What Is An Each Way Bet?

Each way betting is a great way to bet on a horse when your not 100% that the horse will win but very sure it will come 2nd, 3rd, or sometimes 4th. The great thing about each way betting is that you can still make a profit if a horse doesn’t win a race, obviously the profit will be a lot less but you have a lot less risk. Depending on the odds of the horse you are betting on depends on the return you will get on a place. Generally anything under 4/1 is not worth an each way bet. This is the way we look at it and work it into our tips due to the return being less than what you staked.

What does each way mean? An each way bet basically means your putting your money on the horse winning and placing. If your horse places you get a fraction of the odds which is stated on the bookmakers racecard. This can often be 1/5 of the odds or ¼ of the odds, we will come to this later.

We all know what the win bet is but what’s a place bet? Well… depending on the size of the field depends on where your horse can finish to be classed as a place. Between a field of 5 and 7 horses generally a place bet covers 1st and 2nd. Between 8 and 14 runners then you generally get places for 1st, 2nd, 3rd and sometimes 4th,5th and 6th depending on what bookmakers promotions are on for that race.

So let’s start talking about what odds you get for an each way bet. Well the win is obviously the full odds but only half of your wager goes on your win bet and the other half goes on the place bet. The place bet on a field of 5 – 7 horses will be ¼ of the odds for 1st and 2nd and the place bet of a race with over 8 horses is 1/5 of the odds for 1st, 2nd and 3rd. Let’s say your horse wins and you place a £1 each way bet on a 10/1 horse in a 8 runner race. £1 will be at 10/1 so you will get £11 and £1 will get 1/5 of the odds which will be 2/1. For this race you will be looking at winning £14 from your bet.

Don’t worry as you don’t have to calculate your winnings out before your bets if you still don’t understand the maths. Every bookmaker whether it’s online or through the app will show you your expected winnings on an each way bet. On a high value horse it can give you a good chance of winning big and having something to fall back on if it places.