Sport Nation Review - No UK Customers

Sport Nation closed to the UK on 30/11/22.  The company have not gone bust, yet at least, and remain solvent meaning you can withdraw any funds as normal.  The site will remain open until 07/12/22 to allow withdrawals after which you will need to contact their customer support ([email protected]) to request any further withdrawals.

A surprise to some given the brand was well regarded by users who enjoyed their lower odds margins and high value loyalty promotions.  However, the holding company (Esports Entertainment Group (EEG)) had been trying to restructure debts for a while and failed to secure new investment leading to eventual failure.

Sport Nation screenshot

SportNation is a bookie that has covered a lot of ground in a very short time. After a slight misfire to begin with they have re-branded and grown to become a popular online bookie in just a few short years, boasting the latest features and a fairly unique way of doing things.

By fully embracing the modern age SportNation will appeal to the new generation of sports bettors, and those willing to move with the times, and the ability to deposit by phone is another sign that they are fully onboard with new tech.

The odd few may find their payment methods to be a little limiting, but most people won’t struggle with this, and for such a feature rich site with so many betting markets to choose from you would need a very good reason to avoid SportNation.

The casino side is called Casino Nation, but it is the same site, you only need one wallet to access all products although payment options here are limited.  The casino itself isn’t though, it features games from Evolution Gaming, Microgaming, NetEnt, Play’n GO, iSoftBet, Blueprint Gaming, and Red Tiger Gaming.

Sports Markets & Odds

Sport Nation Markets

If there is a professional competitive sport going on anywhere in the world, chances are you will be able to bet on it at SportNation.

Tanzanian football, horse races from Chile, Serbian basketball, bandy from Sweden; there is serious depth here and from a bookie that is barely a few years old that is astounding. You are looking at anywhere up to 150+ pre-match betting lines for top fixtures which is easily beaten by some of the older bookies but is not a small number by any stretch of the imagination.

In most instances you will be hard-pressed to find significantly better odds, especially for football, so while they might not be the head of the pack for odds levels it won’t be worth your while going elsewhere in most cases, although they do occasionally drop the ball with sports like tennis and darts.

Enhanced odds are a regular occurrence and the promotions page is always busy too, so there are plenty of ways to squeeze extra value from your bets, and the amount of general information available across the site shows that they are happy for their punters to make well informed wagers.

Live Betting/Streaming

Sport Nation In-Play

Even though live streaming is limited to horse and greyhound racing the live betting at SportNation is a real highlight, and the streaming they do have is free to watch once logged in.

It’s the interface that works so well, with the ability to study one game in particular while simultaneously keeping track of every other live game in all sports being really useful when you are multi-tasking.

The game visualisation can be expanded or shrunk down depending on your preference, and the match stats that it provides are both fun to use and useful if you consider yourself a bit of an analyst.

Speaking of stats, there is a separate comprehensive statistics tool that opens in a new window and is the perfect accompaniment to live betting, showing head to heads, form, even player info.

The markets themselves are categorised to make things simpler and you can favourite those you use a lot, while fast market availability is clearly shown and readily available; this is a great way to add some excitement to an otherwise dull game.

Banking

Banking Method Max/Min Deposit Max/Min Withdrawal Notes
Debit Card £10 £20 3-5 Days
PayPal £25 £25 3 - 5 Days

You’re not exactly spoilt for choice when choosing a payment method at SportNation, but those options that are available are quick and easy and most modern day gamblers will have access to them. Once again, SportNation is a bookie for the more modern bettor and it shows – Applepay is one of the few deposit options for example.

There is quite a high minimum deposit via Paypal though as you can see, which won’t suit everyone. The maximum deposit you can make is £20,000, so you will just have to keep the rest of your money in your pocket until the next transaction if you bet big. If you are one of the other 99.9% of us though, this will be no problem at all.

A mixed bag then, but at least there are no fees (unless you mess them about, but they will get in touch first) and the time frames include the processing time at SportNation’s end which should be no longer than 48 hours.

Features

This is a site well worth exploring properly because there is much more here than the usual online bookie is offering.

As well as features like cash out, partial cash out, stats, and enhanced odds, SportNation have lots of little add ons that really make it stand out as a bookie, not to mention the casino products. You probably wouldn’t come here for any of the following features specifically, but they are cumulatively a great reason to choose SportNation over another bookie that doesn’t think outside the box.

Have a gander below and see what you think.

Reward Points

Sportnation RewardsA good system this, with plenty to choose from at the other end.

The concept is no different to what you might have seen elsewhere: you get points each time you bet whether you win or lose, and these points accumulate over time. Once you have enough, you can exchange them in the Rewards Store for things like free bets, casino bonuses, and specials.

They add up quicker than you might think, and you don’t need millions of them to claim a prize. Plus, with double points weekends and ‘rewards rush’ periods you can really start to stack them up. Not forgetting the ‘refer and earn’ scheme where you can bag thousands of points by referring a friend to SportNation.

We’ve no idea if the claim is true, but the site claim to be the only one that rewards every single sport and casino bet.

Pick a Pony

Sportnation Pick a Pony

This sort of follows on from the reward points, plus it’s great fun and an added extra that won’t cost you anything but is guaranteed to earn you a prize.

SportNation pick 7 races and two horses from each to go head to head. You need to pick which of the two will beat the other. The more you get right the more reward points you earn, and if you get none of them right at all you get £10 cash!

You can change your mind right up to the last minute as well, so if you get a tip late in the day you can still use that info.

This isn’t available all of the time but check the site around big racing events and you are more likely to find it.

Epic 8

Sportnation First FiveFor the fantasy football fans this one, although it may not be available for ever.

This is a free to play game where you pick 8 players from 8 different matches which you think will score the most fantasy football points.

The winner gets a stack of free bets as well as bragging rights for days.

A great way to up the ante at kick off and make things interesting right from the get go, plus, if you don’t have a bet on the games involved then this gives you a reason to watch.

Virtuals

Sportnation VirtualThe virtual sports category is chocka block with options; racing, tennis, greyhounds, football, trotting, speedway, and velodrome. All have excellent graphics and animations making it feel as realistic as the latest console games.

They run every 3 minutes and the commentary does add to the experience, in football more than in the racing which lacks any interesting intonation.

Forecasts and tricasts are also available with the races and the football has markets like over/under, home/draw/away, and halftime/fulltime.

Casino Nation

Sportnation Casino

The main brand might be called SportNation, but that hasn’t limited the company to being solely a sportsbook. Not only do they have a casino and a live casino working alongside their sports betting product, but it is worth a visit in its own right.

CasinoNation, as it is wittily called, boasts 600+ games from 9 different providers and they range from industry stalwarts to newer companies with a fresher approach. iSoftBet and Playn’GO are among them, as is Microgaming and Big Time Gaming – which means the popular Megaways games are available here.

There are around 500 slots resting on the easy to use interface and plenty of ways to organise them into manageable numbers too. Video poker, blackjack, roulette, and other table games are also in plentiful supply.

It’s a great website actually because the game tiles are nice and big and span the entirety of the screen space, so there is a lot of colour and great imagery before you even load a game up. It also makes them a pleasure to browse, with no squinting required.

Live Casino

Sport Nation Live CasinoYou will only find live games powered by one provider in here, but that provider is Evolution Gaming, so you really needn’t worry.

Laid out in the same way as the Casino, the Live Casino is even easier to browse due to there being fewer games, and once you get into the lobby you will be working with Evolution’s familiar interface.

Alongside plenty of roulette and blackjack variations – including some very inventive roulette options like Lightning and Double Ball – you will find Sic Bo, Dragon Tiger, and the branded Game Show style games which are so popular these days, like Deal or No Deal and Monopoly Live.

Desktop Website

Sport Nation Horse Racing

It’s no secret that we love SBTech as a platform provider, so we were always going to be fans of SportNation’s website. The layout feels classy yet clean and the orange branding against the darker colours used to define odds buttons and the like really works. We even love the unique design style used for their flashy graphics where they appear, but this is not an obnoxious neon lit pushy bookie by any means.

SportNation treat their punters like adults with a website structure that feels natural to use and then lets them get on with it. It would be a huge surprise to hear of anyone struggling to use the site, with a sports list opening the door to a homepage of sorts for each sport, from where you can view the daily match list, the top leagues, a list of all leagues covered in that sport, or any live games. Everything is collapsible too so you won’t be scrolling for hours.

The sub menu directly below the main menu helpfully but quietly provides quick access to features like Rewards, VIP, and Promotions amongst other things, and at the bottom of each page there is a bible of useful info pertaining to the page you are on. For example, when looking at football markets it will cover football betting, explaining the different bet types etc. A gold mine if you are inexperienced or betting on new markets for the first time.

Over at the casino things are even simpler. The main menu gives way to a sub menu where you can choose your game type, before a few filtering options become available. The games are also broken up into useful categories to reduce scrolling.

Overall, we found this to be one of the most functional sites we have tested, and with the smallest learning curve too.

Mobile Website

Sport Nation MobileA combination of scrolling menus, collapsible buttons, and clever AI makes SportNation’s mobile site a dream to use. It is a busy interface but not so much that it will ever trip you up, although once or twice we have hit the wrong button when trying to log in.

There is an app for iOS users but Android users will need to make do with the browser based mobile site for now, although at the pace the company are going this shouldn’t be the case for long.

The same app/site works for both the sportsbook and the casino too, so the build and layout works equally well for both.

In terms of performance the site doesn’t skip a beat, deftly carrying out instructions almost instantly and with no bumps or page jumps along the way – this really is impressively smooth and impressively quick.

The betslip only appears when you make a selection but is never in the way, and a handy ‘back to top’ button appears after you have scrolled a certain distance to save time on the way back up. These seemingly small features make a big difference when time is of the essence.

Live betting on mobile doesn’t get much better and every feature from the desktop site has made it across to the smaller screen. You can switch between a game visualisation and live stats in an instant and any key events will show up as you browse the odds so you can act accordingly.

The sports list is an extra tap from the menu button which does make it a slightly longer journey to get to, but we are really doing our best here to come up with points for improvement.

About

Sportnation LogoIf you ever wondered what happened to BetonBrazil, the online sportsbook that launched in 2016 with ex Tottenham player a now pundit Alan Brazil as its public persona, well, you’re reading about it.

BetonBrazil was re-branded to appeal to a wider audience only a year after it launched and SportNation was the result. It might have sucked for Alan Brazil but it worked wonders for SportNation, who quickly gained traction and started to build a solid customer base.

The SBTech platform the new site was built on probably had something to do with it as well, opening the door to a whole host of betting features that the punters loved and much greater depth of market in all fields.

The company now puts across a fresh and modern image which appeals to the younger and/or more contemporary bettor, offering plenty to hold the attention of even the most easily distracted of punters.

The brand is owned by Argyll Entertainment AG, a Swiss company that also runs RedZone Sports and GivemeBet. Their ethos is centred around offering a more dynamic product and not blending in with the crowd, and this comes across well in the service they provide. It also explains why they sponsored the Barmy Army, a cricket supporters club, and the Solihull Moors, a National League level football club. An undeniably different approach.

Why Bet With SportNation?

This is a thriving bookie full of ideas and perfect for the modern bettor who wants to experience new industry trends as they happen.

If market variety ranks high on the list of importance for you then you have come to the right place, and even though SportNation can’t claim to offer more betting lines per event than anyone else you won’t often want for much.

Extra betting features and plenty of promos and enhanced odds keep things fresh so the website feels alive and responsive to whatever is going on in the world of sport, meaning each time you log in you could be pleasantly surprised by what you find.

This is a great bookie which has elbowed its way to the front of the queue in a crowded industry, so it’s going to be genuinely exciting to see what else they have up their sleeve.

Customer Support

Sportnation SupportSportNation are doing everything right when it comes to support. There are plenty of contact options – all of them except phone support in fact – and the team work 7 days a week.

The fact that they are available 24 hours a day is a real highlight for a youngish brand, and it means that anyone who bets or plays casino and unsociable hours can do so safe in the knowledge that problems will be fixable then and there..

The FAQ is always there too, of course, and should probably be your first port of call anyway as it is fairly comprehensive and could answer your query faster than waiting for a rep. You can’t search it directly but it is split up into helpful categories to help you find the answer you need.

Licence & Contact

  • Live Chat – Probably the best option. Accessible from the contact tab at the bottom of each page.
  • Email – It could take up to 48 hours to get a reply but use [email protected] if live chat is closed.
  • Phone – No phone support with SportNation unfortunately. Didn’t want to talk to them anyway.
  • Address – If you want to write for some strange reason then stick this on the envelope: Argyll Entertainment AG, Bahnhofstrasse 10, Zug, 6300.
  • @TeamSportNation – Not a support account as such but great for news and offers.
  • UK Gambling Licence45143