How long do surebets last?

Every surebet scanner shows arbs. The question that matters is how long one stays there. We log every surebet our scanners find and every one that passes the re-read at the book, with the second it opens and the second it closes. These are the numbers.

Found is not confirmed

Our scanners found about 4,300 surebets in the period. 2,964 (69%) passed the re-read: every leg read again at its book, at that price, before the surebet showed as confirmed. The other 31% were gone, stale or mismatched by the time each leg was checked. That gap is why we never show a found surebet as confirmed. See Why surebets disappear.

Most are gone in minutes

The median life is 90 seconds. A quarter of them close within 32 seconds; one in ten lasts more than 11 minutes. If you need two minutes to open two books, log in and type two stakes, you will miss about half of them.

By sport

Basketball surebets are the shortest-lived: the markets are liquid and lines move all day. Smaller markets (handball, esports) last longer, but there are fewer of them and stakes at the books are usually smaller.

By market

Handicaps are more than half of everything: many books price them, at many lines, and they disagree often. They are also the market where a rule mismatch (a different line, period or treatment of a push) is easiest to miss. See Asian handicap explained.

Bigger margins last longer, and are flagged more

The median margin is 1.22%, and 43% of confirmed surebets are under 1%. The big ones stay up longer, but most of them have one leg priced far from every other book: often a palp, an obvious error that the book may void. A 12% surebet that lasts four minutes is usually a warning, not a gift. We flag those legs and leave the decision to you.

How they end

Most surebets end because one book corrects its price. Some end because a book's feed stops updating: then we stop showing the surebet as confirmed until fresh data comes in, rather than show a price we can't vouch for.

What this means if you bet surebets

• Speed matters more than margin. Half of all confirmed surebets are gone in a minute and a half. Have accounts funded, stakes worked out (the surebet calculator does it) and place the leg most likely to move first.
• Be suspicious of big numbers. Above 3%, most surebets have a flagged price. Check it before you place anything.
• Many come back. 37% of the surebets in this data were confirmed more than once: the same pair opened, closed and opened again as prices moved.
• Prematch helps. The median surebet was confirmed about 6 hours before kick-off; a quarter of them within the last hour.