If you are looking for a new betting experience that breaks the mold set by conventional sportsbooks, then sports prediction and event trading platforms are a good way to go. These are platforms that provide you with contracts, not bets, relating to sports events and virtually eveyrthing else. Instead of odds, you will be monitoring percentages and trading contracts with your peers.
Sports prediction and contract trading platforms can give you a lot more control over how you stake your game tips, opening the door for all kinds of masterful betting strategies and systems. We will go through everything you need to know about these platforms and how they can benefit you below.
How Sports Trading and Contracts Work
Instead of providing bets as you would get at US sportsbooks, at sports prediction markets you buy contracts with percentages that determine your payout. The prediction markets are two-way affairs, using the Yes/No betting format, and you can either buy your contract at market value, or set your own price for the contracts you want to buy. A single contract is priced anywhere between $0.01 and $0.99, and each contract wins $1.
The value of the contracts will fluctuate, depending on the market trends, and traders have a few options when it comes to buying their contracts. You can either:
- a) Buy a contract at the real-time current price
- b) Wait for the market to dip and then buy your contract
- c) Create an order with a custom limit price – one you set, that will become a resting order with an expiration date
The prediction model is closer to a stock market or trading exchange where prices fluctuate on a daily basis. After buying your contract, you can either keep it running until it settles or sell it back – the equivalent of cashing out at a sportsbook. Just like a traditional sports bet, once the game has concluded, your sports prediction will settle, and you will be paid out. For each contract you buy, you will be paid $1 minus any trader’s fees.
Set Your Price and Resting Orders
This feature is more akin to a betting exchange, where you can offer a price for other sports fans to buy. Essentially, you are laying a prediction at your preferred price, and hoping that one of your peers will swoop in and buy the opposite outcome based on your price.
When you create a price and set your desired stake, this will be offered in the market, and another player can buy the opposing contract at the reciprocal price. Your proposal becomes a resting order, for which you can set an expiration date.
Peer to peer betting exchanges fall somewhere in the space between sportsbooks and prediction markets. They also allow bettors to name their prices and back or lay prices laid by others. Though they tend to have a greater pool of specifically sports-related bets, closer to what you would get at a real sportsbook. It’s highly worth checking out some of the USA’s top betting exchanges to get a good idea of what’s out there. Here are a few of our top picks, with reviews that explain everything you need to know.
Best US Sports Contract Trading Platforms
There are numerous event-based trading platforms in the world, including a fair few US-based companies. The principles of trading contracts and predicting Yes/No markets are generally the same, but some exchanges may have a greater market scope, or different conditions as far as trader’s fees and limitations are concerned. In the US, the biggest and most renowned event based trading platform is Kalshi, which is regulated by the CFTC in the US, and it was among the first to roll out sports specific wagers and even parlay betting. The prediction market is now joined by numerous competitors in America, including Robinhood, with whom Kalshi formed a partnership.
#1. Kalshi – America’s Best Known Prediction Market Exchange
Kalshi was the first CFTC-regulated prediction market exchange, and the US-based platform is a market leader in this space Kalshi is available in all 50 states, as it is not considered to be a sports betting platform but rather a Designated Contract Market, regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. It works in full transparency, offering contracts that have been vetted.
But sports betting is just the tip of the iceberg as far as Kalshi is concerned. The platform launched in 2021 in Manhattan and offered contracts in all sorts of outcomes, including economic, political, and even weather pattern contract trading. In 2024, Kalshi had its largest contract series to date on the US Election, with over half a billion dollars spent by traders predicting who would become the next US President between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump. Kalshi offers predictors a wide array of markets and even possibilities to submit new ideas to enhance the offering. In January of 2025, Donald Trump Jr joined the platform as a strategic adviser.
Kalshi’s key selling point for US traders is its specific sports predictions products. The platform rolled these out at the start of the 2025-26 NFL season, under the name Combos. Now, Kalshi covers 10+ sports officially – with moneylines, spreads, totals, futures, and awards, these include:
- NFL
- NHL
- NBA
- MLB
- Soccer
- eSports
- Motorsports
- Golf
And more. But of course, you can always upload your own trades and cover other sporting events or sports related happenings. To enhance the experience, you have a Kalshi feed where you can communicate with your peers – potentially sharing your new market orders or looking for unfilled orders from peers to play against. Then, there is a 3.5% APY on balances held over $250. This 3.5% APY is paid out on the first week of each month, but accrual is calculated on a daily basis.
Kalshi Pros:
- Ideas feed for promoting your created market orders
- Expansive sports markets with parlays
- 3.5% interest on balances exceeding $250
- Debit cards accepted (no credit cards), PayPal, Venmo, Cashapp, and ACH transfer for US users
- Make your own market via Market Maker Program
Kalshi Cons:
- 2% processing fees on bank card deposits and withdrawals
- Varying fees based on risk – from 0.7% up to 3.5% (average >1.2%)
- Fees come out a lot higher than competitors
#2. Polymarket – Expansive Prediction Market with Stablecoin Support
Polymarket is an American crypto-first prediction market that was launched in 2020, was ousted by the CFTC in 2022, and returned to the US in 2025. The platform has a massive selection of prediction markets to try out, including categories such as finance, tech, culture, economy, politics, elections and sports. A hugely popular platform, Polymarket had orders for the 2025 Champions League Winner and 2025 Super Bowl Champion that exceeded $1 billion in market volume. The NBA Champion of the same year broke the $2 billion line, but the biggest order, by a longshot, was the 2024 US Presidential Election Winner, which amassed over $4 billion in orders.
Those numbers tell you how popular Polymarket is, and this is a good sign for sports predictors as more volume means greater liquidity and more options. Within sports, Polymarket looks similar to a conventional sportsbook. There are categories for the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, tennis, soccer, eSports, golf, UFC, and many more. In total, there are over 10 sporting categories. Polymarket covers live wagers, futures, and many standard markets.
There are leaderboards, daily rewards for activity, and users can also trade cryptocurrencies on the platform. Polymarket is honest about its fee hours – there is a flat fee of 0.01 cents per every one dollar traded. That means around 0.01%, which is a lot lower than some competitors. The only thing you have to note about Polymarket is that the exchange runs on the stablecoin USDC. You can trade contracts in USDC, buying USDC via bank cards (using Coinbase) or make straight deposits from your external cryptowallet. Deposits and withdrawals carry no internal charges, but you may pay some conversion fees on Coinbase if buying with USD, or pay network fees if sending USDC from an external wallet.
Polymarket Pros:
- Very low fees
- Expansive sports scope
- Very popular (biggest contract had over $4 billion volume)
- Daily rewards, leaderboards, and social functions
Polymarket Cons:
- Only accepts USDC no fiat currencies
- You can’t make new markets yourself – only suggest ideas
#3. Crypto.com – Crypto Exchange Meets Prediction Marketplace
A crypto trading platform first, Crypto.com is a Singapore based exchange that launched its services in the US in 2025. Crypto.com offers sports prediction markets on basketball, football, hockey soccer and motorsports, with standard betting markets and futures. The platform boasts accessible contract prices, clarity on market probabilities and trading prices, and a highly intuitive trading interface.
Beyond sports, Crypto.com also has prediction markets on economics, financials, politics, and entertainment categories are set to arrive in the near future. There are options to sell early, limit losses, and open multiple contracts on the same position, giving hedge bettors plenty of features to test their predictions against the ever-fluctuating market prices. You can trade via cash or convert your assets into any of the 400 cryptocurrencies Crypto.com supports. Crypto.com doesn’t just have $1 contracts, but it also has $10 contracts, extending the possibilities for sports bettors, with event level position limits of $2.5 million set at either.
Opening positions are charged at $0.02 for $1 value contracts and $0.10 for $10 value contracts, and closing the position early is charged at the same amount. If the position settles and you win, your exchange fee on $1 value contracts is waived, but on $10 value contracts is an additional $0.10. Crypto.com also charges a slippage tolerance, which is an extra fee to compensate for any immediate line moves, which is set at $0.05 per contract.
The fees, on the whole, can fluctuate greatly depending on the price of the order, and whether or not you are buying $1 value or $10 value contracts. While transparent about the fees, they are quite difficult to track, which is one of the areas Crypto.com can improve its service in. But otherwise, it has great market coverage, excellent financial products, and supports hundreds of cryptocurrency tokens, making it a popular choice among US prediction market bettors.
Crypto.com Pros:
- Supports over 400 crypto tokens
- Covers plenty of major sports events
- Intuitive interface
Crypto.com Cons:
- Fees are very complicated and can be high
- Could have more props and other sports products
#4. Robinhood – A Professional Financial Derivatives Exchange with Sports Contracts
Robinhood Markets is a California native company that was founded in 2013 and has a massive range of financial trading products. There are exchange traded funds, stocks, index options, futures contracts, crypto trading, and in 2025 Robinhood launched event contracts and a prediction market hub through its partnership with Kalshi.
The prediction market app boasts great flexibility and coverage, with real time event contracts offered all across the US. The prediction markets are only available through Robinhood’s mobile app, so you must download this to access the products. Robinhood supplies Yes/No prediction markets mainly on NFL, college football, the NBA and college basketball, with more sports set to follow. Fees are capped at $0.01 per contract bought or sold – it doesn’t matter what the level of risk or how many contracts you bought – you will always be charged just $0.01 per contract.
Robinhood’s sports coverage is a bit slimmer than other competitors, but it has a massive range of financial products, including 3.5% savings APY, estate planning and even professional tax advice with certified professionals. The platform also released an added functionality to cover live games, with winners, spreads and total scores predictions.
Robinhood Pros:
- Fixed fees for trading
- Extensive financial products and resources
- Real time odds with live game coverage offered
Robinhood Cons:
- Prediction markets only offered in Robinhood mobile app
- Limited sports coverage
Other Contract Trading Platforms
There are many other contract trading platforms cropping up in the US, but in our list we wanted to focus specifically on those with sports coverage. PredictIt a New Zealand-based company, also operates in the US, but its status is contentious. In 2022 PredictIt entered a legal battle with the CFTC, who wanted to shut down the platform. Then, in 2023, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals granted PredictIt relief to continue operating until the Court completes its consideration.
ForecastEX is a financial derivatives exchange that is fully registered by the CFTC. An affiliate of Interactive brokers, it has a range of financial products to offer, including contracts on political, climate and economic events. There are some sports markets, but not enough to make our list for the time being.
SportTrade is another prediction market that provides members with the opportunity to buy and sell sports contracts. The Philadelphia-based company announced a strategic partnership with SIG Sports Investment Corps in 2024 to enhance its sports trading products. SportTrade only operates in select states across the US, but the owners have stated a desire to step into more states in the upcoming years as SportTrade gains momentum in the sports prediction industry.
Augur is a decentralized prediction market that runs on the Ethereum blockchain. The platform also uses binary market options (Yes/No format), which implies it should fall under the jurisdiction of the CFTC, but Augur hasn’t been licensed yet. The platform uses the native cryptocurrency as its internal currency, but also introduced a stablecoin, DAI, to make the market resolution faster and reach a wider audience.
FanDuel Predicts – Coming Soon
FanDuel teamed up with CME Group in September, 2025, with the goal of launching its own prediction markets. These will most likely have entertainment, culture, politics and financial event contracts, potentially with some sports products.
DraftKings Predictions – Coming Soon
With its acquisition of Railbird, DraftKings joined FanDuel in declaring an interest in America’s latest trend – prediction markets. DraftKings Predictions is currently in the works.
How You Can Get Started Trading Contracts
Making the jump from classic sports betting to prediction markets may sound daunting, but it is quite a simple process. First, you will need to sign up at a sports prediction trading, or contract trading, platform.
Just like at sportsbooks, you will need to verify your account before proceeding with making a deposit and buying your first contracts. Even trading is not regulated in the same light as sports betting. It is seen as a financial exchange that does not necessarily relate to sports event-based predictions (though it falls into the same category). Event trading is legal in all 50 states and so long as you meet the following requirements:
- You must be 18+ years old
- You must provide a US residential address to link to your account
Though you should note. Just because it is legal, doesn’t mean every sports prediction platform will be available across all 50 states.
Verification, Payment, and Additional Conditions
All traders must have their accounts verified so that the authorities can determine that there is no fraud. Upon registration, you may be asked to make a phone verification, email verification, address confirmation, and submit a government-issued photo ID. Submitting your SSN is the last verification step, and once you are done, your account will be good to go.
Payment options depend on the trading platform, but for the most part, you can expect debit cards, bank transfers, and wire transfers. You may not find eWallets or prepaid voucher options offered on event trading platforms, but some do offer crypto banking options. Most trading exchanges do not charge you membership fees, deposit or withdrawal fees (unless otherwise stated). They take their cut out of the small percentage discrepancy in the contracts, which is variable. The only other fee that you may run into is the trader’s fees, which we will analyze in depth a bit later.
Any money you make trading contracts must be declared and is subject to taxation. You will need to file 1099-INT for interest (APY) based profits you make. Sports predictors will need to fill out 1099-MISC forms for any credit or profits they make from their winning sports predictions.
As contract trading is not regulated in the same way as sports betting, you won’t be taxed in the same way. The good news is, you don’t have additional state taxes to pay out on your winnings (where applicable).
Juice or Trading Fees at Event Trading Platforms
Even the biggest US sportsbooks must add some juice, or vig, to their odds to ensure they make a profit. These are small cuts taken off your potential winnings, that will ultimately ensure the sportsbook makes a profit in the long run. At sports trading platforms, the Yes/No contracts always add up to $1, but the percentages will have a slight discrepancy, similar to the sportsbook juice. But that is where the similarities end.
Sportsbook juice varies greatly depending on how popular or niche the sport (or betting market) is and can range from around 5% up to 8%. The bigger sportsbook brands tend to have lower juice. Sports prediction markets blow these out of the park, with juice of around 1% or even lower. That little extra may not seem much, but it does wonders in the long run.
Trading fees are applied to contracts that are sold back to the platforms before settlement, or to those that settle. The rate varies depending on how much you sell your predictions for, or how much you stand to win on your settled contract. Different trading exchanges have their own variable rates, but for the most part, they will not charge any traders fees if you sell your contracts back without making a profit. Cashing out to break even does not generally incur any trader’s fees.
Sports Event Trading vs Conventional Sportsbooks
Sports prediction trading definitely has a lot of positives, but there are areas in which it cannot compete with classic sports betting. There are fundamental differences between how the two types of platforms operate, though sports prediction markets are a newer phenomena and one that we are sure will grow exponentially in the coming few years.
| Sports Prediction Markets | Conventional Sportsbooks |
|---|---|
| Pros | |
| Price Fluctuations and Cash Out | Diverse Sports Betting Markets |
| Lower Juice | Parlay Betting |
| Crypto Payments | Cash Out and Live Bets |
| Alternative/NASDAQ Markets | More Banking Options |
| Available All Across the States | Excellent Mobile Apps |
| Cons | |
| No Sports Bonuses | No Pregame Cash Out Fluctuations |
| No Parlay Betting | No Alternative/NASDAQ Markets |
| Limited Sports Predictions Markets | Higher Juice |
| Limited Payment Options | Limited State Availability |
Now let’s break down a few of these and analyze them more carefully.
Sports Betting Experience
The prediction market platforms are perfect for bettors who are looking to squeeze out bigger returns on their wagered dollar. Even with any applicable trader’s fees, you will still win more on your predictions than the moneyline (or other types of betting) equivalent at a sportsbook. However, there are no features to accommodate parlay bets. Most platforms do not allow you to combine predictions, so you cannot make any of the following: teasers, round robins, SGP, SGPx, parlays, and so on.
As for the markets themselves, sportsbooks offer a greater variety of options. You won’t really get player bets, totals, props bets, and so on at sports prediction platforms. They must use binary markets (yes/no), so you can completely forget about spread betting, as the lines cannot shift or be recalculated before a game starts.
Another big pro of sportsbooks over prediction platforms is sports bonuses. Sportsbooks can offer you bonus bets, parlay insurance, early payout offers, and all kinds of incentives to help you out. But don’t expect any of the same at sports prediction platforms.
Payment and Banking Options
The betting experience is noncomparable, but where handling your finances is concerned, it is easier to weigh up the pros and cons. Trading platforms tend to cover all bank cards, wire transfers, and bank transfers – the basic necessities for any bettor. Some platforms like Kalshi support crypto deposits (USDC), something that the sports betting regulation is nowhere near.
But sportsbooks tend to have a more flexible array of banking options. The bigger brands support a number of eWallets, vouchers, and even cash options if your sportsbook has retail locations. Plus, when it comes to limits, sportsbooks tend to have the lowest minimum deposit and withdrawal ranges.
State Availability and Legality
Sportsbooks can only operate in states where betting has been legalized. Even in those states, there may be constraints as to how many operators can provide their services, limitations on mobile/online sports betting, and even some markets that may be completely ruled out. Sports betting may be spreading across the US, but there are states where the legalization procedure is nowhere near ready.
As for trading platforms, the ones that are officially registered with the CFTC are available in all 50 states. Because these are not sports betting products, but financial derivatives – that are federally governed and not regulated at a state level. Therefore, Kalshi, Robinhood, and the others that are officially recognized are available in all 50 US states.
Going back to sportsbooks and state legality, there are alternatives if your state hasn’t yet legalized sports betting. Social sportsbooks and Fantasy Sports apps are available in the majority of US states and offer similar betting products but without the need to play for real money. Apps like Rebet or Fliff are hugely popular, with highly competitive betting scopes and excellent features that any sports bettor can benefit from.
Betting Strategy and Ethos
As the betting experience is so inherently different between prediction markets and classic sportsbooks, your betting strategy will also need some tweaking to adjust to the trading platforms. For instance, the fluctuation of the betting markets and the possibility to sell back your bet at any time grants you excellent cash out possibilities. It can also go a long way with hedge bettors, who can take advantage of price fluctuations and pick out the perfect contract prices to successfully hedge their bets.
Which is Better For Your Needs?
It all boils down to how you want to bet, and what types of bet you want to place. If you prefer the idea of seeking good value for your money, and potentially hedging or selling your bets, then it is no question. Prediction markets are still relatively new to the US, and as they become more popular, we expect a greater volume of sports predictions to pop up.
But make no mistake, by sticking to a sports prediction app, you will be giving up any chances of parlay betting, receiving odds boosts or other bonuses, and, specifically, spread betting or markets with alternative betting lines. Of course, if you wanted the best of both worlds you can sign up for both – no one will stop you and you don’t have to pay any money to join a sportsbook or a trading exchange. If you need any more information regarding the top US sportsbooks or even want to check out some top social sportsbooks, feel free to check out some of our top picks below.
