Betway Sportsbook Alberta Review: Is Betway Legit in Canada?
Betway is a reputable online sportsbook brand, and over the last few weeks, we’ve been working hard to test the Alberta version of its site to see what it offers for Canadian customers from this Province.
If you continue reading our Betway Sportsbook review, we’ll start by making sure the brand is legit, and that it has all the basic features. We’ll then dive into the sportsbook itself and see what sports and bets it supports on popular events like the NHL and CFL. We’ll finish by giving our overall impressions and recommendations.
- Stylish and modern website
- Fantastic iOS app
- Huge sports market variety
- Versatile live betting setup
- No Play Store app
- Live support isn’t 24/7
Is Betway Sportsbook Alberta legit? Reviewing its basic features
When we created our bet365 Sportsbook review, we started with the basics - the legitimacy of the brand, and we’ve done exactly the same here with this Betway sportsbook review. To summarise, everything is as expected - it’s got the license, got the support options, and does everything we expect from a reputable Alberta sportsbook.
Gambling license
Alberta residents at Betway are covered by a gambling license from the Malta Gaming Authority. This is gambling license number MGA/CRP/130/2006, and for this review, we checked the official licensing details page - everything checks out and is expected. In terms of ownership, the Betway brand is operated by Betway Limited which is a company based in Malta, and registered under company number C39710.
We also noted that the site is certified by eCOGRA, is part of the International Betting Integrity Association, and part of the IBAs service which is an impartial third-party betting adjudication service for complaints.
Security & transparency
We had no doubts about the security and transparency at Betway Alberta either. The site encrypts data using SSL encryption as standard which is something we expect, and at the time of creating our Betway Sportsbook review, there was an active SSL certificate provided by Google Trust Services.
There’s also verification processes and KYC checks if you want to sign up and use all the site features, and we were pleased to see a host of standard documentation such as terms and conditions, a privacy policy, transparency report, and responsible gambling.
Responsible gambling
We were incredibly pleased to see that Betway Alberta is committed to responsible gambling, and giving customers the tools they need to stay safe. It has a dedicated responsible gambling page, plus a load of tools you can use if you wish. The info page has a host of useful tips and ideas, and the following were the tools we found:
- Daily, weekly, and monthly deposit limits.
- Session reminders.
- Account closure.
- Self-exclusion periods.
We thought the session reminders were pretty good, as they give you a pop-up message to remind you to take a break when you’ve been on the site or app for a specific amount of time. Self-exclusion periods are especially flexible too, as you can set them from anywhere between 24 hours to indefinite.
Banking
For banking, Betway Alberta actually offers crypto and fiat deposits, but you can only withdraw your CAD using fiat methods - they don’t currently have facilities for crypto withdrawals. We were able to use a range of different payment methods including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Dogecoin for crypto, or Visa, MasterCard, Neosurf, PaySafeCard, Much Better, ecoPayz, FlexePin, and Instadebit for fiat payments.
Please note that you might be able to see different payment methods depending on your location. In a similar manner, while the minimum deposit and withdrawals limits were low, they were generally different depending on the withdrawal method you used. We DIDN’T get charged any payment fees though, which was a big positive.
Customer support
If you get stuck while using Betway Alberta, we recommend heading to the help center. This is essentially a subdomain of the site and it has a massive collection of help articles relating to topics like deposits, your account, login problems, technical issues, and responsible gambling. The help center is fully searchable, and we used this to find out a heap of info about the site.
For direct queries, your best option is the live chat which you can also access from the help center. The only downside with it is that it’s not available 24/7. Instead, it has standard hours of operation which are between 8am to 12am midnight, Eastern Time. When the live chat isn’t active, you can send email queries instead. We sent a couple of email queries, and we got replies within 24 hours which is to be expected.
What’s the Betway Sportsbook in Alberta like?
We had the most fun while creating this Betway Sportsbook review when actually delving into the sportsbook and betting offer, and we found exactly the same when we did our Caesars Sportsbook review. Betway has done a great job of giving you a diverse betting setup with plenty of sports, markets, and both pre-match and in-play betting options.
It has an excellent A-Z sports list
Whenever we create a sportsbook review like this for Alberta customers, we check to see what sports you can bet on. In the case of Betway, they have the following options:
Aussie Rules, Baseball, Basketball, Boxing, Cricket, Cycling, Darts, eSports, Field Hockey, Football, F1, Futsal, Gaelic Sports, Golf, Greyhounds, Handball, Hockey, Horse Racing, Virtuals, Motorsport, Politics, Rugby League, Rugby Union, Snooker, Soccer, Table Tennis, UFC/MMA, Volleyball.
All the main sports are covered, and we were pleased to see all the popular Canadian and US leagues and sports such as the CFL, NHL, NBA, MLB, and NHL. Outside of that though, this online sportsbook also has plenty of other markets.
Its soccer and tennis sections are both extensive - for example, with soccer, you’ve got bets for the EPL, La Liga, Ligue 1, Champions League, plus loads of 2nd and 3rd tier competitions. Similarly, for tennis, there’s the four Grand Slams, plus all the ATP and WTA 250 and 500 events from around the world.
There’s a varied betting selection
While they’ve done a great job with the sports selection, Betway Alberta also has all the main types of bets we expect, such as:
- Singles.
- Parlay/Acca.
- Same Game Parlay/Bet Builder.
- Pre-match.
- Live betting.
For most individual matches, you’ve got common betting lines like the moneyline, spread, and over/under line bets. On top of that, for the most popular sports, you can usually find a heap of team and/or player proposition bets. For example, we looked at a WNBA match between the Chicago Sky and Connecticut Sun, and found the following props:
- Points spread.
- Point totals.
- half-time/full-time splits.
- Winning margins.
- Will there be overtime?
We were impressed with the live betting setup
If you enjoy live betting, you can also jump straight into the dedicated live betting part of the site. As far as we can see, they offer in-play betting for all of their support sports and whenever we tested the live betting setup, the odds were refreshing instantly, so there was no delay with adding items to our bet slip.
We do think they could add a few more details and stats for the individual live game setups, but there was some live streaming which you can either watch on-site, or via links to other streaming platforms.
It offers competitive odds
Lastly, we did a comparison of the Betway Alberta odds compared to other top sportsbooks. They were pretty much always competitive, and we barely saw any difference with market averages. It looks like they have a small house edge/margin, and we think their bets are definitely some of the most competitive you can find from Canadian online sportsbooks - we never felt like we were getting a bad deal for the bets that we placed.
Using the Betway Alberta Sportsbook site
Like how we did in our DraftKings sportsbook review, we dedicated a section to the usability of Betway Alberta. Simply put, the high quality design of the desktop website and the mobile apps meant we had a really enjoyable experience using Betway - it’s clear that usability was a key priority during the development process.
The desktop website looks fantastic with a modern design
First up, we looked at the desktop website - it’s got a clean, modern style that puts the emphasis on the sportsbook content and makes everything really easy to find. It just looks especially professional. You’ve got a classic left-to-right information flow also, which veteran sportsbook customers will be familiar with - on the left, there’s the sports categories, the middle contains the betting info, and on the right is your bet slip.
Technically speaking, we saw no issues with the site either - no missing content, no broken links, and lightning fast loading speeds. Lastly, we think they’ve done a top job of cramming all the mass of sportsbook betting info into the site, without it feeling cluttered or messy. This should make it easy for beginners to use too.
There’s also downloadable mobile apps
For mobile betting, you can download one of two mobile apps which have the following info/ratings:
- App Store version - 4.7 star rating from 70,000+ reviews.
- Android version - looks to be an APK as opposed to a Play Store app.
It was pretty clear that there was an iOS app, and this had glowing reviews from the App Store. However, things were a little more confusing for the Android version. We DON’T think there is a Play Store app for Betway Alberta, but there IS an APK you should be able to download and install directly from the site which basically does the same job.
We thought that both versions of the app worked great, and they both have the same smooth, clean, and modern design as the desktop website.
Conclusion - how does Betway Sportsbook Alberta shape up?
Like Betway Ontario, we really had great fun with Betway Sportsbook Alberta. It’s one of the better Canadian online sportsbooks you’ll find, and we think that Alberta residents will enjoy the diversity of the sportsbook offering, the excellent range of betting markets, and the superb usability of both the desktop website and mobile apps.
We’d like to see a little more detail and info on the individual live betting sections, BUT, other than that, the site doesn’t need many improvements. It also helps that things like the gambling license, support options, and security are all in place. If you want to try it out for yourself and start betting, you can click any of the relevant banners we have on this page.