- Mobile apps from Barstool Sportsbook and 888 Sports are now listed as ‘coming soon’ on the Colorado Division of Gaming website.
- 888 Sports has been up and running in New Jersey for awhile and has previously indicated plans to go live in Colorado in the third quarter of 2021.
- Barstool Sportsbook opened their first retail location at the Ameristar Casino in Black Hawk, Colorado in November 2020. Their mobile app has previously launched in Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
The sports betting scene in Colorado has been fairly quiet of late. That’s not surprising as the industry has historically been somewhat dormant between the end of basketball season and the start of football season. There’s every reason to think that the booming Colorado market will heat up as NFL season draws near. In fact, it might be happening sooner than that as the state’s Division of Gaming has recently listed two new sportsbooks as ‘coming soon’ to the Colorado mobile betting marketplace.
A sportsbook’s listing on the Colorado Division of Gaming’s list of ‘licensed sportsbooks and operators’ has to this point been a precursor to an imminent launch in the state. The last sportsbook to launch was BallyBet in late May. The new additions to the list are a couple of well known names in the US and Europe respectively–Barstool Sportsbook and 888 Sports. They’ll likely be joined by a number of other new entries before NFL season kicks off including previously licensed books Tipico, Betsson and Bet365. fuboTV’s forthcoming sportsbook has also announced plans to launch in Colorado and a new Sports Illustrated branded sportsbook project has mentioned their debut in the state. In addition, tribal gaming property Ute Mountain Casino has announced the launch of their sportsbook in conjunction with IGT within the next month joining Colorado’s other tribal casino–Sky Ute Casino–in the busy sports betting ecosystem.
By now, everyone has heard of Barstool Sports and is likely familiar with their sports betting platform in partnership with Penn National Gaming. Barstool’s first retail sports betting facility actually launched at the Ameristar Casino in Black Hawk, Colorado in November 2020 but until now they haven’t dropped their mobile app in the state. It looked to be a foregone conclusion that they would and Penn National mentioned as much in their earnings reports but this is the first indication that the launch is forthcoming. Barstool now has four additional retail locations–two in Illinois and one each in Michigan and Indiana–with more no doubt on the way. The mobile app is live in Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Pennsylvania with several additional states coming online before NFL season.
888 Sports is a well known brand in Europe that is just now getting established in the US. Their mobile sports betting platform is already operational in New Jersey and they offer casino gaming (888 Casino) in New Jersey along with Delaware and Pennsylvania. They also offer poker (888 Poker) in the previously mentioned three states. In addition, they are Caesars Entertainment’s technology partner for the World Series of Poker online poker platforms. They’ve been licensed in Colorado for awhile now but all along they’ve targeted Q3 of 2021 for a launch in the Centennial State. 888 Sports is also planning to launch in Indiana and Iowa soon after. In their Q4 2020 earnings call, they indicated they’d be launching in a couple of additional states by the end of 2021.
We’ve had it pegged all along that Colorado was going to be a huge state for sports betting and if anything they’ve exceeded our expectations. At this point, the variety of sports betting options available in the heart of the Rocky Mountains is staggering. With the addition of Bally Bet in May there are now 22 different mobile betting apps live in Colorado and the forthcoming additions of Barstool and 888 will take the total to 24. There’s also the Sky Ute Casino’s sportsbook app and the forthcoming Ute Mountain Casino sports betting app. That’s a total of 23 apps live in Colorado, soon to be 26 after Ute Mountain, Barstool and 888 join the party. It’s not unrealistic to speculate that by the time NFL season kicks off there could be 30 different sportsbook apps available to Colorado bettors–by far the most of any jurisdiction in the US. There are also 17 retail sportsbooks in Black Hawk, Cripple Creek and Central City.
