Banker Betting Term Meaning


A ‘Banker’ is best described as an insurance policy for your combination or accumulator bets. It gives punters the chance to walk away with a profit even if one or two of the other selections do not win.

A banker bet is the foundation upon which your multiple-selection bet is built on. This selection must win in order for the rest of your bet to be successful. If your banker loses, the rest of your bet goes down with it regardless of what happens in the other games.

You should always choose the team that you think has the best chance of winning as your banker.  For instance, if Liverpool are playing Rochdale in the FA Cup, a Liverpool win would be a good banker bet. On the other hand, if Man Utd are playing Arsenal, picking out a sure-fire banker from this fixture is not so easy.

Once you’ve selected your banker you can start to add riskier bets on top of it to boost your odds. The whole point of choosing a banker is that it can combine with a number of different bets to cover you even if one or two of the other teams you’ve selected lose.

Examples of a Banker Bets at bet365


This an example of how a banker bet works at bet365. so that you have a full understanding. First of all, you’ll need to pick a minimum of three selections. In our example we picked out four bets:

  1. Spurs to beat Huddersfield @1.5
  2. Liverpool to beat Man City @4.0
  3. Arsenal to beat Everton @3.0
  4. Brighton vs Watford draw @5.0

Next, we must select our ‘banker’. For our example, we will choose A. Spurs to beat Huddersfield @1.5. The following bet combinations are then offered:


No. of bets
No. of winners required
Bet combinations
1 Banker + 1/33Banker + 1 other
A + B 
A + C
A + D
1 Banker + 2/3 3Banker + 2 others
A + B + C 
A + B + D 
A + C + D
1 Banker + 3/3 1Banker + all others A + B + C + D

You can decide which combination you want to back. Although pay attention to the number of bets because if you plan to stake £10 per bet, for options one and two, it will cost £30 (3 x £10) each. 

Payouts on Banker Bets


Even with a banker bet, you still need at least one more selection to be correct to make a profit. Based on the information above, these are the payouts a punter would receive.


Total Stake

Bet combinations

Odds & Payout

1 Banker + 1/3 £30 (£10 per bet)
A + B
A + C
A + D
1.5 x 4.0 = 6.0 x £10 = £60
1.5 x 3.0 = 4.5 x £10 = £45
1.5 x 5.0 = 7.5 x £10 = £75
1 Banker + 2/3£30 (£10 per bet)
A + B + C 
A + B + D 
A + C + D
1.5 x 4.0 x 3.0 = 18.0 x £10 = £180 
1.5 x 4.0 x 5.0 = 30.0 x £10 = £300 
1.5 x 3.0 x 5.0 = 22.5 x £10 = £225
1 Banker + 3/3£10 A + B + C + D 1.5 x 4.0 x 3.0 x 5.0 = 90.0 x £10 = £900

You can clearly see the upside of using the banker bet system. It is very flexible. A punter can refine the bet selections to match their betting style. For instance, you can have one selection a 1.50 and another at 2.0, both stand a very good chance of being correct, this will at least break even on a 1/3 wager, which allows for some longshots for the other picks.

There is a slight variation between bookmakers in what ‘banker’ means that you should be aware of. For instance, at bwin, you cannot use a banker on accumulator/parlay bets. The reason is that you need all of the accumulator selections to win for the bet to pay out, so the benefit of using a banker is in effect muted.