A sports betting API returns bookmaker odds for sporting events in a structured format, usually JSON, together with the fixtures, scores and results you need to use them. Developers build odds comparison sites, betting tools, trading models, apps and sports media products on top of one.
This guide explains what a sports betting API contains, how the data is structured and delivered, and what to check in a sports betting API provider, with examples from the Odds-API.io v3 API captured on 6 November 2026. If you want working code, the Python sports betting API tutorial goes from the first request to a full script. If you are comparing vendors, our comparison of the best odds APIs in 2026 puts five providers side by side.
What is a sports betting API?
It is a data API for betting markets. You send a request for a sport, a league or a match, and you get back the prices that bookmakers are offering, the markets those prices belong to, and the event they are for. Most providers add the data around the odds: fixtures, live scores, match status and results.
Three different products get called a sports betting API, and it helps to know which one you need.
- An odds API or sports betting data API delivers bookmaker prices, fixtures and results. Odds-API.io is this kind.
- A sports statistics API delivers play-by-play data, player stats and projections, usually without bookmaker odds.
- A sportsbook platform API handles bet placement, player accounts and payments for an operator. It uses an odds feed but is a separate system. The sportsbook API integration guide covers how the two fit together.
What data does a sports betting API provide?
A full sports betting API covers more than the current price. This is what Odds-API.io serves and where each part lives:
| Data | What it gives you | Endpoint |
|---|---|---|
| Sports and leagues | 34 sports and their competitions | /sports, /leagues |
| Fixtures and teams | Event ids, kickoff times, participants | /events, /participants |
| Pre-match and live odds | Prices from 450+ bookmakers | /odds, /odds/multi, WebSocket |
| Scores and match status | Live scores, period scores, status changes | /events/live, WebSocket |
| Price history | How a line moved, for selected bookmakers | /odds/movements |
| Historical odds | Past events, their odds and closing lines | /historical endpoints |
| Results and bet grading | Final scores and won, lost or void per bet | /settlements, /settlements/grade |
| Calculated feeds | Expected value, arbitrage and dropping odds | /value-bets, /arbitrage-bets, /dropping-odds |
The calculated feeds save you from building the cross-bookmaker maths yourself. The rest is the raw material for any betting product.
How the odds data is structured
An odds response is one event with a bookmakers object. Each bookmaker holds a list of markets, and each market holds its prices. This request asks for two books on one Premier League match:
curl --compressed -G "https://api.odds-api.io/v3/odds" \
--data-urlencode "apiKey=$ODDS_API_KEY" \
--data-urlencode "eventId=72221372" \
--data-urlencode "bookmakers=Bet365,DraftKings"The response, captured at 11:17 UTC on 6 November 2026 and trimmed to the ML market and one Totals line per bookmaker:
{
"id": 72221372,
"home": "Arsenal FC",
"away": "Hull City",
"date": "2026-11-07T15:00:00Z",
"status": "pending",
"sport": {"name": "Football", "slug": "football"},
"league": {"name": "England - Premier League", "slug": "england-premier-league"},
"bookmakers": {
"Bet365": [
{"name": "ML", "updatedAt": "2026-11-04T15:03:57.387Z",
"odds": [{"home": "1.166", "draw": "7.500", "away": "15.000"}]},
{"name": "Totals", "updatedAt": "2026-11-06T06:17:20.737Z",
"odds": [{"hdp": 3, "over": "1.825", "under": "2.025"}]}
],
"DraftKings": [
{"name": "ML", "updatedAt": "2026-11-04T18:59:52.394Z",
"odds": [{"home": "1.16", "draw": "8.00", "away": "17.00"}]},
{"name": "Totals", "updatedAt": "2026-11-05T22:14:23.752Z",
"odds": [{"hdp": 3, "over": "1.80", "under": "2.00"}]}
]
}
}A few things to know before you write a parser:
- Market names are shared across bookmakers: ML for the match result, Spread for handicaps and Totals for over/under. Period and prop markets have their own names, listed per sport by /markets.
- Lines sit in hdp. One market can hold many lines, so group by market name and hdp before you compare two books.
- Prices are decimal odds sent as strings. Convert them to numbers when you read them.
- updatedAt is the time that market last changed in the feed, which tells you how fresh a price is.
- Bookmaker names are case-sensitive and must be spelled as /bookmakers returns them.
REST or WebSocket?
REST is request and response. You ask for odds and get a snapshot. It suits pre-match pages, lookups and anything on a schedule. Paid plans include 5,000 requests an hour, and /odds/multi returns up to 10 events per request.
A WebSocket stream pushes each change as it happens over one connection. It suits in-play odds and products that track many matches at once, where polling would burn requests and still lag. On Odds-API.io the stream carries odds, scores and status. Reconnect with lastSeq to recover the latest odds state, and rebuild from REST if the server sends resync_required. The live odds API guide compares the two in detail.
How to choose a sports betting API provider
Headline numbers are easy to compare and tell you little. These checks decide whether a provider works for your product.
- Coverage. Count only the bookmakers, sports and leagues you will use. Pull fixtures for your main leagues and check which books price them.
- Markets. Check the markets you need, including alternative lines, periods and player props, on real fixtures.
- Freshness. On markets that move in play, compare each new timestamp with the time you received it. An unchanged price keeps its older timestamp.
- Live delivery. Ask whether in-play odds arrive over a push stream and what happens after a disconnect.
- Results. Check that final and period scores arrive with a clear status, and whether the provider can grade bets for you.
- History. If you build models or audits, check how far back historical odds and closing lines go.
- Documentation and SDKs. Read the docs before you sign up. Odds-API.io has official TypeScript and Python SDKs.
- Uptime. Look for a public status page with incident history. Ours is at status.odds-api.io.
- Terms and pricing model. Confirm commercial use is covered, and compare per-request, per-bookmaker and flat pricing against your real request volume. Our plans are on the pricing page.
Odds-API.io covers 450+ bookmakers across 34 sports. The sportsbooks page lists every book in the feed.
What changed in sports betting APIs for 2026
If you last looked at this space a year ago, three things are new on Odds-API.io.
- Bet grading. Since 12 October 2026, POST /v3/settlements/grade grades up to 50 bets per request as won, lost, void, half_won or half_lost, and says pending or ungradeable when it cannot. The bet grading API guide walks through it.
- Closing lines in bulk. Since 1 August 2026, /v3/historical/closing-lines returns closing odds for up to 10 leagues over a date range of up to 366 days in one request, on paid plans.
- Standard market names. Market names were standardised in August 2026, and the old names stopped being served on 5 September 2026. Code written against older examples should filter on the names /markets returns today.
Is there a sports betting API for Python?
Yes. Any REST API works from Python with requests, and Odds-API.io also has an official Python SDK. The Python tutorial builds a script that fetches leagues, fixtures and odds and compares bookmakers.
What is the best sports betting API?
It depends on what you build. Bookmaker breadth matters most for comparison products, official data rights for some media uses, and stream quality for in-play products. Our odds API comparison goes through the tradeoffs provider by provider.
Getting started
Pick a plan on the pricing page, select the bookmakers you need, and make your first request with the quickstart. Building a sportsbook? Read the sportsbook API integration guide next. For enterprise volume or custom terms, email hello@odds-api.io.
