Bonus bets

What bonus bets are

Bonus bets are a sportsbook promotion paid as wager credit rather than cash. A new customer might be offered bonus bets after a first wager, or as a refund if a first wager loses. The credit can be placed like cash, but with a catch that changes its value: when a bonus bet wins, the payout usually includes only the winnings, not the stake. A cash wager that wins returns the stake plus the winnings; a bonus bet that wins returns the winnings alone. Sportsbooks also attach expiry dates and sometimes minimum odds to the credit.

An example

A hypothetical new customer receives $50 in bonus bets. They place the full $50 on a team at even money, and the team wins. A $50 cash wager at those odds would return $100, the stake plus $50 in winnings. The bonus bet returns $50, the winnings only, because the stake was the sportsbook's credit and does not come back. Had the team lost, the credit would simply be gone. The headline figure and the value of the offer are different numbers.

How Speed Survivor is different

Speed Survivor is a skill-based contest, not a sportsbook, and it has no bonus bets. There are no odds to set a payout and no house on the other side. What its promotions pay is contest credit: balance that enters contests, cannot be withdrawn, and expires at the end of the 2026 NFL regular season. The first-deposit match and the referral credit both work that way.

What you win in a contest is a different thing. Prizes come out of a pool funded by the entries in that contest, which Speed Labs may top up, paid down the tiers shown before you enter, and winnings are cash. So the useful question is not what a credit returns on a win, but which contests it can enter. How it works covers the contests, and the promo code page has the terms of each offer.