Bovada Review (2026): Bonuses, Payouts and Where It’s Available
We earn a commission if you open a Bovada account through links on this page. Facts below were checked against Bovada’s help center and state regulator records in September 2026.
Bovada has been taking bets from Americans since 2011, and it’s one of the best-known offshore sportsbooks in the US. It’s also shrinking: after a wave of state cease-and-desist letters, it now turns away players from 19 states and Washington, DC. This review covers what you get, what it costs you, and the risks you take on by playing somewhere no US state regulates.
Our take
- Good for
- Recreational bettors in states without legal online betting who are comfortable paying in crypto
- Skip it if
- You live in a blocked state, or you want a regulator to turn to if something goes wrong
- Best bonus
- 75% up to $750 on a crypto sports deposit, 5x rollover
- Biggest drawbacks
- No US license, 15.9%+ fee on card deposits after the first, $100 per check withdrawal
Affiliate link. 18+ (older where your state requires). Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.
Is Bovada legit, and is it legal?
Bovada is a real, long-running business. It launched in December 2011 when its predecessor, Bodog, pulled its brand out of the US, and it has run the same sportsbook, casino, poker room and racebook ever since.
It isn’t licensed anywhere in the United States, though. The footer on every Bovada page says it’s licensed by the Union of the Comoros and the “Central Reserve Authority of Western Sahara.” State regulators’ letters name the operator as Harp Media B.V., a company in Curaçao. No US state has licensed Bovada, and the regulators who’ve written to it call it an unlicensed, illegal operator.
For you, that has two practical effects:
- If a withdrawal stalls or a bet is voided, your only escalation is Bovada’s own dispute email. A state-licensed sportsbook would answer to a gaming regulator.
- State laws on betting with unlicensed sites differ. The state actions so far have been cease-and-desist letters to Bovada itself, but check your own state’s rules before you deposit.
Bovada’s current and former operators are also defendants in a Kentucky class action brought under the state’s old gambling-loss recovery law. In December 2025 the court refused to dismiss the case against one of them, so it’s still going.
Where you can sign up
Bovada only takes US residents. It doesn’t accept players living in Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Vermont, West Virginia or Washington, DC.
Most of those were added between June 2024 and January 2025, after state regulators sent cease-and-desist letters. Vermont and Rhode Island followed in late 2025. A few states that sent letters, including Washington, Illinois, Florida, Mississippi and Minnesota, weren’t on the blocked list as of September 2026.
Don’t try to get around the block with a VPN. Bovada’s terms treat masking your location as fraud, and the penalty is a closed account and a forfeited balance. If you already have an account and move to a blocked state, contact support and they’ll arrange a crypto withdrawal. The state-by-state detail is in our guide to where Bovada is available.
Welcome bonuses
| Offer | Match | Code | Rollover |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sports, crypto deposit | 75% up to $750 | BTCSWB750 | 5x deposit + bonus |
| Sports, card deposit | 50% up to $250 | None listed | 5x deposit + bonus |
| Casino, crypto | 125% up to $1,250, three times ($3,750) | BTCCWB1250, then BTC2NDCWB | 25x (Bovada’s pages disagree on later deposits; check the cashier) |
| Casino, card | 100% up to $1,000, three times ($3,000) | CAWELCOME100, then BV2NDCWB | 25x |
| Poker | 100% up to $500 | BPWB500 | None; released in $5 steps as you earn poker points |
The sports bonus is the one worth taking. A 5x rollover means a $400 crypto deposit gets a $300 bonus, and you’d need to bet $3,500 in total before the locked money becomes withdrawable. The casino bonuses are much harder to clear at 25x. Slots and specialty games count in full, table games count 20%, blackjack 10%, and live dealer games don’t count at all.
A few rules catch people out:
- Your deposit gets locked together with the bonus. It’s released to your withdrawable balance as you work through the rollover, which is why new players see “locked funds” they can’t cash out. We explain it in why your funds are locked.
- While a bonus is active, a single sports bet can’t be more than half your deposit (20% in the casino).
- Bonus money can’t be used on live dealer games, virtual sports, Hot Drop jackpot games or sports futures.
- There’s no sign-up bonus without a deposit. Bovada does hand out small no-deposit cash bonuses through its rewards program and social media, capped at a $125 cashout for bonuses under $100.
If you’d rather keep your money free to withdraw, skip the bonus. A deposit with no bonus only has to be wagered once.
Deposits
| Method | Limits per deposit | Bovada fee |
|---|---|---|
| Bitcoin, Litecoin, Ethereum, Bitcoin Cash, Bitcoin SV, USDT | Coin minimum up to $5,000 | None |
| Bitcoin Lightning | Up to $10,000 | None |
| Visa, Mastercard | $20 to $1,500 | First deposit free, then 15.9% or more |
| MatchPay (PayPal, Venmo, Zelle, Apple Pay, Chime, Cash App) | $10 to $2,000 | None |
| Player Transfer | $10 to $15,000 | None |
The card fee is the thing to avoid. After your first card deposit, Bovada charges 15.9% or more, and your bank may add its own cash-advance or foreign transaction fees on top. Crypto has no Bovada fee and usually arrives within about 15 minutes.
If you don’t own crypto, MatchPay lets you pay another Bovada player through apps like PayPal, Venmo or Cash App, and Bovada credits your account. It works, but you’re dealing with a stranger’s account, so read Bovada’s warning about peer-to-peer scams first. Our MatchPay guide walks through it.
Withdrawals and payout times
| Method | Limits per request | Time after approval | Fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bitcoin | $75 to $9,500 | Up to 24 hours | None from Bovada |
| Litecoin | $10 to $9,500 | Up to 1 hour | None from Bovada |
| Ethereum, USDT | $50 to $2,500 | Up to 1 hour | None from Bovada |
| Bitcoin Lightning | $10 to $10,000 | Not stated | None from Bovada |
| MatchPay | $10 to $2,000, twice a day | Listed as instant | None |
| Check by courier | $250 to $3,000, once a week | 10 to 15 business days | $100 every time |
| Bank wire | $1,500 to $9,500, once every 30 days | 10 to 15 business days | Not published |
Every request is reviewed first, which Bovada says takes 24 to 48 hours (about 24 for Bitcoin). After that, crypto is the fastest way out by a wide margin. Checks are slow and the $100 fee applies to each one. Some review sites still say the first check every 90 days is free, but Bovada’s current help page doesn’t say that. More detail is in how long a Bovada withdrawal takes.
Before your first withdrawal, expect to upload a photo ID and a credit card verification form for every card you’ve deposited with. Large wins are paid in installments. Checks over $3,000 go out in $3,000 pieces every 7 days, and Bitcoin requests over $9,500 are split into installments sent every 3 days.
One more thing. Bovada says it doesn’t report winnings to any tax authority. That doesn’t make them tax-free; in the US, gambling winnings are taxable income whoever pays them.
The sportsbook
Bets start at 50 cents and the maximum payout on a single bet is $1 million. You get the usual spreads, totals and moneylines on the NFL, NBA, MLB, NHL and college sports, plus soccer, tennis, golf, UFC, boxing and esports. Live betting, cash out, same-game parlays and a prop builder are all there.
Parlays can run from 2 to 16 legs. Teasers go up to 12 teams, and a standard 6-point NFL teaser pays -120 for two teams, +150 for three and +260 for four. Bovada also offers political markets, including the 2026 midterms, which US state-licensed sportsbooks don’t. Our guides to parlays and teasers show how to place them.
Casino, poker and horses
The same account and balance work across the casino, poker room and racebook. The casino has hundreds of slots, blackjack and roulette variants, specialty games like keno and crash games, and a live dealer section with around 50 blackjack tables. Bovada doesn’t publish return-to-player figures for its slots or name the lab that tests its games, so there’s no way to compare payout rates.
Poker runs on the PaiWangLuo network with anonymous tables and a fast-fold format called Zone Poker. The racebook takes bets from $1, with maximum payouts that depend on the track, up to $100,000 on Triple Crown races.
Mobile and support
There’s no Bovada app in the App Store or Google Play. The site runs in your phone’s browser and you can save it to your home screen. Poker also has Windows and Mac clients.
Support is available around the clock by live chat, or by email at service@bovada.lv with replies promised within 48 hours. There’s no phone line, whatever other sites list. If support can’t resolve a problem, you can escalate to disputeresolution@bovada.lv between 7 days and 6 months after it happened.
What we like and what we don’t
Good
- The sports bonus has a low 5x rollover
- Crypto deposits and withdrawals carry no Bovada fee
- Parlays up to 16 legs and political markets
- One balance for sports, casino, poker and horses
- 24/7 live chat
Not so good
- No US state license and no regulator to complain to
- Closed to 19 states and DC
- 15.9% or higher fee on card deposits after the first
- $100 fee on every check withdrawal
- No app and no phone support
How to sign up
- Check that your state isn’t on the blocked list above.
- Open Bovada through our link and fill in your name, address, date of birth, email and phone. Use your real details, because Bovada checks them against your ID before it pays out.
- Confirm your phone number by text message. Accounts with an unfinished SMS check can’t log in.
- Make your first deposit. Use crypto or MatchPay if you’ll be depositing more than once, to avoid the card fee. Enter a bonus code only if you’re happy to play through the rollover.
Affiliate link: we’re paid a share of revenue from accounts opened through it. You must be 18 or older, or the legal age where you live if that’s higher.
More Bovada questions
- How old do you have to be to use Bovada?
- Why did Bovada disable my account?
- What fees does Bovada charge?
- How to contact Bovada customer support
- How to close your Bovada account
Betting should cost you only what you’ve set aside for fun. If it’s stopped being fun, call 1-800-GAMBLER for free, confidential help, 24 hours a day. If you tell Bovada’s support you have a gambling problem, they’ll close your account for good.
Sources
- Bovada help center: restricted states, deposit fees, withdrawal limits, withdrawal requests and fees, bonus terms, betting limits
- Bovada terms of service (VPN, account closure and dormancy rules)
- Massachusetts Attorney General, cease-and-desist letter to Bovada (October 2024)
- Illinois Gaming Board, cease-and-desist letter to Harp Media B.V. (February 2025)
- Woods v. Morris Mohawk Gaming Group, E.D. Kentucky, order of December 2, 2025