Moneyline bets are the most common wager bettors would add to their parlays due to their familiarity and payout opportunity. Do you need a unique tool or formula to know if a five-team parlay for the next NBA season will be profitable? How much would that parlay pay if you were to add three or four moneyline favorites?
We answer these questions by showing you how to calculate moneyline parlay payouts.
Calculating Moneyline Parlay Payouts
Parlays are a clump of wagers called legs that forms a single bet, which predicts that every moneyline it carries wins. Because of its risk, parlays have incredibly high payouts when it wins.
The payouts are such that big bettors often struggle to know how much they can really get from a series of moneylines they plan on making. This struggle can make picking a specific set of moneyline bets challenging when there is no access to a sportsbook platform or a moneyline parlay calculator.
Below are two steps to help you see the payout of your moneyline parlay.
Turn American Odds To Decimal Odds
The first step is for US bettors, where nearly every sportsbook within the jurisdiction uses the American odds format. To simplify the next step, you must turn the American odds of your moneyline parlays into decimal odds.
American odds are centered around a $100 wager, so this type of odds is more than 100. Odds with a minus or (-) symbol next to them indicate a favored team or player. Prices with a plus or (+) are the underdogs.
Favored American odds are the stake amount needed to win $100. If a team has -150 odds to win, you need to wager $150 to get a payout of $250 or a profit of $100. On the other hand, underdog American odds is the amount you will get if you wager $100. Staking $100 for odds of +160 will grant you a payout of $260 or a profit of $160.
Let us use NBA lines as our example with the following teams:
- Golden State Warriors -125
- Miami Heat +175
- New York Knicks +115
- LA Clippers -130
We have two favorites and two underdog moneylines for our parlays. We use this formula for favorites to turn the Warrior’s odds to a decimal format.
- 1 – (100/ American Odds) = Decimal odds
- For the Golden State Warriors, we calculate their odds of 1-(100/-125) = 1.80
- For underdog moneylines, use the formula below for Miami.
- 1+ (American Odds/100) = Decimal odds
- Using this for Miami Heat will give us: 1+ (+175/100) = 2.75
Multiply The Moneyline Payouts
After getting the parlay decimal odds for your moneylines, we multiply every leg by each other to get the true odds of this wager. The formula for a four-team parlay is:
- (decimal odd x decimal odd x decimal odd x decimal odd) = parlay odd
Going back to the four examples before:
- Golden State Warriors 1.80
- Miami Heat 2.75
- New York Knicks 2.15
- LA Clippers -1.77
Your four-team parlay should be (1.80 x 2.75 x 2.15 x 1.77) = 18.84
If you stake $100 for this moneyline parlay wager, your payout should be $1,884.00 with a profit of $1,784.00. On the other hand, a stake of $50 can grant you a payout of $942.00 or a profit of $892.00.
There is another important calculation you will also want to consider once you get the true odds of your moneyline parlay, implied probability. This value tells you the likelihood of your parlay winning. The formula is:
- (1/parlay odds) x 100 = implied probability
- (1/18.84) x 100 = 5.31%
Due to the requirement of winning four moneylines, two of which are underdogs, your chances of seeing the parlay payout is only around five percent. Note that this implied probability is for a four-team parlay. You can reduce the risk by making two-team parlays or adding moneyline favorites to your bet.
Calculating Totals and Spread Parlay Payout
You can apply the same formula to total or spread parlays. We can use the English Premier League’s totals and spreads bet as our example:
- Leicester City +0.5 +110
- Aston Villa +1 -120
- Everton 2.25 under -130
- Liverpool 4.00 over +120
- Convert the odds to decimals:
- Leicester City +0.5 2.10
- Aston Villa +1 1.83
- Everton 2.25 under 1.77
- Liverpool 3.00 over 2.20
Once we have the odds in the correct format, we multiply them to get this: (2.10 x 1.83 x 1.77 x 2.20) = 14.97. The four-team parlay also has an implied probability of 6.70%. Staking $100 for this parlay results in a payout of $1,497.00 or a profit of $1,397.00.
Are Parlay Payouts The Same In All States?
Yes, the method to calculate how are your parlay tickets paying out is the same across the country. It is the same worldwide though it may have different names (e.g., bet builders or accumulators in the UK).
Some bookmakers offer different types of odds, unique odd boosters, and markets. Do your due diligence to know which betting site has the best deals in your state. For instance, Massachusetts sports betting sites will have great odds for anyone looking to take advantage of it if you want to get in on the action. New York betting sites also have a vast selection of betting markets available with unique bets specific to the NY culture.
Manually calculating will help you know the risks and payouts of any parlays while at home or at your local sports betting venue. If you are in a hurry, we have a parlay calculator for moneylines, spreads, totals, and other wagers available.
This article was published on April 25, 2023, and last updated on April 25, 2023.
