TonyBet Review

TonyBet Sportsbook Summary

If you followed poker shortly after the much-publicized boom of the early 2000s, you likely know the guy behind the TonyBet sportsbook and gaming brand.

Antanas Guogo, known worldwide as Tony G, bought the fledgling product in 2009 and named it after himself; it has since grown into a well-known international brand and made a triumphant arrival into Canada in 2021. But while Tony G’s poker skills are second-to-none, his sportsbook is more like 2-5 unsuited against a K-10-9 rainbow flop. And that, folks, is not good.

TonyBet Bonuses

With TonyBet, new users get a 100% first deposit bonus up to $350. Follow the steps below to redeem this offer:

• Register for a new account directly on TonyBet's website.
• During the sign-up process, you'll have a choice between the offer above or an online casino promo. You can choose either one but if you want to stick to sports betting, choose the former.
• Make a deposit of at least $15 to qualify for the welcome bonus. To redeem the full value, you'll need to deposit $350.
• To receive the bonus, you'll also need to place qualifying bets. The wagering requirement is 5x your first deposit amount and you'll also need to pick bets with odds of 1.50 (-200) or longer (multi-bets require cumulative odds of 1.70 or longer). For example, if you deposit $15 and claim $15 in matching bonus funds, you won't unlock the bonus until you make $75 in cumulative wagers.
• Note: the wagering and 5x playthrough requirements must be met within 14 days of registration to unlock bonus funds.

Once you've played through the TonyBet welcome offer, you can also take advantage of the following ongoing promos:

• Reload bonus bets
• Forecasts
• VIP Club
• Tournaments
• Early Cashout
• Odds Boosts
• Casino Welcome
• Spin-Tastic Weekend

TonyBet Locations

TonyBet has a global presence and is a factor in several countries worldwide. The company has access in Canada, everywhere but in the Ontario market, which was the first to move away from a “grey market” and toward a fully regulated and licensed one.

Sports Leagues to Bet On

The Estonian-based TonyBet isn’t going to wow you with its selection of sports, as it falls short of what most sportsbooks offer in Canada. At least the main sports are here, along with tennis, soccer, boxing, cricket, MMA, and auto racing.

From there, it gets a bit weird. There were zero golf markets available during our search (no major futures?), while sports like biathlon and ski jumping were represented. And the “Favourites” menu bore no resemblance to what Canadian sports fans would prefer, with the list featuring table tennis, volleyball, and handball.

Working in TonyBet’s favour is the inclusion of esports, though they aren’t listed as esports in the side menu. You’ll have to know which form of egaming you’re looking for, be it League of Legends, Counter-Strike, Dota 2, esport FIFA or otherwise.

NFL Betting

TonyBet offers a wide range of betting options for NFL wagers, including moneylines, spreads, totals, quarter- and half-specific betting options, in-game wagers, and a decent selection of player props each Sunday during the season.

NBA Betting

There’s no shortage of betting options for NBA fans, as TonyBet offers moneyline, spread, and total plays for every game on the schedule. You can also wager on quarterly or halftime options and daily player props.

College Football

If it’s NCAA football markets you seek, you’ve come to the right place. TonyBet offers moneyline, spread, and total plays for the majority of Division I games on any given Saturday during the season, along with a large assortment of quarter-by-quarter or halftime plays. You can also wager on team props, though player props aren’t available.

College Basketball

While you won’t see as robust a market for NCAA basketball as you would find on more popular sites like bet365 or Sports Interaction, TonyBet does have a presence here. Marquee games during the regular season are covered, while TonyBet follows the lead of most Canadian sportsbooks by ramping up the betting markets ahead of March Madness.

NHL Betting

TonyBet does well to appeal to the puckheads that preside in Canada, offering a healthy number of hockey markets every day during the season and into the Stanley Cup playoffs. In addition to moneyline, puckline, and total plays, bettors have access to team and player props, along with period-specific betting markets.

MLB Betting

How do you make a summer afternoon even better? By firing up your TonyBet account and placing some baseball wagers. TonyBet offers comprehensive MLB markets for pre-game bets (moneyline, runline, total) and in-game action (five innings moneyline/run line, player props, team props).

Other Sports Leagues

TonyBet has an incredibly strong esports foundation. Bettors will find markets across every major esports competition, with odds available well in advance of the start of the actual events.

Online Betting Experience

TonyBet doesn’t yet offer an iOS or Android app for its product, so sports bettors are forced to use either the desktop version or the mobile web iteration.

Website Experience

Both versions greet players with an absolute deluge of betting options and numbers upon sign-in. TonyBet arranges its betting options in one long line on the main screen, with headers like “1”, “X,” “2”, “1X”, “12”, and so on. More experienced bettors know what’s up, but if you’re new to the game, you’ll have no idea what these headers mean and how they correspond to the bet you’d like to make.

Making matters worse is the insistence on TonyBet to add two decimal points to its American odds – so instead of seeing -115, you’ll see -115.00. Or you’ll see -114.68. We get it, you want to show how precise you are. But again, it comes across to a new sports bettor as intimidating, over-the-top, or simply one more reason to go elsewhere.

There’s also the issue of every new sports or matchup page taking time to load. Thankfully, most of these load times are short – but if you’re trying to access a long list of bet options, it can take 5-10 seconds for the entire menu to appear. And that can get annoying, as well.

Mobile Betting and Betting App

You won’t find TonyBet on either the App Store or Google Play – at least, not yet.

Live Betting

If and when you can get accustomed to TonyBet’s messy interface, the resulting live betting product is quite strong. Click the “Live Betting” tab at the top of the screen, and you’ll be taken to a master list of events going on in real-time, sorted automatically by sport.

Below the games going on at that moment, you’ll find a list of everything with a live betting market coming up over the next 12 hours. This is a handy feature for planning out the rest of your betting plan – and if it’s too much for you, you can minimize the list.

Clicking into a matchup provides you instant access to all of the available bets for that event, along with the option to arrange the live bets into one, two, or three columns. You’ll also get a “virtual field” in the top right, where you can follow the event (if the option is available).

Unfortunately, TonyBet doesn’t yet offer live streaming for Canadian bettors.

Casino, Poker, & Other Gaming Options

While the sportsbook experience might not be the most satisfying for Canadian residents and visitors, TonyBet’s casino offerings are among the best in the country, period.

Clicking into the “Casino” section along the top nav takes the player to TonyBet’s vault of slot machines; you can either sift through the more than 4,600 slot options from the main Slots header, or you can sort the machines through a variety of categories like “Most Popular,” New,” or “Bonus Buy” (where you can skip right to the bonus spins option for a specific slot.)

The “Live Casino” section of the site is also robust, with nearly 120 tables available to those looking for some cards or roulette action. Games covered here include Baccarat, blackjack, game show-style options, and poker, all featuring live dealers or spinners.

Head over to our TonyBet Casino review for even more details, or check out the TonyBet bonus code section to learn about the welcome bonus for new players. 

TonyBet History

The company was founded under the name OmniBet in 2003. It had established itself as a force in the European iGaming scene before being taken over by Tony G and promptly rebranded.

TonyBet continued to grow in scale and influence and made even bigger waves in 2016 by becoming one of the first gaming sites in the world to begin accepting Bitcoin as a deposit method. TonyBet converted Bitcoin into regular currencies while being used on the site but also allowed those who deposited via cryptocurrency to withdraw using the same method.

The brand's overwhelming success allowed Tony G. to sell off the Lithuanian side of the business to Betsson AB for approximately six million Euros in 2016.

TonyBet made its first appearance in Canada in 2021 and spent millions in promotion and advertising in hopes of making an immediate impact.

Customer Ratings & Reputation

There is a common theme among second- and third-tier sportsbooks operating in Canada – and it’s a major concern for players looking to get the most value out of their bets.

TonyBet’s odds are primarily below the industry standard and not by a little bit. While major sports see decent pre-game odds that are usually only 1-2 cents off, pre-game odds for non-major sports and in-game odds for just about every market can be 10 cents off – or more.

It’s not unusual, for example, to see totals carry odds anywhere from -117/-117 to -120/-120, well off the standard of -110/-110. And the odds get worse as you veer further away from 50/50 results: Consider examples of -180/+125 or -170/+115, which each feature 35 cents of vig.

TonyBet does deserve full credit for not only responding to every negative Trustpilot review it has received but doing so in a professional manner, offering help to anyone with a complaint. And with a 2.5 rating out of 5, you can imagine how many people fall into that bucket.  

It’s also notable that TonyBet offers some nice player perks that other sites don’t provide. You can participate in sports betting tournaments that pay out cash prizes, and there’s also a contest called “Forecasts,” where you win money for nailing the outcomes of 8, 9, or 10 straight matches.

Customer Service

As mentioned earlier, TonyBet takes pride in providing a solid customer service experience – and that dedication to putting out fires on Trustpilot carries over to its on-site CS approach. Agents are available via chat 24-7; they respond quickly to inquiries and are quite pleasant to deal with despite what is obviously a difficult job.

Unfortunately, there aren't many other ways to get in touch with TonyBet. You can try the email (info@tonybet.com), but the response time there is a bit on the delayed side. And there’s no dedicated phone line for customer service, so if you don’t like live chat, you’re out of luck.

TonyBet Contact

• 24/7 Live Chat
• Email: info@tonybet.com

TonyBet Legal Betting

TonyBet is regulated in Canada by the Kahnawake Gambling Commission, which has effectively and successfully regulated interactive gaming longer than almost any other jurisdiction in the world.

The Commission’s authority to license and regulate gaming is a facet of the sovereign rights Kahnawake has as a community of indigenous peoples to govern its affairs.

Responsible Gambling

The legal age for gambling in Canada (Ontario excluded) is 18+. Please play responsibly. TonyBet complies with the rules laid down by the Kahnawake Gaming Commission, Mohawk Territory of Kahnawake, Canada.

Here are a few resources to help ensure you are gambling responsibly.

• BeGambleAware.org
• Gambling Therapy
• ResponsibleGambling.org

TonyBet Review Conclusion

If you’re a gaming aficionado, you probably aren’t going to find a more immersive experience than the one you get from TonyBet.

Unfortunately, this is a sportsbook review, not a casino analysis. And when it comes to the sports betting experience, there’s plenty sorely lacking here. From the vig-heavy odds to the strangely complicated interface to the list of sports with a more European audience in mind, it stands to wonder whether TonyBet truly cares about its Canadian audience.

Whether they do or don’t is ultimately of no consequence. The product is below-average overall, and it won’t take Canadian bettors long to see they have much better options at their disposal.