CSGO Betting Guide for 2024

So, you want to get better at CSGO betting. Are you interested in increasing your month-to-month profits, or perhaps you’re looking for a way to wet your feet in the esports betting industry? Well, if either of those fit the description, you’ve come to the right place!

This online CSGO betting guide is the ultimate tool for betting on everyone’s favorite first-person shooter game. Our take is as comprehensive as they come, featuring a whole heap of information ranging from the best CSGO betting websites and most common types of esports bets, all the way to basic information about the game, its mechanics, history, as well as the biggest events people love to bet on.

There are a ton of similar guides online, but we guarantee ours provides the most useful and up-to-date info. So, if you’re ready to learn about how to bet on CSGO online for real money, let’s get right into it!

Best CSGO Betting Sites

Let’s start off with the basics about where to bet on CSGO online. Oh, and what qualities should you look for when it comes to real money CSGO betting sites in the first place? Well, the answers will vary depending on who you ask. These days, everyone is standing behind someone. Partnerships are formed left and right, so it’s kind of difficult for the average Joe to find a site that suits all of his needs.

Many things make a good bookie, and beginners often don’t have the knowledge nor the experience needed to recognize the value. The situation is getting even worse because there’s just so many new names in the industry. New esports betting sites are popping up everywhere, all fighting for their share of the esports betting cake.

Rank	Gambling Site	Deposit Bonus	Get Started
#1	Bovada	50% Up To $250	Visit Site
#2	BetUS	125% Up To $2,500	Visit Site
#3	BetOnline	50% Up To $1,000	Visit Site
#4	SportsBetting.ag Esports	50% Up To $1,000	Visit Site
#5	MyBookie	100% Up To $1,000	Visit Site

What should you make of the above-featured table? Should you trust us? Well, we’ve been in the industry for years, and we certainly have no hidden agendas. We’re here to provide online betting enthusiasts with the most up-to-date information on everything gambling-related. In the case of esports betting, the biggest “issue” seems to be the influx of bookies, and it’s our job to point our visitors in the right direction. As far as the best CSGO betting sites are concerned, the above-listed bunch are no-brainers! Go ahead, compare them with other CSGO betting sites and you’ll realize our advice is legit!

What Makes These the Best Sites for Betting on CSGO?

How should you compare them? What are the key characteristics you should keep tabs on when choosing your go-to bookie? Well, there’s a ton of them, come to think of it, and many aren’t that obvious. Customer support is perhaps the most important factor of them all. And it’s not just because of the sheer importance of customer support. It’s because real money esports betting sites with CSGO odds invest more in their customer satisfaction elements typically excel in other areas, too. We’re talking stuff like payment method variety, payout speed, esports bets variety, and so on.

What Is Counter-Strike: Global Offensive?

Now, let’s back up a bit! We’ve already told you a great deal about betting on CSGO, but so far, we haven’t really talked about the actual game. What is CSGO anyway? How do you play, and how popular is it? Is it too late to get into it nowadays?

CSGO (also known as CS:GO, for some reason), stands for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. We are talking about Valve’s most successful first-person shooter (FPS from now on) that’s still going strong eight years after its initial release.

What makes CSGO so special? Well, it took the best things from earlier games (CS 1.6 and CS Source) and shaped them up into a futureproof package, spicing things up with extra stuff like skins, trading, battle passes, community maps, and so on.

That still does not explain why it’s averaging around 650,000 players this year, and why there are more than 900,000 active players at the moment. Well, let’s just say CSGO is fun to play and has the perfect balance between casual and competitive gameplay. The game is relatively fast-paced, has small, narrow maps, and punishes players for even the slightest mistakes both in low and highly-competitive environments.

Plus, Valve realized that games such as Overwatch, Rainbow Six, and the newest one, Valorant, are threatening to take over the FPS esports, which prompted a whole series of long-awaited improvements. At least for the time being, CSGO is heading in the right direction, which means the future of CSGO betting is not endangered!

If you’re ready to transition to CSGO from another FPS game, the transitioning period shouldn’t take too long. After all, most popular FPS games have “borrowed” certain mechanics from Valve’s esports masterpiece, meaning it won’t take too long for you to settle in a new competitive environment.

How to Play CSGO

Even though this guide is primarily focused on real money CSGO betting online, we feel obliged to tell you a bit about the actual CSGO gameplay. After all, you can’t expect to be any good at CSGO betting if you don’t know how to play the game. Knowing the gameplay, learning the core mechanics, and getting the much-needed experience are the first step on your way to becoming a profitable CS:GO betting enthusiast.

There are three steps you need to overcome to become a (somewhat) good CS:GO player.

Aim

The aim is the basis! The aim is the holy grail of FPS titles, there’s no point denying that! The best way to practice aim in CSGO is to just play the game, preferably the notorious deathmatch mode. This way, you’ll have fast spawn times in a free-for-all setting that’ll train your reflexes and hopefully give you that headshot trigger.

If deathmatch mode isn’t your cup of tea, there’s a number of aim maps available on the game’s community workshop. Pick one that suits your needs, and start clocking those training hours in! You can even try third-party aim trainers like the almighty AimLab. It’s a great, innovative way for aim training, backed by numerous streamers, pro gamers, and other prominent FPS community members.

Crosshair placement is another important aspect of competitive CSGO. You need to know where to position the crosshair so you can shorten your reaction time for headshots. It might seem simple enough, but mastering crosshair placement is rather difficult. It’s worth the effort, though. Players with exceptional crosshair placement have a hefty advantage over those who haven’t mastered it yet.

Map Pool Depth

But aim is just a portion of the stuff that makes good CSGO players. After you’ve put in countless hours in aim training, you should be pretty well-versed across most maps from the current competitive map pool, assuming you haven’t been relying on AimLab and nothing else, that is.

The difference between losing and winning a round is knowing each map that’s in the current competitive map pool. It also involves knowing all the angles, sound cues, nade alignments, site executions, and one-ways. You should also understand how to approach every single round in a unique way. All of these things matter.

The best way to improve your map pool depth is to create your own lobby with the map you want to play, and boot up a YouTube video showing off up-to-date alignments, one-ways, and so on. That, plus plenty of competitive experience, will brush your map pool depth to perfection!

Game Sense

Lastly, let’s talk game sense! What is game sense? How can you get a sound grasp on it? According to PCGAMER, “game sense” is just another phrase for “instinct.” However, we’re not talking about primitive instincts here. We’re talking about instincts driven by gameplay knowledge and players’ ability to concentrate and pay attention not just to their own surroundings, but to the movement and surroundings of their teammates and revealed/visible enemies.

Even though some claim game sense can be taught, we advise you to learn through your own gameplay. That way, you’ll understand things in your own way, and that’s probably the best long-term practice there is.

History of CS:GO Betting

In this part of our online CSGO betting guide, we’ll be taking a look at the story behind this flourishing industry. CSGO was released in August 2012, and it didn’t take too long for the first esports events to pop up. With the rise of Starcraft and League of Legends as global esports wonders, it was only a matter of time before Valve joins the show with CSGO and Dota 2.

Golden Age of Skin Betting

The CS:GO betting scene was conceived in pretty shady circumstances. Despite the fact legit online betting on esports was present from very early on, the first few years were heavily dominated by various skin betting sites.

As you all know, CSGO is Valve’s game, which means it’s available on Steam. It has a ton of skins and all the benefits of Steam’s community market. That was the perfect opportunity for shady businesses to take things to their territory, and the industry flourished.

But things went from flourishing to downhill pretty quickly. Valve sent out 23 cease and desist letters to major skin betting sites, resulting in a massive wave of shutdowns across the scene. Some skin betting businesses are still up and running, but their popularity has vastly decreased with the rise of legit esports bookmakers.

Modern Era of Betting on CS:GO

Yep, real money CS:GO betting is currently in what we commonly refer to as the modern era. Ever since the esports gambling liberalization movement that made quite the stir worldwide, legal betting on CSGO (and other esports, for that matter) has been flourishing across all fronts.

We’re witnessing a massive influx of new bookmakers, some of which are bringing forth more esports specials than ever before. Backed by the gambling industry’s giants, new online CSGO betting sites are doing their best to captivate a wider audience in what’s still one of the most flourishing businesses in the world.

Biggest CSGO Events to Bet on

When looking at the grand scheme of the esports industry, events such as The International, LoL Worlds, the CDL, OWL, and Fortnite World Cups are typically the most popular ones. However, when talking about CSGO’s competitive ecosystem, here are the events most people love to bet on.

CSGO Major Championships

Obviously, CSGO Majors are the number one event! It’s the largest gathering of competitive CSGO, bringing forth only the crème de la crème of CSGO teams. It’s also the event that all CSGO betting enthusiasts eagerly wait. Occurring twice every year (except 2020), CSGO Major Championships bring forth the ultimate CSGO action, both betting and viewership-wise.

ESL Events

Esports bettors also enjoy betting real money on CSGO ESL events, too. Whether we’re talking about ESL One, ESL Pro League, Intel Extreme Masters, or some other lower-tier competitions organized by ESL, the betting presence is always there! If CSGO match betting is something you’re interested in, then you’ll appreciate the sheer number and production quality of the aforementioned ESL events.

DreamHack Events

Similarly to ESL, DreamHack also has several notable events where you can bet real money on CSGO. DreamHack Masters is the biggest and most notable of the bunch, whereas DreamHack Open serves as the little brother, featuring up-and-coming teams shooting for a top 20 slot.

Flashpoint

Last but not least, there’s Flashpoint! Flashpoint is a brand-new IP, a league that was supposed to go head to head with ESL Pro League. It was the first major CSGO event to adopt a franchising system with teams as fully-fledged partners. However, the inaugural season of Flashpoint didn’t fare too well in terms of overall viewership. And it wasn’t due to bad production quality but because Flashpoint was held simultaneously with ESL Pro League and, you’ve guessed it, most top-tier teams sided with the esports industry’s giant instead of the newcomer.

Types of CSGO Bets

Nowadays, you can find a wide variety of CS:GO betting options which wasn’t the case a couple of years ago. Back then, during the skin betting transition era, most legit CSGO betting sites only featured match-winners. Nowadays, though, bookies are competing for the widest selection of CSGO specials. Here are the most common types of CSGO bets and brief explanations for everyone who’s just starting out.

Match-Winners

Match-winners are the simplest wagers for real money Counter-Strike betting. Team A plays against Team B, and your job is to guess which team will win the match. See? It doesn’t get any simpler than that! You can bet on a single match-winner, or you can connect a few into an accumulator. Learn more on that below.

Esports Specials

When talking about esports specials, we need to separate long from short-term ones. Starting off with the latter, they range from player-based stats (e.g. player vs. player kills), team-based stats (e.g. team vs. team total kills), and all sorts of totals, all the way to map-based wagers and handicaps.

Live Betting Options

Another cool type of CSGO match betting options revolves around live betting. Yep, you’ve read that correctly. Some CS:GO betting sites allow you to bet on all sorts of aspects of the match while the match is playing. Live betting on esports draws roots from conventional sports betting. Keep in mind though, live betting coverage can’t be found all that often. Typically, CS:GO betting on live matches is available during the biggest events and on just a few top-tier betting platforms who were smart enough to recognize the demand.

Accumulators

Lastly, let’s talk about accumulators. We already mentioned them earlier, so it’s only logical to tell you guys more. An accumulator is a bet that’s made up of several wagers on different matches, all combined in a single bet. All wagers must be successful for the accumulator to win, which increases the risk significantly.

However, all wagers’ odds multiply with each other, as well as the stake in the end, meaning you’ll be in for a fine profit, assuming you nail down a lengthy accumulator.

How to Bet on CSGO Online?

Here’s a short step-by-step guide that’ll help you grasp on the basics of placing real money CS:GO bets.

1. In order to start betting on CSGO matches, first, you’ll have to find a good bookie. The sites listed at the top of the page are some of our favorites!
2. After joining a CSGO betting site, you’ll have to confirm your email address. Some esports betting sites might want you to confirm your identity as well.
3. Once you have full control over your account, it’s time to go through the available payment methods. Pick one you can use, and deposit money into your account.
4. During your initial deposit process, keep in mind that some betting sites with esports bonuses calculate the bonus based on the amount of your initial deposit.
5. Once you have money in your account, it’s time to place your first CSGO bet. Head to the esports category, select CSGO, and scroll to the event you want to bet on.
6. The last part is the most time-consuming one—doing research. Do plenty of research before placing each bet; this will greatly increase your chance of success!
7. That’s about it as far as our step-by-step CSGO betting guide goes. As you can see, Counter-Strike betting isn’t too difficult once you’ve chosen a reputable site.

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Betting Advice

This step-by-step guide offers only the most basic advice that’ll help you place your first-ever CSGO bet. If you’re looking for more useful advice on improving your CS:GO betting stats, make sure you check out our esports betting strategy guide! It doesn’t just explain the importance of experimenting with different strategies, but offers plenty of useful advice that’ll help you get a grasp on things.

CSGO Betting FAQ

We’re nearing the end of our real money CSGO betting guide. There are just a few more questions we need to take care of before wrapping everything up and calling it a day.

Conclusion on CSGO Betting Online

CSGO betting was, still is, and is most likely going to remain at the top of the esports betting scene, together with the likes of League of Legends and Dota 2. It’s an entertaining game with a loyal community that’s packed with online betting enthusiasts.

The game’s betting scene is as healthy as they come, with awesome new online betting sites popping up left and right. There’s plenty of entertainment to be found here. So, if you’re interested in online CSGO betting, we highly recommend you try it out. Just make sure you don’t invest too much money right off the bat! You could always place higher bets as you gain more experience.