FanDuel Illinois is one of the most popular and reputable betting platforms available on the market today. Learn more about this sports betting site in this review, where we’ll cover the bookmaker, its features, promo codes, pros and cons, and more.
FanDuel illinois has emerged as one of the leading betting operators and the United States thanks to its strong brand recognition, lucrative promotions, and high-quality user experience. The site was previously renowned for offering Daily Fantasy Sports, but it pivoted to sports betting after joining the Flutter Entertainment empire in 2018.
Flutter is the world’s largest online gambling group, as it owns Paddy Power, Betfair, SkyBet, FOX Bet, Sportsbet, Poker Stars, and other prominent brands. The group, formerly known as Paddy Power Betfair, saw an opportunity to carve out a market-leading position in the United States after the Supreme Court overturned a federal sports betting ban in 2018.
It recognized that FanDuel was already a very strong brand, so it decided to turn it into a sportsbook operator. That has proved to be a shrewd decision. FanDuel quickly became the No. 1 sportsbook app in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and several other states, and it continues to expand across the country. FanDuel Illinois went live in August 2020.
The operator is renowned for the quality of its app, the depth of its sporting coverage, and the attractive bonuses it offers.
Hoops fans should enjoy the comprehensive basketball betting section at FanDuel. It offers a remarkable breadth of NBA betting trends in Illinois. You will find the classic trio of bets – spread, moneyline and total points – but it goes beyond that by offering a large array of game and player props. For example, you can bet on the first point scorer, the total points scored by each player, a wealth of player rebounds and player assists options, player 3s, player combos and a player to record a triple-double.
FanDuel Illinois has betting on the winning margin, broken down into various bands, and you can combine spreads and totals or moneylines and totals in double bets. A number of these wagers are available on halves and quarters too, and there is a same game parlay builder that allows you to customize your own bet. You will also benefit from an infographic that provides you with useful stats on each team, such as recent results, seasonal records, points per game scored and allowed, season scoring statistics and so on.
The FanDuel sportsbook Illinois also features WNBA and NCAAB action. Outside of North America, it covers all the Euroleague games, along with domestic leagues across Europe. We found betting on basketball games in all manner of countries when conducting this FanDuel sportsbook Illinois review, including Taiwan, Israel and Lithuania. You will not find as many prop bets on niche games, but there are lots of live betting options when the action gets underway, and FanDuel also provides several exciting futures markets on basketball leagues.
Cubs and White Sox fans will have a wealth of betting options to choose from on every MLB game of the season. You can bet on the spread, moneyline and total, or combine those options. There is a same-game parlay builder too. Player props include to hit a home run, to record a hit, 2+ hits, 3+ hits or 4+ hits.
There are all sorts of alternate run lines and total run lines. You will find lots of first five innings betting markets, and specific innings props, such as the result of each inning, a run line for each inning, odd/even for each inning and the correct score for each inning, plus the inning of the first score, and the result after a certain number of innings.
Once again, you will benefit from a variety of stats displayed on a colorful rolling infographic, and the betting pages are laid out in a neat and orderly fashion – both on the desktop site and on the FanDuel sportsbook app. Alongside Illinois MLB betting, it features minor league baseball and it provides futures markets on team performances and awards such as the Cy Young.
NHL games are covered in a similar level of depth to NFL, NBA and MLB games. Alongside the moneyline, totals and spread (puck line), you can bet on a 60-minute line, both teams to score, correct score, whether there will be overtime and much more. There are lots of alternate spreads, period props and player props, such as player goals, points, assists, shots on goal and powerplay points.
You will not be restricted to simply betting on the Illinois NHL games. All the AHL action is covered, alongside a variety of European leagues. FanDuel does not offer as many player props on European games, but there are still prop bets on the highest scoring period and so on.
Flutter Entertainment is an extremely experienced online sportsbook operator. It owns some of the leading brands in Europe and Australia, and it has concentrated all its expertise on turning this operator into a high-quality mobile app and desktop site. It is rich with features that enhance the user experience and give bettors greater flexibility.
FanDuel also covers Australian Rules, boxing, cricket, cycling, darts, golf, MMA, motor racing (NASCAR and Formula 1), rugby league, rugby union, soccer, table tennis and tennis. It has the capacity to offer more sports – Flutter’s flagship Paddy Power sportsbook has betting on handball, netball, snooker, surfing and volleyball, plus Gaelic sports – but it has clearly decided that they would not be popular among American sports fans. Paddy Power, Betfair and its other sites also take bets on politics, current affairs, entertainment, virtual sports, horse racing and greyhounds, so it could offer them if permitted to do so in Illinois.
Soccer is covered in exceptional depth, as you would expect from a European sports betting giant. It covers leagues and cups on every tournament, including lower league action in major soccer nations like England. Once again, it could go deeper, but Flutter has decided not to include some of the niche leagues on offer at sites like Paddy Power. You will be able to choose from hundreds of different betting options on big soccer games, including goal props, spread props, half markets, customizable parlays, goalscorer props, corner props and card props at this sportsbook.
FanDuel also provides a diverse array of betting options on tennis, rugby and cricket matches. All the big golf tournaments are covered, alongside many unheralded events, while the MMA section features Bellator alongside UFC. All in all, the depth and breadth of the sporting coverage at FanDuel is exceptional, and you are unlikely to find an online sports betting site that furnishes you with more pre-game, live and futures wagering options each week.
FanDuel covers a very broad range of sports in extraordinary depth. Football fans can bet on every NFL game in Illinois, and you will be able to choose from hundreds of different wagering options whenever the Chicago Bears are in action. The sportsbook also offers a long list of futures betting options, including the winner of the Super Bowl and the various conferences and divisions, plus the regular-season MVP and markets on draft picks. You can bet on all the big NCAAF action, just not on schools located in Illinois or games taking place in the state.
One great feature of the site is the enhanced odds boost pages, which offer larger profits if you follow the picks handed out by the featured FOX analyst. Fox Sports became a shareholder in FanDuel’s parent company, Flutter Entertainment, after its $12.2 billion merger with The Stars Group in 2020. Flutter now operates FOX Bet betting in Illinois alongside FanDuel, Betfair and other brands, and it works with Fox Sports on various initiatives. FanDuel customers will often receive Colin Cowherd’s best five NFL picks, and then receive boosted odds if you follow his picks and they go on to win.
The Illinois sports gambling site for bettors built up its business by running high-profile contests as a Daily Fantasy Sports operator. This fantasy sports offering is now available in 44 states, including Illinois. Pick a new fantasy team each week and play free or paid games to compete for cash payouts. There are all sorts of contests available from NBA Big Shot and the PGA Tournament of Champions to the MLB Home Run Challenge and the NBA Daily Fantasy Contest.
Another popular tournament is the NFL Survivor contest. Pick one team to win each week and survive the season to claim the cash. This is free to play, and the last fan standing wins $100,000.
There are also free NBA In-Play contests, which allow you to enjoy the thrill of live betting for free, and much more. The site runs a busy schedule of sportsbook contests throughout the year, alongside its $1,000 No Sweat First Bet. Customers can check out the list of active contests and promos at any time by clicking the “Promotions” tab on the sports betting or fantasy sports site.
FanDuel Illinois sportsbook offers a wide range of convenient deposit methods for you to choose from. All deposits are free and instant. The minimum deposit amount is just $10, and the maximum is $10,000 via some methods.
Most Illinois FanDuel customers will opt for a credit card or debit card deposit, with Visa and MasterCard both available as payment methods. You can alternatively opt for PayPal, a wire transfer, a PrePaid Card+, Venmo or PayNearMe at retailers such as 7-Eleven.
You can also mail a check to FanDuel or pay in cash at the casino cage or a retail sportsbook. In Illinois, FanDuel operates a retail sportsbook at Par-A-Dice Casino in East Peoria and another at the former Fairmount Park in Collinsville, so you can pay in cash at either of those venues.
One thing to note is that the operator no longer offers ACH transfers. However, you can take advantage of its online banking feature to use your checking account for deposits and withdrawals. Make sure you enter any necessary FanDuel sportsbook promo code ahead of your first deposit to unlock the $1,000 No Sweat First Bet.
Most of those methods are available for withdrawals. PayPal is the quickest withdrawal method, with a 48-hour processing time at FanDuel sportsbook. If you decide to use online banking for your payout, it will take two to four business days for the funds to arrive in your bank account. You can request a check, which should arrive within 7 to 10 business days.
You should also be able to get paid out in cash at either of the FanDuel retail sportsbook properties in Illinois, or you can send money back to your prepaid card. Withdrawals are free, and there are no official withdrawal limits, but it might be worth contacting the customer support department to discuss the best options if you plan to make a large withdrawal request.
You can click on the “Live” tab at the top of the FanDuel sportsbook Illinois homepage to see a list of all the in-play sporting events that you can currently bet on. The list of live events is enormous. For example, we found a Taiwanese basketball game between Bank of Taiwan and Yulon Dinos, an Armenian soccer game between FC Van Yerevan and FC Ararat Yerevan and tennis matches between several obscure players all available for live betting when conducting our FanDuel Illinois sportsbook review.
Some sports betting sites might just offer a few basic live wagers on such niche sporting events, but FanDuel IL allows you to bet on the outcome of every point in a live tennis match, and you can bet on live markets like correct score, next goalscorer, draw no bet, double chance and alternate spreads on low-key soccer games.
The FanDuel Illinois live betting section is user-friendly, and the bet slip is easy to use, which is important when trying to get your bets on quickly.
You will be able to see if your bet is available for early cash-out by clicking on the “Active Bets” tab within your FanDuel account. If it is possible, you will see a green “Cash Out” button and the amount you can receive for ending your wager before the sporting event has finished. This allows you to lock in a profit if your team is winning but starting to look a little shaky or to claw back some of the amounts you risked if you fear your team will lose.
The ability to take early profits and cut your losses gives bettors a great deal of flexibility, and all the best online sportsbooks now offer this function. It is available on all major sporting events and many niche events at FanDuel Illinois betting, and the early cash out offers are reasonably generous.
You will find a “Boosts” tab on the “Sport A-Z” menu to the left of the FanDuel Illinois homepage and on the dropdown menu when using the FanDuel sportsbook Illinois app. It provides you with a constantly updated list of boosted odds offers on a variety of sporting events each day. It tells the bettor the original odds and then provides the boosted odds to the right. These offers are divided into “Super Boosts” and “Odds Boosts”. The markets featured are generally props, such as a player scoring at any time in a soccer game or either team scoring 40+ points in a quarter of an NBA game. The odds boosts are generous at FanDuel sportsbook Illinois, and it is good to see this section updated on a regular basis. It will be important to understand betting odds before you start getting into odds boosts. Luckily, these are not difficult to get a grasp of!
FanDuel offers a sophisticated same-game parlay builder tool on several major sporting events each day. If it is available, you will see a small “SGP” icon next to the game. You can combine the same game parlays on the most popular sports, plus all the biggest soccer games.
Within the “Same Game Parlay” menu option on the betting page, you will find a long list of potential legs that you can add. Click on any markets that appeal to you and they will be added to the bet slip. A “Same Game Parlay” section will appear at the top of the slip, instantly informing you of the odds. The odds will increase as you add more selections.
You could, for instance, opt for the United States to win a soccer game, under 4.5 goals and Christian Pulisic to score, or the White Sox to cover the spread, Jose Abreu to hit a home run and the first inning to finish 0-0.
FanDuel offers a huge range of betting options on big sporting events. You can bet on spreads, totals, moneylines, player props, game props, halves, quarters and periods. It offers futures betting options on the winners of various tournaments and individual awards, and on teams making the playoffs or winning a certain number of regular-season games. If you add multiple selections to the bet slip, a parlay option will appear. You will also see two new tabs: Teaser and Round Robin.
Sports bettors will enjoy an excellent all-round user experience at FanDuel Illinois sportsbook. As one of the best sportsbooks in Illinois, it is powered by Scientific Games’ OpenSports engine, but it also uses some proprietary technology owned by Flutter to offer a unique experience for sports fans in Illinois. Most of its rivals use a white-label sportsbook powered by either Kambi or SBTech, but FanDuel stands out by providing a distinctive user interface that you will not find elsewhere.
The desktop site follows a blue and gray color scheme, which is aesthetically pleasing. A rolling carousel at the top of the sportsbook homepage advertises the promotions you can take advantage of, while there are shortcut tabs to take you through to the live betting, daily fantasy sports and online casino sections. A widget at the top-left of the homepage groups all the popular categories at any given time. It changes throughout the year, but as an example, you might find live betting, promotions, NBA, MLB, NHL and soccer all featured.
You will then find an A-Z list of all the sports covered, followed by links to a betting guide, house rules and so on. The most popular sporting events of the day are displayed in the middle of the screen. The betting guide is reasonably useful. It explains what round robins, same-game parlays and double-sided wagers are, but it feels a little like an incomplete section of the FAQ.
We found that the bet slip populated effectively when we tested it out for this FanDuel sportsbook Illinois review. Click on any selection, and it will be added to the slip. You will see the odds and can enter the amount you would like to wager. It will inform you of the profit you stand to make it successful, and you can opt to review line changes if you so desire.
Overall, the navigation process is smooth and simple, and the interface is clean. The pages never feel disorderly, despite displaying a significant amount of information, and that is a testament to the strong design principles. It would be great to see FanDuel incorporate a search function in the future, as that would speed up the process, but you should have little trouble in finding sporting events you want to bet on. The menus are designed intuitively and there are a lot of thoughtful shortcuts, so you can place your bets quickly and effectively.
The FanDuel Illinois app quickly became the most popular mobile sportsbook in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and several other states after launching. It is easy to see why. The FanDuel Illinois sportsbook app is easier to use and navigate than most of its rivals, and sports bettors are clearly impressed. It has an average rating of 4.7 out of 5 after receiving more than 125,000 reviews on the Apple Store, and the average is 4.2 out of 5 on the Google Play Store.
You can download the app directly from the mobile version of the site or from one of those stores. We tested it out on several different devices and found it worked smoothly on them all, even the older mobiles. It follows similar design cues to the desktop site, but there are more shortcuts and menus to help speed up navigation on a smaller screen. The icons and prices are large, clear and easy to read, and the mobile bet slip works well. This is an impressive sportsbook app, free of the glitches and lag times that blight rival operators, and it is justifiably a market leader across the country.
The registration process at FanDuel Illinois is simple. Just follow these steps:
- Click on the green “Join Now” button at the top right of the FanDuel Sportsbook homepage.
- Choose Illinois as your state.
- If you already have a FanDuel fantasy account, you can log in and transfer the details over to a new sportsbook account.
- If you are new to FanDuel, enter your email address, pick a username and choose a password, and then click “Create account”.
- Enter your name, mobile number, address and the last four digits of your SSN.
- Provide your banking information for your first deposit, and make sure to claim the FanDuel sportsbook promo code $1,000 risk-free bet offer.
- Agree to the terms and conditions and click to complete the process.
You will need to verify your email address and complete a standard KYC (Know Your Customer) procedure, which involves uploading a scan of valid, state-issued photo ID, a utility bill and a headshot. You can also create an account through Facebook if you so desire.
FanDuel does not currently offer a loyalty program, which might disappoint some people. Many rival sports betting sites run rewards programs, such as DraftKings Illinois, allow you to rack up points as you bet and then exchange them for free wagers and other rewards.
This is not possible at FanDuel, but it does work hard to provide sports betting customers with added value. The sportsbook offers a range of short-term promotions throughout the year, particularly big events like the Super Bowl, and it regularly hands out more promotional credits than any other sports betting site.
You will find a link to FanDuel’s responsible gaming section at the bottom-left of the site in the “Other Links” section. The page is aimed at sports bettors and daily fantasy sports players, so it informs you that you can use deposit limits, contest entry alerts and limits, maximum entry fee limits, wager limits, maximum wager sizes and time limits on your play. You can impose a timeout period on yourself, insert a deposit threshold, set up reality check reminders of the time and money you have spent, or self-exclude for an indefinite amount of time.
There is a link to the Illinois Alliance on Problem Gambling, Gamblers Anonymous and other organizations. Further links will take you through to pages with practical tips to stay within safe limits, myths associated with gambling, information regarding the risks associated with gambling, and the potential signs of a gambling problem. It is a thorough responsible gambling section.
The FanDuel online sportsbook for Illinois bettors fully deserves its status as one of the top brands in the U.S. market. It is determined to consolidate its market-leading position, so it offers a strong welcome bonus and a steady stream of exciting promotions for new and existing customers to participate in. The odds boost page is updated daily, so there are lots of ways to unlock extra value when playing at FanDuel Illinois.
It is live across the country for daily fantasy sports, and the plan is to make FanDuel IL Sportsbook equally ubiquitous. You can therefore play at FanDuel when traveling to many other states, so it scores highly for accessibility. It is part of the world’s largest online gambling group, so the user experience is understandably excellent on a mobile device or via the desktop site. It covers a huge range of sports betting options, and the odds are competitive. There is also a high-quality online casino in several states as well as FanDuel sportsbook horse racing betting available at this racebook, so you can take care of all your online wagering needs at one site.
FanDuel offers a range of convenient banking options and reliable withdrawals. It is a safe, secure, legitimate operator. The customer service lags rivals, as there is no customer service number and you can only fill in a ticket and wait for a response, but the site does include a fair amount of information in an FAQ section. Overall, it makes an excellent choice for sports bettors in Illinois.
