What do NFL spreads mean in football betting?

American Football is one of the toughest and most exciting sports in the world, which is why it gets much love from the gambling community. Apart from being exciting to watch, bettors have the ability to place wagers on many different things in a game, making them even more thrilling to watch.

Among the thousands of bets you can make on an NFL game, point spreads actually stand out as one of the most common types of bet, and there is a good reason for that. Point spreads are great just because it gives you good odds of winning without getting involved in too much risk.

However, understanding NFL spreads can be overwhelming, especially for beginners that place bets on NFL for the first time.

This is why we decided to have a much deeper look at NFL spreads, see how they work, and which is the best way to bet on point spreads.

Here is a quick guide on how NFL spreads work, in case you are a beginner in football betting.

NFL Point Spread Explained

Point spread betting might look complicated, but it is actually really simple. With point spreads, bookmakers set a spread with the hopes of getting equal action from both teams in a game. For example, if two teams like the Colts and the Texans are facing in a game with a -3-point spread bet, the -3 indicates the spread between the two teams making them equal.

In this case, if the colts win by two points, you would lose the bet since they didn’t reach the key number of 3 points.

The Rams have been priced at -182 truly to beat the 49ers and strengthen to the Super Bowl, requiring a stake of $182 to be risked to go back a $100 profit, with an implied winning possibility of 64.5%.

The first objective of a spread is to convey the perimeters a lot towards coin toss odds compared to the price for an aspect to simply win the game. The NFC Championship unfold accomplished this goal, with the SF 49ers “prevailing” with the aid of just 1/2 a point after the 3.5 points have been delivered.

More obviously, the spread gives an equitable making bet opportunity to each team even when the sport appears to be a big mismatch.

When the very great of teams play the very worst, points spreads may be upwards of more than 10 points, which gives a massive underdog, perhaps on an upward curve, a real danger to reason and disillusioned in opposition to the spread playing a dominant crew who may work into the game with one eye on future demanding situations.

How to Bet on NFL Point Spread

In point spread betting, you have got two options: the favorite or the underdog. The preferred could be displayed with negative odds, that is a minus symbol (-) observed through a variety of (-6.5). The underdog will be displayed with positive odds, which is a plus sign (+) accompanied with the aid of a number of (+6.5).

Spread betting sounds complicated, but it clearly isn't always. If the Los Angeles Rams are -4.5, they want to win by using five points or greater to win the bet. If the San Francisco 49ers are +4.5 at the unfold, they are able to lose by more than 5 points to win the bet. If the unfold numbers are both 4.5, there's no center ground for each team to win/lose.

Using the above instance, if we make a bet on $100 at the Los Angeles Rams (-4.5) with odds of -one hundred ten and that they win the game 27-21, we'd income $90 because they won by six or greater points. 

If the spread was -6.5 and they received the game 27-21, we would lose our bet because they didn’t win by way of seven points or extra. At -3.5, winning with the aid of four points or greater is ideal, and prevailing by 3 points or fewer is terrible.

With underdogs, it’s a little different. If we wagered $100 at the 49ers (+4.5) at -110 and they lost the sport 27-21, we might lose our $100 guess due to the fact they misplaced by means of six points or more. 

If the spread has been +6.5 and the 49ers lost 27-21, the +6.5 could win because the Giants didn’t lose with the aid of seven points or extra. At +5.5, losing with the aid of five points or fewer is right and dropping with the aid of six factors or more is awful.

American odds may be perplexing, but our odds calculator can assist us to determine how tons we’d win based totally on the amount we wagered.

In most cases with a spread bet, the odds usually sit at -110 for both sides, depending on the sportsbook.