FanDuel, founded in 2009, is one of the world’s largest daily fantasy sports platforms. The platform offers fantasy contests in most of the famous U.S. sports leagues. Over the past decade, it has paid out more than $4.5 billion.
FanDuel’s range of fantasy leagues is not as impressive as what major competitors such as DraftKings support. Still, FanDuel’s scoring system and salary cap games help set the platform apart.
FanDuel also launched an online sportsbook in 2018 that looks at betting on most major U.S. sports leagues. The sportsbook is very impressive, with an extremely large number of reference bets available for each competition. The user interface, on both desktop and mobile devices, also helps promote FanDuel’s sportsbook to the beginning of the online betting package.
So, is FanDuel the best option for daily fantasy sports or online betting? Let’s take a closer look at this platform to find out.
Head straight to the FanDuel site to learn more and play
Sign up and make a deposit
Signing up for FanDuel is easy. Just go to the site and enter your name and email address to get started. You can also use your Facebook account to connect to FanDuel.
The company accepts payment via any major credit card, PayPal account or ACH wire transfer. You can even send FanDuel a check if that works better for you.
However, you can also opt out of the bonus and explore the site before making a deposit. FanDuel offers a large number of games for free, many of which come with cash prizes.
FanDuel’s Sportsbook
FanDuel’s sportsbook contains most of the major American leagues, including the NFL, NHL, NBA, MLB, NASCAR and many others. The company is also expanding into leagues that are more popular overseas and now includes betting on cricket, rugby, golf, UPL and UEFA soccer leagues.
What really sets the FanDuel sportsbook apart is its user interface. It’s one of the most attractive and user-friendly online betting platforms we’ve ever seen.
On the home page, you can quickly see which upcoming matches are attracting the most attention from players and place bets on the outcome. Your bets have been overlaid on the same window, so you can view your current bets, make changes, and customize all bets while viewing the list of available bets.
The range of bets available is also huge. For one NBA game, we count over 50 different bets to choose from. You can bet on individual players or the results of certain quarters, and you can customize custom bets or circular bets in your betting.
The only thing missing from FanDuel’s sportsbook was a detailed study that you could use to inform your bets. The platform doesn’t provide stats on teams or players, let alone stats pertaining to specific bets, so you can find that information yourself. Honestly, this isn’t a huge drawback, as most users turn to FanDuel to place bets, not to figure out what to bet on.
FanDuel Fantasy Sports
FanDuel’s league offerings for daily fantasy sports are noticeably limited compared to both the sportsbook and its main competitor, DraftKings. The platform offers daily fantasy only about the NFL, NBA, NHL, MLB, PGA and UPL, as well as NCAA basketball and soccer. Nevertheless, it fully covers the most popular leagues in the United States.
One unique aspect of how FanDuel approaches fantasy is that every fantasy game, regardless of the sport, has a $60,000 salary cap. This consistency is a major attraction for the platform, as users have a pretty good idea of what to expect in different tournaments.
Several different leagues and games are available on the platform. For starters, FanDuel offers a beginner category in which only users below a certain threshold are allowed to play. This gives beginners a real opportunity to learn the platform in a friendly environment, where most tournaments have no entry fee.
For more advanced players, competition types include tournaments, personal competitions and multiplayer leagues for 3-100 players. From time to time, FanDuel also experiments with some unusual competition formats. For example, the platform had a challenge home in the 2019 MLB season and a faceless NBA fantasy league in the 2019-20 NBA season. These competitions are a good option for those who want to try something different from the traditional fantasy league.
Regardless of the sport, the FanDuel development interface is quite simple. You can filter players by position or search by name and then add them to your list with one click. A consistent $60,000 salary cap simplifies the process, and the platform clearly displays the remaining payroll when selecting players.
Mobile App
FanDuel offers a variety of mobile apps for daily fantasy and sports betting. There are also different apps for the FanDuel sportsbook depending on what state you live in.
Aside from the initial confusion of choosing the right app for your needs, FanDuel’s mobile platforms are extremely clean. The Sportsbook app looks almost identical to the desktop client. The main change is that your betslip is displayed on a separate screen, which can be accessed from a simple menu at the bottom of the app. Otherwise, it’s still very easy to find reference bets and set up bets.
The daily fantasy app simplifies your display by giving you a selection of sports immediately after logging in. From there, you can easily browse or search for sports. Most are categorized by contest type or start time to help you find what you’re looking for on the small screen.
Drafting players is a little more cumbersome because you can’t view the entire lineup when selecting additional players. The app will display the salary cap, but it takes a few taps to change a player halfway through the draft.
Customer Support
FanDuel offers 24/7 customer support via phone, email or chat. This is a big improvement over DraftKings, which only offers chat. The company also has an extensive online knowledge base that answers the most common questions about how to use the platform or get your winnings.
Territories
FanDuel has daily fantasy sports in 43 states in the U.S. and Canada. Currently, you cannot use the service if you live in Arizona, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Montana, Nevada or Washington.
FanDuel’s sportsbook is much more limited in area. It is currently only open for betting in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Indiana and West Virginia.
Court’s ruling
FanDuel does not offer the same range of sports for daily fantasy or sports betting as its main competitor DraftKings. But what FanDuel does, it does very well.
FanDuel’s daily fantasy stands out because it offers innovative contests that go beyond traditional fantasy sports. Meanwhile, the sportsbook offers an incredibly large assortment of bets for each game and makes it easy to customize parlays. The user interfaces for both branches of FanDuel are very well designed, making the platform more appealing.