Nearly Half of Adult Super Bowl LVII Viewers Are Expected to Bet

How many people will bet on Super Bowl LVII between the Chiefs and Eagles on Sunday? About 20% of the population of the United States, according to the American Gaming Association.

Per the AGA, a record 50.4 million American adults are expected to bet on the Super Bowl, a 61% increase from the record set in 2022. Of those that plan to bet, about 30 million plan to place a traditional sports wager online, at a retail sportsbook or with a bookie, up 66% from 2022. Others plan to bet casually with friends, be part of a pool or fill out Super Bowl squares.

“Every year, the Super Bowl serves to highlight the benefits of legal sports betting: bettors are transitioning to the protections of the regulated market, leagues and sports media are seeing increased engagement, and legal operators are driving needed tax revenue to states across the country,” AGA president and CEO Bill Miller says.

Sports betting legalization is also driving fan interest in the #NFL, with more than a third (34%) of NFL fans saying the expansion of legal sports betting has made watching an NFL game more exciting. pic.twitter.com/6nN8K2jFwe
— American Gaming Association (@AmericanGaming) February 7, 2023

Fox is expecting to break viewership records by attracting 115 million viewers to this season’s championship game, according to The Sports Business Journal. If that estimate is correct and the AGA’s projections are also on the money, that would mean nearly half of the adults who watch the Super Bowl in the United States will be betting on the matchup of the NFL’s two top seeds.

The Philadelphia Eagles Are America’s Team in Super Bowl LVII

The majority of adults think the Eagles will take down the Kansas City Chiefs

That figure is fairly high, but so is the public’s interest in what is shaping up to be an all-time game between the two favorites to win MVP in Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts. “If you ranked every possible Super Bowl matchup, one through 256, Kansas City-Philly is a top-five matchup, if not a top three,” Fox Sports head of strategy and analytics Mike Mulvihill told the SBJ.

With the Eagles still listed at 1.5-point favorites at most books and the over-under holding at 50.5, bettors who have yet to place a wager have some tough decisions to make. And approximately half of them will be wrong, as 44% of bettors are backing the Chiefs and 44% are backing the Birds, according to the AGA.

As three U.S. markets that have approved legal sports betting still wait to launch, above-the-board wagering is currently available in 33 states and Washington, D.C., which means more than half of American adults (146 million) live in a live, legal sports gambling market.