There is no doubt that Virtual Sports bettors are also amongst the 
keenest of sports betting enthusiasts and similarly those that enjoy sports betting are also very likely to enjoy Virtual Sports betting.
It is tempting to think that both types of betting are essentially the same and indeed many of the bets you can make on real life sports, can be replicated within the Virtual Sports environment, particularly the most common types of bet, such as betting on a team or individual to win a game or a race.
However, while it may seem that betting on either real or virtual sports is pretty much identical, there are some big differences between the two. This can influence therefore how likely you are to be a winner in either Virtual Sports or real betting, so this does raise the question, which of the two is the type of betting that you are most likely to see a winner from?
Sports Betting Pros & Cons
- The Pros
Sports betting is based on real life sporting events and of course, with that comes the ability for the punter to, if they so wish, do a little research on their chosen market and in particular, the teams or individuals competing in the event.
This research can be hugely beneficial in helping a punter identify which are the most likely bets and there are any number of websites now available, covering a whole host of different sports, that allow you to go back and study historical data and in some case, even historical performances of teams and individuals.
Bet365 for example, offers its customers the chance to view races from its archive, which allows punters to see how horses they may want to back have run in previous races. Football fans can visit official sites to view the latest statistics on their teams and you can sometimes find video clips of recent games to watch (such as on the Sky Sports app, or using Sky Go or similar).
Live Streaming can be a great source to view things if you are 
considering a bet and a number of betting sites also offer this service to its customers. This allows you to watch a sport event and then bet in play on it. This means you can respond to how a game is going and the changes that occur within a given match or race.
In sports betting too, knowledge can be very helpful for a punter. If you know a lot about, say football, then you are going to be more comfortable betting on soccer games as your knowledge will be able to suggest to you which is potentially a good bet, and which is not. For example, if you know nothing about the current Premier League table, you may think Fulham v Manchester City this weekend is a 50/50 match, when those in the know the odds massively favour Manchester City as they have been in incredible form of late, while Fulham have struggled.
The sheer wealth of information, from a wide range of sources and across a massive choice of sports means that if you want to research your bets to make better informed decisions, then it is easy to do so.
Furthermore, there is also a wealth of different sports betting markets available for you to bet on and events are available round the clock, due to betting being available on markets based in countries dotted all around the world. However, you may have to wait if you want to bet in play on a certain sporting event, such as a specific basketball match of Formula 1 race.
Finally, the other big positive for sports betting is the sheer number of bets available, On many events, you can have tens, sometimes hundreds of different markets available and many sites now offer punters the ability to build their own bets up using selections from a number of markets so that they can bet on exactly what they want.
- The Cons
The main thing that goes against sports betting is that even if you are
very good at it, you are still going to lose more bets than you win in the vast majority of cases for punters. That’s just the nature of the beast.
Sure you can back the big favourites all the time and increase your chances of winning, but you will find the odds on these selections make the value of your wins so small, that you earn back just a fraction of what you bet as a win. While this is still profit, it is not a huge one.
Furthermore, waiting for certain events can be a pain, if, for example, you place a Premier League accumulator each week, you can only do that when there are Premier League games taking place. You can bet on other matches of course outside of this competition, but if that is where your knowledge and expertise is, you are putting yourself at a slight disadvantage by betting on other leagues etc.
Remember too, that there is no such thing as a ‘sure thing’ in sports betting, Even the big favourites will lose sometimes and occasionally, the rank outside will win. As Leicester City did in the Premier League back in 2016, when they were the 5,000/1 outsiders to win the league title at the start of the season but held the trophy aloft in May.
Virtual Sports Pros and Cons
- The Pros
Virtual Sports has a number of positive aspects going for it. Firstly, they 
are available 24-hours a day, 7 days a week, 365-days a year which means that whenever you are ready to have a flutter, Virtual Sports will be available. You can also enjoy betting for Microstakes or much higher value bets on Virtual Sports too.
The number of markets on some virtual sports is also good, Virtual Football in particular has a good number of markets to bet on and you will find better odds on some Virtual Sports games than you would find in some real life sports events. This is due to the fact that Virtual Sports, with its greater use of randomness in deciding the result, tends to be slightly more volatile in terms of results.
Another positive for Virtual Sports is that you don’t need to research your market to enjoy a bet on it. With all the teams and individuals competing randomly generated, there is no previous history to look at, no statistics to peruse. All you need to do is pick which selection you want to back, back it and then hope that good fortune is in your favour.
Virtual Sports are very much like slots in this respect and indeed, in addition to attracting sports betting fans, Virtual Sports also draws on popular support from slots gamers too. This is why it has become so important as a stream of revenue for so many betting sites today.
- The Cons
Sports betting enthusiasts may not like the random nature of Virtual Sports and the fact that events cannot be researched. The odds available on Virtual Sports events, particularly those with a smaller number of competitors, such as Speedway, also tend to be less varied than some real life sports events (but by no means all).
There’s also the realism factor too as Virtual Sports take place as single event entities only. They are not part of a league or competition or have any context other than the game being played, which can make it harder for players to judge how strong or weak the competitors are in respect to each other.
Which is potentially the most profitable?
This is a much tougher question to answer than it appears. Initially, you
would say that with a greater random factor built in to Virtual Sports and a lack of context for each virtual game, that this would be a more difficult platform to register more regular profits on than sports betting.
Certainly, the ability to research your bets in real life sports betting is a very useful tool for serious punters and in the main, that would perhaps just give real life sports betting the edge, but there are things you can do in Virtual Sports to mitigate that benefit and perhaps even tip it in Virtual Sports betting’s favour.
If you decide to bet on Virtual Sports with just a few competitors, such as Virtual Greyhounds or Virtual Speedway, then with so few competitors, you could potentially win as often, if not more so, than betting on their real life counterparts. That’s because even research on sports events is not infallible and as we have already said, sometimes big favourites lose and the long shots selection wins.
In short, I feel you could turn a profit more likely in real life sports betting, but if you bet predominantly on Virtual Sports with fewer participants, or on markets with just two or three outcomes (such as the Match Result market in Virtual Football), then you should find you win about the same on both types of betting.
