The racing section of the site is its own thing, with the sportsbook – with all the other sports aside from horse racing – fall under the “Sports” tab. Once in the Sports part of the site it’s much like any other bookmaker in terms of product and style, but the Racing section offers far more than just standard horse racing betting.
- Luke Bradshaw Lee, Senior Sports Betting Editor
Also, remember that it is always worth checking alternative betting options, including best spread betting sites and betting exchange sites, depending on who you are as a bettor.
Live Betting
This is very limited. At the time of review there is some in-play betting for tennis and cricket. At other bookies, at the same time, there’s football, baseball, basketball, cycling and plenty more. For other live betting, head to our best bookmakers for in-play betting.
Live Streaming
You can watch all UK and Irish racing live on Tote.co.uk without placing a bet. You just need to log in to your account. In addition to that, and you won’t get this in many other places, you can watch races from the rest of the world – France, Italy, the US, Australia, South Africa and more – live on the site.
Bringing Pool Betting Back With Totesport and Betfred, things got muddy with Tote betting - now standalone again, they are bringing the Tote into the 21st century with a dedicated service that is a must for serious bettors.
🏇 Horse Racing
The fact of the matter is, if you want a horse racing betting site, while you may have your favourite bookie app installed, and perhaps an Exchange account for laying or trading, you should also have a Tote account for all of the extra things it can provide that no other betting site will. Tote is a must-have for serious horse racing punters, bringing pool betting up to date for horse racing (and football).
Pool betting involves all bets placed on an event being “pooled” together, hence the name. The odds are then determined by the total amount wagered on each possible outcome, rather than being set by bookmakers. It’s important to remember that the more predictable the outcome, the more winners there will be so the lower the payout will be. For a full rundown head to our comprehensive guide to tote betting.
Promotions
Tote’s promotions are all horse racing based and are far more inventive than your general bookie promo stuff. Tote Ten To Follow is a season-long bet whereby you select a stable of ten horses, which can potentially score you points throughout the season each time they run. You are placed in a tournament table, which is constantly updated. You can check your stable’s progress, and even win monthly prizes for topping tables, as well as the jackpot for having the best performing stable at the end of the season.
Their Stayers Club rewards regular bettors. If you place six bets in a week you’ll earn a free Stayers Credit and receive exclusive offers.
You Should Have a Tote Account In addition to a BOG bookie, an Exchange for Laying and Trading, you should also have a Tote account for the easiest way to make placepot bets.
⚽ Football Betting
You won’t find the same breadth of competitions here as most other bookmakers. There is international stuff, European competitions, and the English professional leagues. On top of that there is the top flight for the major European countries and some MLS stuff. So not nearly as much as most other bookies, but don’t let that cloud your judgement because if you head to a game you’ll find plenty of markets per match – the Champions ones I viewed had everything you’d want.
You can see in the chart below, in greater detail, why certain bookies rank among the top for football betting sites, and what Tote is up against.
Tap or mouseover chart elements for more info. Pinch to zoom.
Bet Builder
There’s a bet builder option at Tote, and it’s pretty good. They could maybe add a few more options per game but generally this isn’t bad at all. There are match markets, goal markets, cards and a few more. Ideally I’d like a few more player markets because although there are goalscorer markets, there’s no foul committed, tackles made or assists.
🇺🇸 US Sports Betting
A full range of American Sports is available. We’ll check out the major leagues, but also look into the sports further down the pyramid and, as well as across the globe.
🏈 American Football Betting
When you land on an American football section, you want to see game lines, with spread, total and moneyline markets right there. That’s exactly what you see at Tote. There’s no NFL games at the time of this review but it’s great to see plenty of markets to bet on still. There are odds on theNFL Draft, but in addition to that, outrights on pretty much every market possible, from outright winners, to player props, win totals and whether teams will make the play-offs.
It’s worth checking out our best NFL betting sites to see how Tote compares.
🏀 Basketball Betting
There is a huge array of leagues on offer at Tote. Of course there is the NBA, and it’s good that there are some game odds already, alongside the outrights for Championships and Division winners, but on top of that there is a very good range in world leagues. Basketball punters can choose from matches in Sweden, Turkey, Colombia, Australia, Greece, Spain and a load more on top of that. It’s pretty impressive.
Keep tabs on the top basketball betting sites though, to see if they make it onto our list.
⚾ Baseball Betting
The MLB, understandably, is a big part of Tote’s baseball betting, but they also have markets for the Japanese and South Korean leagues. The markets, and the odds, especially on the outrights, appear to be really good. The MLB season hasn’t quite started at the time of writing, but there is an impressive amount of markets here, such as individual awards and the like. Keep tabs on the top baseball betting sites though, to see if they make it onto our list.
🏒 Ice Hockey Betting
The NHL takes up the majority of real estate here, as one would expect. But there are also some Danish, Polish, and Kazakh fixtures included, among others. I selected an upcoming NHL game and there is a really impressive number of markets available – more than pretty most other sportsbooks I’d wager. For the lesser leagues that reduces a bit more, which makes sense. Overall, I think this is impressive from Tote
🐕 Greyhound Betting
Tote has no greyhound betting at the time of review.
🎯 Darts Betting
Matthew Edgar
Darts Editor and WDF Professional
Compared to the very darts betting sites in the country, Tote has some strengths and weaknesses. The outrights on future events are very good, but once you click through to the match ups, this then falls down a fair bit and there is no option for bet builders. Maybe they increase the market number and variety as it gets nearer to the time of the match, but I’d ideally like to see more earlier on.
Compare to the best darts betting sites in the UK.
Snooker Betting
Steve Madgwick
Editor-In-Chief
As with the best snooker betting sites, there are markets for a couple of different competitions, including the World Championships and the Champions League. At the time of the review we’re in the middle of the latter, which I can’t live stream unfortunately, but I do like the amount of markets per match up that are on offer here, and generally the odds are pretty good.
Compare to the best snooker betting sites in the UK.
🏉 Rugby Betting (Union & League)
By Luke Bradshaw Lee - This has pretty much every competition going – domestic and international – that I'd hope to wager on, which is brilliant. And that goes for rugby league as well as union. If I were being very picky it would be great to see the Japanese league here, given its emergence and big name players plying their trade there, but that is nit-picking because overall this is excellent event coverage. What lets it down, and seems different to other sports at Tote, is the market depth per game isn’t great. If there was more I’d absolutely see them making OLBG’s best Rugby betting sites.
🏏 Cricket Betting
James Banting
Tipster Competition Assistant
If there were anything in the way of cricket promotions, or if the odds were a little better, I could see Tote being one of our Top 10 cricket betting sites. Overall, it’s pretty nice because Tote offers all the competitions that I’d expect to see, plus a few more on top of that – not everywhere covers the Oman D10 League, for example. And I do love how many markets are available here for each game, but the value here is just okay.
We list the 10 best cricket betting sites here.
🎾 Tennis Betting
By James Banting - At the time I reviewed their tennis section, Tote had 317 different tennis games to bet on – that’s very impressive indeed. These games obviously cover the globe, Grand Slams right down to smaller Challenger events. The odds are fine, but there’s plenty of markets, including in-play markets. There’s no live streaming, but the stats that feature are pretty good. See if they make it into the top 10 tennis betting sites on OLBG.
🏌️ Golf Betting
By James Banting - Tote’s golf offering is a tad disappointing. There are only markets for the majors and the Ryder Cup, and those are just basic outrights. There are a few smaller tournaments happening right now, or due to start soon, such as the Phoenix Open, Astara Championship or Commercial Bank Qatar Masters, and none of these are listed in any capacity. I’d like to see a good bit more for me to consider using them consistently.
🏎️ Motorsports Betting
Andy Powell
Content Editor
The motor sports section here is great. Everything is it’s own thing, rather than housed under a “motor sports” banner, but I can see Formula 1, obviously, on top of Speedway and NASCAR racing. There’s nothing in the way of bikes, such as MotoGP, which is a little annoying, but, that said, I am impressed with the detail in the Formula 1 markets.
Compare to the best motorsport betting sites.
🥊 Boxing Betting
Frank Monkhouse
Boxing Editor
There’s plenty of boxing bouts to get stuck into here, and the markets look dependent on how far in advance they are. Those this weekend and over the next few weeks have an okay offering, whereas the further away they get the less markets on offer. That’s fair enough, and I wouldn’t expect to find round by round and the like for fights that are months away, but I would definitely like more options for big fights happening this week, and that’s definitely limited based on my experience with Tote.
Compare to the best boxing betting sites.
Opening Process
A reassuringly easy process. At the top-right of the screen Tote has their “Join” button. Bettors just need to select this and follow the simple steps as guided through. You’ll be asked for the usual information – name, date of birth, address etc – and once complete be sent a verification email. Clicking this from your inbox will redirect you to the site, and then you’re free to get betting.
Navigation and user experience [desktop v mobile]
The navigation, and the general app design is very good. You can look at it two ways: as a complete betting novice, or as an experienced bettor who has accounts elsewhere.
For the former, everything would feel intuitive. There’s a menu of sports down the left hand side, and offers down the right, with the main panel of markets front and centre. If you're struggling or lost at any point, there’s a search function in the top left of the screen that will allow you to immediately find where you’re going (or see that it's not there and stop your search).
For the experienced bettor, everything will feel familiar. There’s no attempt to jazz things up for the sake of being different – this is how you’d want it, and what you’ll be used to from a number of other sportsbooks.
Placing a bet
This section should only really highlight if there are issues, as the process is almost identical on every site. Within a few minutes of signing up to Tote I placed a couple of bets on different sports, one of which took advantage of the welcome offer, and I used their bet builder feature, which worked well.
Managing your account
As mentioned above, the design really helps this along. On the desktop version, it’s stuff to the left of the screen. On the app, it’s all at the bottom, with just the login at the top. I haven’t experienced any issues logging in, or finding customer service options, either. Overall, it feels like Tote has got this part nailed.
Casino
They also have some bonuses and offers that lead to casino spins should you win sportsbook bets. Check our Casino Sites page for dedicated new online casinos and slot sites.
You can also check out OLBG’s latest addition; our Best Bingo Sites. All of which are, obviously, sites fully licensed by the UK Gambling Commission.
Responsible Gambling Features
You can set your deposit limit while you’re signing up; long before you’ve got close to actually making a bet.
There is also a Settings tab at the bottom of the page, no matter what page you’re on, that allows you to make changes to limits, as well as odds formats, or odds change preferences/notifications.
There are the following measures within its functionality:
Responsible Gambling
There is a full suite of responsible gambling tools for your protection and may request further identification after certain depositing levels are exceeded or stakes are increased quickly.
Bookie Review Expert Contributing Team
OLBG Expert Review Team
This review was conducted by our expert team. Our dedicated review process guide provides a full description of the undertaking.
How OLBG reviews betting sites
Opinion, research and data collection for this review by
James Banting (Horse Racing, Golf and Tennis)
Nigel Skinner (Football and Politics),
Matt Edgar (Darts)
Frank Monkhouse (Boxing)
Andrew Powell (Horse Racing, Ice Hockey and Motor Sports)
Jake Ashton (Entertainment and Specials)
🛂 Fact Checked - Sam Darkens - Commercial Manager
✍️ Written by - Luke Bradshaw Lee - Commercial Content Manager
✏️📚 - Steve Madgwick - Editor-In-Chief
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