What is The Vig in Betting and How Does it Affect Your Betting Profits?

What is The Vig in Betting and How Does it Affect Your Betting Profits?

What You Need to Know

  • The vig comes from the Russian word vyigrysh and is the fee charged by a sports book on each bet.
  • The vig is also known as the juice, cut, edge, or rake.
  • It is also known as the house edge in casinos.
  • The word 'vig' has also been used in popular culture as the regular payment to a loan shark.
  • Knowing what the vig is for a particular sportsbook and how to calculate the vig is essential to knowing how much money you will make on any given wager at Danske-casinoer.com.

Vig is a short form of vigorish, which is the built-in house edge on all sports bets. It's basically a token commission that guarantees that the sportsbook will win regardless of the result of the bet. Learning about how gambling vig operates is vital for placing sports bets since it determines the ultimate success of your bets over the long term.

Origin and Meaning of Vig in Gambling

Vigorish, vig, juice, cut, edge, rake; whatever you'd like to call it, it's all the same thing. The origin of the gambling term vig is thought to be derived from the Russian word "vyigrysh", meaning "gain" or "winnings". Its earliest recorded usage was in the 1960s, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

The shortened "vig" can even refer to the interest owed on a loan shark. Picture this: I borrow money from Big Tony and fail to repay him the vig. Next thing I know, he's threatening to break my knees. Not surprisingly, this use was popularized by the Italian-American Mafia.

How to Calculate the Vig

Every bet on a sportsbook already has the vig built into the odds. If you're a casual gambler, gambling online to enjoy yourself, there is no need for you to calculate the vig in the event you're choosing your sportsbook based upon how much you like the site and not the quality of the odds.

But if you're a seasoned sports gambler betting for long-term profit, calculating the gambling vig will allow you to make intelligent bets and (hopefully) increase your net profit. The vig is typically varied for various sportsbooks, so it makes sense to shop around and select the site with the smallest edge. 

The Vig in Online Gambling

The vig looks different at an online sportsbook compared to a casino. At a casino, it’s hidden away within the game’s RTP. You’ll need to open up and scroll through the paytable to find the RTP amount. As discussed above, the sportsbook vig is a little more obvious, as it’s embedded in the odds of every bet.

There is little to no variation between the vig at retail sportsbooks/casinos and online sportsbooks/casinos. Similar to their online equivalents, retail sportsbooks will build the vig into the odds. Similarly, all retail slot machines arrive at the casino with a preinstalled RTP percentage, and games like American Roulette and Caribbean Stud also have an RTP that has been set in advance.

Types of Vig in Gambling

Spread Betting Vig

A spread bet is a discrepancy in the two teams' predicted points. The favourite is a minus figure, and has to do better than the spread for your wager to be a winner. Meanwhile, the underdog is a plus and has to lose by this number of points or win. Spreads for baseball games typically have a decimal (0.5) so as not to end in pushes, as most baseball games are worth less than two runs between the teams.

Spread bets are not like over/unders in the sense that they focus on the point differential between the two teams rather than whether or not the total points scored will be above or below the specified level. Vig on the spread bet is factored into the odds, typically from -120 to +100. Remember the spread and the odds are two unrelated concepts.

Moneyline Vig

A moneyline is a bet on the final score of the game. Since there is but one possible outcome – winning or losing – they are one of the simplest sports bets available. As with all other bet types, the moneyline vig is built into the odds.

Though moneyline bets are perhaps the most simple, research has proven that they can also be the most efficient and prosperous. Since you’re wagering on a pretty black-or-white outcome, odds for moneyline bets – which already have the vig included – can be crazy, with some underdogs reaching into the thousands.

Sportsbook Vig

All bets made at a sportsbook carry a vig. The vig, as much as both the sportsbook and bettors care, is the business's most important thing. It can both make and break you in terms of seeing a long-term profit, and it helps keep the sportsbook from going broke when bettors win big. 

Casino Vig

It’s very unlikely that you’ll come across the term “vig” at an online casino. Instead, casinos use the phrase “house edge” to describe the advantage that the house has over the bettor. Unlike a sportsbook vig, which is determined by the sportsbook itself, the house edge is already built into the game by the software developer.

Every game has a house edge, whether you’re playing slots, blackjack, or roulette. Most casino players are familiar with the Return to Player (RTP) percentage, which is hypothetical money the casino will return to gamblers in thousands of slot spins or games rounds. RTP reflects the gamer's perspective regarding how much they can win back, while the house edge is the remaining percentage. For example, if I select a game with an RTP of 95%, then the house edge is 5%.