In Sports betting you will often hear handicappers or tipsters refer to a number of units a bet value is when it comes to placing a bet.

A unit is an amount that is calculated based on your total stake amount to provide you with a unit value. Your total stake amount should be an amount of money you have saved, and can afford to speculate with. If you’re betting paycheck to paycheck it may also serve as a means of setting a limit amount so you can better manage your financial position. 

In our experience using a unit system is the best way to build a disciplined and consistent approach to sports betting. Using unit limits is a further step in discipline, which will also allow you to shut a week or a month down when a unit limit is reached or to up a unit amount when an attractive opportunity arises.

To win at sports betting you simply must have a unit system, and stick with it. The problem we mainly see is sports punters after a win up the value of the next bet and if that bet loses they wipe out there profit. It's incredibly difficult to beat the bookmakers and you'll need to make the most of every unit, and every bet you place.

Before we look at how we believe you should calculate a unit, lets have a quick look at the difference between a conservative unit strategy and a bold aggressive strategy.

AGGRESSIVE UNIT STRATEGY 50 UNITS / YEAR
CONSERVATATE UNIT STRATEGY 500 UNITS / YEAR

If you're starting stake is say $5000 then aggressive is $100 per unit (or 2%) and a total of 50 x 1 unit bets. 

For the conservative approach $5000 divided by 500 is $10 per unit (or 0.2%) and a total of 500 x 1 unit bets.

Considering you might have as many as 5, 10 or even 20+ bets in a single week, you can see the obvious difference between how an aggressive unit stake and a conservative unit stake strategy is.

We'll dig deeper into why we believe in the middle ground between aggressive and conservative is a better approach, but is safe to say that in sports betting being conservative pays, being aggressive is high risk and comes with a much lower chance of winning.

Here are the FAQs we get when discussing units in sports betting-

Q1 – How do you calculate a unit?

The best approach we have found is to allow for 250 units in a calendar year, or approximately 5 units per week, or about 20 - 25 units per month. If you have an initial stake amount or total bank amount of $5000 then 1 unit would equal $20.

See our unit table below based on 250 unit / year calculation –

Q2 – How many units should you allow to bet within a month?

We believe in allowing up to 20% of your total stake in one month is acceptable, importantly this assumes that you are winning first and foremost and you’re making the most of increasing your unit amounts on excellent outcome opportunities. This means that we believe that allowing up to 50 units is acceptable in the month (NB – the 20 unit limit rule must apply first, if you lose the 20 units then we believe you should stop and wait until next month to start again), however if you are winning, and or outcomes with odds are in your favor, then we believe you should look to maximise your returns. Having an initial starting limit of 20 units is a way to ensure you will be able to carry on to the next month to claw those units back should you lose. Remember this is war of attrition, if you start with 250 units stake, you need to make sure you finish with more than 250 units to turn a profit. If you can win just 10 units a month you'll finish with a pretty nice bank balance come the end of the year. 

Q3 – Should you ever go past a 1 unit limit?

As explained above, allowing units in a month and speculating a unit in an outcome are different. Units allowed in a month are directly related to your bank, or your stake. Unit limits in a specific outcome is directly related to the single bet (or parlay bet) that you are wagering on. We’ve all come across a good thing, or a market set by a bookmaker that was in a sense “A LOCK”, of you just knew that the odds were well in your favour. While we all know no bet is really a lock in some cases some bets are better than others, and some outcomes are better evaluated than others. 

When the evaluation and the market offering line up then we believe in increasing the unit amount for that outcome. This is a very complex method, takes a lot of work, it also adds more risk, which means you stand to lose more per outcome. This means you best be doing the work, but be fair warned no matter how much work you do, when you up the unit amount sometimes they will lose, you hope if you are really really good at evaluating outcomes, then only some of the time does the increased unit bet lose. 

The way we like to look at this is by placing the outcome into 4 categories. 

1 – GOOD – A good chance to be right – 1-2 units of speculation 

2 – VERY GOOD – Likely to be right – 3-4 units of speculation 

3 – HIGHLY LIKELY – Highly likely to be right – 5-6 units of speculation

4 – EXTREMELY LIKELY – Extremely likely to be right – 6-10 units of speculation

PLEASE NOTE  – We only recommend increasing units if you are highly experienced in evaluating outcomes, and most importantly you have a very high PROVEN success rate (in excess of 85%) when increasing unit amounts in outcomes. 

NB – We do not recommend going past 10 units in a single bet either, as this is the equivalent of about 2 full weeks of units in just one outcome, and believe us when we say this, any outcome no matter how much of a certain you think it is, they can lose. You want to be the one who wins these increased unit bets, not losing them.

Also in our strategies we have a lot of 1 unit bets, and we chip away bet by bet, don't fall into the trap of having a higher unit bet lose, only to chase that with an even higher unit bet in attempt to try and win that money back, this is one of the all time worst strategies you can go with.

Q4 – How do you determine how many units a particular outcome is worth?

The better you are at staking, or handicapping the better you will become at evaluating how many units a specific outcome should be valued at, and that takes a lot of insight and understanding about the sports, the teams, and the players you are betting on. Along with the fact that you need to evaulate the market odds against that outcome. Keep it simple until you have a proven record of winning the increased unit bets.

NB - It is best to create a tracking system, so that you can keep tabs of how you are going with these, which outcomes fall into which category and what your overall success rate is, before you start placing your hard earned money down on any increased unit amount.

Q5 – What is the highest number of units you have ever bet with?

We recently landed a 55 unit bet. Importantly we were already in a winning position for the year and had plenty of the bookies money to wager with, rather than hitting our own stake. Much better to betting with the house’s money, than you're own, which is the ideal position to be in. When rare opportunities arise, if you are well in front for the year, this is the time you can take advantage of the rare mistakes from the bookmakers, and trust us they do make mistakes. However WARNING! We do not recommend upping the total unit amount past 10 units in a single outcome. Our financial position does allow us to take on certain additional risks, but we know this isn’t everyone’s position, so be smart and set a limit.

Q6 – Is 2% of your overall stake in one week an acceptable amount? 

Setting limits or reserves in sports punting is the first step in creating a disciplined approach to how you set out in an attempt to win money by speculating on sports markets set by bookmakers. 2% of your overall stake allows you to potentially have 50 individual outcomes. Which if you’re a successful punter you can really make that work for you. We add an extra level to this and reduce a single unit down to just 0.4% of your total stake. This gives you a little more room to work a weekly strategy across multiple events. We subscribe to a monthly plan and strategy, weekly is just too short term focused, but the results are all in the long term so plan accordingly and make your year a profitable one.

Q7 – What do you do when you reach your limit?

You must have the discipline to stop. Reflect and review your choices. Go back to the drawing board and work harder. To be successful in this game chasing loses with outcomes that you didn’t really like, look at or review in the first place is almost a sure fire guaranteed way of losing more of your stake. You need to guard your stake at all times and if you reach a limit in the week or the month then stop and start again when your stake and unit system allows for it. You simply have to know when to stop.

‘We wish you every success in your sports betting journey but if you need assistance or or want to talk to someone about a problem with gambling please contact gambling help online click >>> here or call 1-800-858-858. Know your limit.’