A longshot is a bet on an outcome with a very low probability of winning – and a very high payout if it does.

High risk, high reward. You’re backing something that’s not expected to happen, in exchange for odds that pay out many times your stake.

The term comes from horse racing. A „long shot” was originally a shot fired from far away – difficult to aim, unlikely to hit. In racing, horses with little chance of winning were the long shots in the field. The term stuck and now applies across all forms of betting.

How to recognize a longshot by the odds

Odds tell you how much a bet pays out relative to your stake – and they signal the implied probability of the outcome. The higher the odds, the more of a longshot the bet is.

American odds:

• Regular underdog: +150 to +400
• Big underdog: +400 to +1000
• Longshot: +1000, +5000, +10000 or higher

A +5000 bet means a $100 stake returns $5,000 profit.

Decimal odds:

• A regular bet might be 2.5 or 3.0
• A longshot is 10.0, 50.0, 100.0 or more

A decimal of 51.00 means every $1 staked returns $51 total ($50 profit).

Fractional odds (common in UK/horse racing):

• 50/1, 100/1, 500/1
• 100/1 means $1 bet returns $100 profit

Any time odds promise 20x, 50x, or 100x your stake – you’re looking at a longshot.

Longshot vs underdog

These two terms get used interchangeably, but they’re not the same thing.

An underdog is simply the team or player expected to lose. Underdogs can have short odds like -120 or +150 – they’re not favored, but they’re not a massive stretch either.

A longshot is specifically a bet with very high odds – typically +1000 or more. Every longshot is an underdog, but most underdogs are not longshots.

The line between them isn’t fixed, but the distinction matters: a +300 underdog has a meaningful implied chance (25%). A +5000 longshot implies just 2%.

Famous longshot examples

Leicester City, Premier League 2015-16 – 5000/1 At the start of the 2015-16 season, Leicester City were priced at 5000/1 to win the Premier League. A $10 bet would have returned $50,000. They won. It’s the most cited example of a longshot winning in sports history.

Buster Douglas beats Mike Tyson, 1990 – 42/1 (+4200) Tyson was considered unbeatable. Douglas was a 42-1 longshot going into the fight. He knocked Tyson out in the 10th round.

Miracle on Ice, 1980 – 1000/1 (+100000) The US Men’s Hockey team at the 1980 Winter Olympics was priced at 1000/1 against the Soviet Union. They won 4-3.

Country House, Kentucky Derby 2019 – 65/1 Country House paid 65-1 at the Kentucky Derby. A $1 bet returned $65.

Longshots in casino games

Longshot bets exist in table games too, built into the game design:

Roulette – a straight-up bet on a single number pays 35/1. The true probability is 1 in 37 (European) or 1 in 38 (American). That gap is the house edge.

Craps – betting on a 2 or 12 („Hi-Lo”) pays 30/1 in most casinos. The true probability of rolling a 2 or 12 is 1 in 36.

Progressive jackpot slots – every spin contributes a small amount to a growing prize pool. Jackpot odds are often 1 in several million. These are the longest shots in any casino.

The favourite-longshot bias

This is the most important thing to understand about longshots from a betting value perspective.

The favourite-longshot bias is a documented phenomenon: bookmakers consistently apply a higher margin (vig/overround) to longshots than to favorites. The result is that bettors lose more per dollar staked on longshots than on favorites, even before accounting for the lower win rate.

In practice:

• Betting favorites blindly loses roughly 5% per dollar over time
• Betting longshots blindly loses closer to 40% per dollar over time

The reason is partly psychological and partly bookmaker strategy. People overestimate the probability of unlikely events – the appeal of a massive payout distorts judgment. Bookmakers know this and price longshots accordingly, building in extra margin where they know bettors will overpay.

A 2023 study published in Management Science confirmed the bias holds across nearly every betting market. The economist who first documented it was Griffith, in a 1949 analysis of horse racing.

When a longshot has value

Most longshots don’t have value. But some do.

A longshot has positive expected value (EV) when the true probability of winning is higher than the odds imply. If a team is priced at +5000 (implying 2% chance) but the real probability based on evidence is 5%, that’s a value bet – even though it will lose 95% of the time.

This is rare. Finding genuine value in longshots requires:

• An edge in probability estimation that the market doesn’t have
• Odds that are demonstrably too high relative to the real chance
• A large enough sample of such bets to overcome variance

Without that, longshots are entertainment, not strategy.

Bankroll management for longshots

The math on longshots means consistent staking destroys bankrolls quickly.

If you bet $10 on a +5000 shot repeatedly, you’re losing $10 at a time with wins spaced far apart. Even if you eventually hit, the cumulative losses between wins may exceed the payout.

A practical approach if you want to bet longshots:

• Treat them as a separate, small entertainment budget
• Never chase losses by increasing stake size
• Never more than a small percentage of your total bankroll on any single longshot
• Understand that the expected result over many bets is a loss

Related terms

Underdog – team or player expected to lose; all longshots are underdogs, but not vice versa
Favourite-longshot bias – the documented tendency for longshot odds to carry higher margins than favourite odds
Expected value (EV) – the average outcome of a bet over many repetitions; most longshots have negative EV
Futures bet – a bet on a long-term outcome (e.g. championship winner before the season); the most common type of longshot bet
Value bet – a bet where odds are higher than the true probability warrants; the rare case where a longshot is actually a good bet

FAQs

Where does the word „longshot” come from?
Horse racing. A „long shot” was a horse so unlikely to win that backing it was like firing a shot from far away – possible to hit, but very unlikely. The term entered general language from there.

What odds count as a longshot?
No fixed threshold, but generally anything above +1000 in American odds (or 11.0 in decimal) qualifies. Some use +500 as the lower boundary. The defining characteristic is that the implied probability is very low – typically under 10%.

Are longshots ever worth betting?
Occasionally, when the true probability is higher than the odds imply. This requires solid analysis showing the market is wrong. Most of the time, longshots have negative expected value – they’re priced to give the bookmaker a large margin.

Why do bookmakers make more money on longshots than favorites?
Because they apply a higher margin (overround) to longshot prices. Bettors are willing to overpay for the chance of a massive payout, and bookmakers exploit this. This is the favourite-longshot bias.