What is the vig — and how to beat it
The vig (also called juice or the hold) is the sportsbook's built-in commission on every bet. At the standard −110/−110 pricing you risk $110 to win $100, which works out to roughly a 4.5% margin and a 52.4% break-even win rate — meaning a coin-flip bettor slowly loses by design.
Sportsbooks don't make money by being right — they make it by charging that margin on every bet. Understanding it is the difference between bettors who slowly bleed out and bettors who give themselves a real chance.
What the vig actually is
When both sides of a game are priced at -110, you risk $110 to win $100 on either side. The book has built in a cushion: it pays out a little less than fair odds, so it profits regardless of who wins. That cushion is the vig.
How to spot it
Convert both sides to implied probabilities and add them up. A fair, vig-free market sums to 100%. A real market sums to more — often 104-110%. That overage is the hold. The bigger it is, the worse the price you're getting.
Why it makes betting hard
The vig is why a 50/50 bettor doesn't break even — they slowly lose the margin on every wager. To beat the book you don't just need to be right more than half the time; you need to be right often enough to overcome the juice on top.
How to actually beat it
- Line shopping — different books charge different vig; always take the best price, which directly shrinks the margin you pay.
- Reduced-juice markets — some books offer -105 instead of -110; over a season that gap is real money.
- Bet into low-hold markets — major-game sides/totals carry less vig than parlays and obscure props.
Know if you're winning the battle
The cleanest proof you're beating the vig is Closing Line Value — consistently getting a better price than the line's close. Bankroll Guardian compares prices across books and tracks your CLV automatically, so you can see whether you're paying the vig or beating it.
Bankroll Guardian is a bet-tracking and analytics tool — not a sportsbook, and none of this is betting advice. Betting carries risk; please bet responsibly.