ESPN Bet Sportsbook Review
by
Eric Uribe
In August 2023, bombshell news dropped that ESPN was finally getting into the sports gambling business after years of hesitation. The Disney-owned brand had long delayed its entry — and likely left hundreds of millions of dollars on the table because of cold feet. But the point is this: ESPN’s betting offering is now live, and it’s called ESPN Bet — a simple and to-the-point name.
ESPN Bet is a partnership with Penn Entertainment, which was previously tied to the controversial Barstool Sports. Penn’s sportsbook had been branded as Barstool Sportsbook but struggled to gain traction against industry leaders like BetMGM, DraftKings, and FanDuel. At its peak, Barstool Sportsbook only captured a small slice of the market, far short of Penn’s ambitions.
In 2023, Penn moved on — selling Barstool back to Dave Portnoy for $1 — and rebranded its app under the ESPN name. It’s essentially the same sportsbook technology, re-skinned with ESPN branding. Officially, it’s a 10-year agreement worth $1.5 billion, plus additional stock warrants. For Penn, this meant partnering with a bigger name to attract sports bettors; for ESPN, it meant diversifying revenue as cable subscriptions continued to decline.
The question remains: is ESPN Bet actually any good? That’s what we set out to evaluate. The platform officially launched in November 2023, and here’s our unbiased review of ESPN Bet — including betting experience, promos, and much more. Let’s dive in:
States Where ESPN Bet Offers Legal Betting
The table below lists all states and jurisdictions where ESPN Bet currently operates, showing availability for both retail and mobile betting.
| State / Territory | Mobile Betting | Retail Betting |
| Arizona | ✅ | ✅ |
| Colorado | ✅ | ✅ |
| Connecticut | ✅ | ✅ |
| Illinois | ✅ | ✅ |
| Indiana | ✅ | ✅ |
| Iowa | ✅ | ✅ |
| Kansas | ✅ | ✅ |
| Kentucky | ✅ | ✅ |
| Louisiana | ✅ | ✅ |
| Maryland | ✅ | ✅ |
| Massachusetts | ✅ | ✅ |
| Michigan | ✅ | ✅ |
| New Jersey | ✅ | ✅ |
| Ohio | ✅ | ✅ |
| Pennsylvania | ✅ | ✅ |
| Tennessee | ✅ | ❌ |
| Virginia | ✅ | ✅ |
| West Virginia | ✅ | ✅ |
| Washington | D.C. | ✅ |
ESPN Bet Features
Former users of the Barstool Sportsbook app will be happy to know they’re automatically “grandfathered” into ESPN Bet. That means the same exact login credentials will work on ESPN Bet. Everything has been carried over in the brand switch — account balances, transaction history, stored payment methods, and more. The ESPN register process is cake too in case you’re completely new to the app and never used Barstool before.
All the major sports and leagues are bet-able with ESPN Bet. There’s a heavier emphasis on the major American sports like NFL, NBA, college football and basketball, UFC, and more. But don’t think there’s not a good dose of international sports too. Here’s a small peak of how deep the ESPN bets menu goes:
- NFL
- College Football
- NBA
- NCAAF
- NCAAB
- NHL
- MLB
- UFC
- Boxing
- MMA
- Soccer
- Golf
- Tennis
- Motorsports
One thing that immediately sticks out about ESPN Bet in a positive way is its lightning-quick speed. Despite having this deep — and we mean deep — sportsbook menu, ESPN best bets can be accessed super fast. Lag is nonexistent, especially when live betting (more on that shortly). This same speed can be seen when transacting money in and out of ESPN Bet.
Speaking of transactions, ESPN Bet supports a number of traditional payment methods — debit and credit cards (VISA and Mastercard), bank, paper checks, PayPal, and a few others. This should cover it for most bettors.
ESPN sports betting is great and all, but it’s not the only feature of ESPN Bet. There’s also an online casino, which is under Penn’s Hollywood Casino brand. It’s accessible with ESPN Bet, but the branding will differ. At the moment, the online casino is available in four states — Michigan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and West Virginia.
ESPN Mobile Betting
Betting on the go via your phone has become bettor’s go-to method of gambling. Therefore, many sportsbooks live and die off the quality of their mobile-betting experience. We can confidently say ESPN Bet lives just fine off it.
ESPN Bet mobile exists in two ways. One, you can download the ESPN Bet app straight to your phone. It’s available on both Apple’s App Store and Android’s Google Play Store. Two, ESPN Bet can be accessed from any mobile browser. So say you have an iPhone, just go to the site on your Safari browser and you can bet from there without a problem.
There’s no major fall-off from using the ESPN Bet desktop site (on your big computer) and the mobile site. Every feature is carried over just fine.
Where ESPN Bet’s mobile experience truly shines is via in-play betting. It works exactly like it’s supposed to — quickly updating betting lines, zero lag, and a deep menu to bet on. As live betting continues to gain popularity, ESPN Bet has the capability to meet the demand of users.
ESPN Promo Code
Yes, ESPN Bet offers sportsbook bonuses, but they change frequently. There new customers can receive $100 in free bets after placing a minimum $10 wager. Since the ESPN promotion code is always in flux, your best bet is to check the official site directly for the latest offer.
ESPN Bet Customer Service
Customer service is an area where we’d like to see some improvement out of ESPN Bet. Is it bad? We wouldn’t go that far. But is it elite? No way.
You see, ESPN Bet customer support is all online. Users can contact support staff in one of three ways: on Twitter, through their official handle @ESPNBetSupport. You can email them at support@espnbet.com. Or you can go directly to the website and use the live chat feature.
Here’s our gripe, there’s no call-in number that we could find. Call us old school, but when big money is on the line, we still prefer handling issues with a person over the phone. Context can get lost in chats and over email. Until ESPN Bet adds a call-in line, we’d hesitate to give its customer service high marks.
Top Sportsbooks
As you can see, ESPN Bet is a solid online betting option. The fact that it’s brand-new gives us hope Penn and ESPN can continue to improve on it too. But if you’re not sold on it or live in a state where ESPN Bet isn’t allowed in, you might want to check out one of the offshore betting sites below. Per our other sportsbook reviews, the sportsbooks listed below rated extremely favorable.
