Formula 1 betting in New Zealand for the 2026 season

Updated October 2026

Licensed

Available in US

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18+ Only

26 October 2026 · Verified against TAB NZ’s published terms and the Department of Internal Affairs register

Lando Norris carries the number one into the 2026 Formula One World Championship, the 77th running of the title and a season overhauled at the technical level. Twenty-three Grands Prix sit on the calendar after the Saudi Arabian round was pulled, and six of them carry sprint weekends — China, Miami, Canada, Britain, Netherlands and Singapore. The first flag falls at Albert Park on 8 March 2026; the last at Yas Marina on 6 December 2026. The sport has changed shape underneath. A New Zealand bettor who wants a stake on it faces a smaller, sharper question than fans elsewhere: who can lawfully take the bet, and what does the price they quote actually mean?

This page addresses that question. It walks through the New Zealand market for Formula 1, outlines the legal frame that puts TAB NZ at its centre, explains how the odds are built and what the margin inside them costs, and compares the operators a New Zealand bettor encounters — two that are licensed here, eight that are not. Where a figure is firm it stands in digits; where the data runs out, the page says so plainly and points to where the reader finds more.

The shape of the 2026 Formula One season

Twenty-three races is a long stretch for a bettor to keep track of, and the calendar in 2026 is unusual in a few specific ways. The technical regulation reset — MGU-H gone, MGU-K output raised from 160 bhp to 470 bhp, DRS replaced by active aerodynamics — changes how cars perform and how races resolve. The team cost cap moved from $135 million to $215 million, which changes who can afford to fight at the front and for how long. These rules are why pre-season testing and the early rounds will read less predictably than recent seasons and why the odds at the front of the field move more than usual between races.

Six sprint weekends sit inside the calendar (China, Miami, Canada, Britain, Netherlands and Singapore), and each one doubles the working weekend for bettors: practice, sprint qualifying, the sprint itself, grand prix qualifying and the grand prix across three days. For someone running outright championship bets that compression matters because more points are paid out earlier and form swings travel further across the season. For a race-by-race bettor, sprint weekends offer extra markets — sprint winner, sprint podium, head-to-head driver matchups in the sprint — that bookmakers price on their own margin basis.

The Australian Grand Prix at Albert Park opens the campaign on 8 March 2026, and the season finishes under the floodlights at Abu Dhabi on 6 December 2026. Eleven teams contest the constructors’ title. The championship favourites heading into the season are the usual short list, but with the regulation overhaul that list is smaller than the public might assume. Markets reflect this: championship odds for drivers priced as title contenders tend to open wider than usual, which is itself a betting signal worth thinking about later in this page.

How New Zealand regulates betting — and what that means for an F1 bet

New Zealand does things differently from most other betting markets. There is no licence register of bookmakers, because there is no route to obtain one. Section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020, inserted by the Racing Industry Amendment Act 2025 and in force since 28 June 2025, makes TAB NZ the only provider that may offer racing or sports betting to a person in New Zealand, regardless of where that person is resident or incorporated. The Department of Internal Affairs told unlicensed providers to withdraw with immediate effect when the rule took hold. A person betting with an offshore brand does not face a published penalty; the rule targets the operator.

TAB NZ and Betcha together are the only legal online route. They sit under one roof: TAB NZ holds the licence, and Betcha is the group’s second brand, launched under a 25-year partnership with Entain signed in 2023. That partnership gives Entain a 50/50 share of gross profits and commits Entain to pay TAB NZ at least $150 million a year for the first five years, with a one-off $100 million payment pledged to the racing sector when the deal closed. The two brands are not rivals — they are the same operator through different front doors. Betcha is built around the app experience and sports-first design; TAB is the established brand with the full racing suite (Win, Place, Each Way, Quinella, Exacta, Trifecta, First Four, Quaddie, Big6, same-game multis and the rest). For Formula 1 a bettor on either app sees the same kind of markets priced by the same trading team.

The Online Casino Gambling Act 2026 is a separate piece of the picture. It will license online casino gambling — slot machines, table games, live dealer — and TAB NZ won the right to apply for a casino licence when the legislation was drafted. Casino gambling and sports betting are different permits: the 2026 Act does not extend the monopoly to anything other than casino products, and it does not change the betting side at all. A New Zealand bettor who wants a flutter on the Singapore Grand Prix still goes through TAB or Betcha and nowhere else.

Greyhound racing complicates the offshore point in a specific way. The greyhound code is being closed in stages from 1 August 2026, and from that date offshore operators may not take bets on greyhound races either. That rule is narrow and tied to the greyhound calendar; it does not extend to Formula 1 or to any other motorsport. A bettor who encounters an offshore brand offering greyhound markets after 1 August 2026 is being offered something the operator has no lawful basis to sell. The same offshore brand offering Formula 1 to a New Zealand account is in a different and broader breach: section 74AAA covers the entire sports-betting offer.

Responsible gambling tools and where to get help

TAB NZ builds its safer-gambling tools into the apps rather than running them as a separate service. The core set: deposit limits (a ceiling the bettor sets, applied across the account), time-outs (a pause in which the account cannot place bets) and self-exclusion (a longer ban, the duration chosen by the bettor). The self-exclusion applies across both TAB and Betcha because they are the same operator; closing one account closes both. The tools are voluntary and set by the bettor; the operator does not override them on marketing evidence (a self-excluded account does not receive promotional material for the chosen period). Two free help lines sit inside the same system. The Gambling Helpline is 0800 654 655 and runs 24 hours; a text line at 8006 covers people who prefer typing to talking. Both are run by Safer Gambling Aotearoa, the specialist provider funded by the gambling levy TAB NZ pays each year. The helpline does not report back to TAB or to any other operator; the conversation is private to the person making the call. Problem gambling is treated as a health issue at the helpline end, not a customer-service issue.

The law behind the levy matters more than the line itself. TAB NZ pays a Problem Gambling Levy of 0.74% of its gross profits, in force from 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2028 — a fixed slice of what the operator earns, ring-fenced for harm-minimisation work. The 0.74% does not appear on a betting slip; it is an operator-level cost that reduces what TAB keeps from the margin on each market. Offshore operators supplying New Zealand residents pay a separate online gambling duty (12% of profits from 1 July 2024, rising to 16% from 1 January 2027), but a duty being payable does not make an offer lawful. Anyone framing a tax registration as proof of legality is reading the rule backwards.

For an offshore brand a New Zealand bettor is on their own. The brand’s own terms state its own complaint process; it sits under a Curaçao, Anjouan, Tobique or other offshore licence and reaches no New Zealand regulator. Deposit limits, time-outs and self-exclusion may or may not exist on the offshore site; the same goes for links to the Gambling Helpline. The Department of Internal Affairs puts the position bluntly: overseas operators may be in jurisdictions with minimal consumer safeguards, may not return unspent credits and may not pay out large wins. That warning is the practical frame for anyone considering an F1 bet outside the licensed route.

What smart F1 betting actually involves

A few things require clarification before any specific race or market is named. Betting cannot predict a race. Nobody who posts a tip on the Spanish Grand Prix knows the result; the bookmaker adjusts the price to absorb any information. The price is the prediction — read carefully to see what the market thinks, weighted by money flow. A driver priced at 4.50 for the win represents, in the market’s view, roughly an 18% chance; the betting public and the trading desk reached that together.

Bankroll is the term for the amount a bettor sets aside for betting over a period — a week, a month, a season — and that the bettor is prepared to lose. The point of thinking in terms of a bankroll is unit sizing: a unit is a fixed fraction of the bankroll (1% to 5% depending on the bettor’s appetite for risk), and every bet is sized in units. A $200 bankroll with a 2% unit gives a $4 stake; the same bankroll with a 5% unit gives a $10 stake. The mechanic is identical; what changes is how much of the bankroll a single bad weekend can take. A bankroll of 1-2% per unit is the standard starting point in serious F1 commentary; smaller than that and a bettor is not really managing risk at all, just betting one unit at a time until the bankroll runs out.

Forecasting and form are related but distinct. Form is what the last race showed — Norris winning in Singapore, Verstappen struggling with tyre warm-up, Williams hitting a setup they understand. Forecasting reads form through the lens of the next track: a driver strong in slow corners tends to carry that advantage to similar circuits, while tyre-warm-up issues at a cold track might not trouble the same car in Bahrain. Championship outrights are the longest-form bets on the calendar and the most vulnerable to a single regulation-induced shift; race wins are the shortest and the most exposed to a safety car, a weather change or a first-lap collision.

A practical sequence for a New Zealand bettor who wants to put a stake on the next race weekend: open the TAB NZ or Betcha app, set a deposit limit before the first deposit, browse the Formula 1 section under Sports or Motorsport, choose a market, set the stake in whole-dollar amounts, place the bet before the start time, and wait for settlement. Live betting is available in the apps; the in-play price adjusts every few seconds in a race. A note on the same-game multi: TAB NZ lists these for some sports and they work the same way as a multi anywhere else — all legs must win, the prices multiply into one combined price, and a voided leg usually voids the whole betslip.

The markets a bettor meets on an F1 weekend

Formula 1 is unusually rich in market types, partly because each race produces so many classifier positions (twenty finishers, twenty distinct finishing places) and partly because the sport itself invites head-to-head framing. The roster below lists the markets TAB NZ offers on a typical grand prix weekend, in the order they usually appear on the slip.

Outright winner markets sit at the top: Drivers’ Championship, Constructors’ Championship, and the Race Winner for the next round. Outrights are priced before the season starts and adjust through the year; they tie up a stake for months and are bet in low unit sizes because the variance is enormous. Race winner prices adjust most sharply after practice and qualifying, when form for the specific track becomes clearer.

Race-internal markets are where most of the action sits on a race weekend. Podium finish (a driver to finish first, second or third) carries shorter odds than race winner but longer odds than a podium or better. Head-to-head matchups pair two drivers — “Driver A to finish ahead of Driver B” — and the price reflects the gap between them. Fastest lap is a market of its own: a separate bet on who sets the quickest lap in the race, which can pay out even for a driver outside the podium. Each-way betting, more common in racing than in team sports, pays a fraction of the win price for a place finish (usually top three in an F1 race); it costs more than a straight win bet and reduces variance.

Props and same-game multis round out the weekend. These combine markets from the same race — race winner plus fastest lap, podium plus both drivers in the top six — at multiplied odds, with the same voiding rules as a multi. The volatility on a same-game multi is high: a win on Verstappen for the race and a fail on Norris for fastest lap gives a losing ticket even though both bets were sensible in isolation. Live betting sits on top of all of these and is priced continuously in the race. The live price is set by an in-house trading desk and reacts to the on-track picture; the in-play margin is usually higher than the pre-match margin, which is itself a quirk worth knowing about.

The 2026 calendar and how each round reads for betting

The breakdown matters for how a season-long bettor plans the bankroll. The early rounds (Melbourne, Shanghai, Suzuka) give the first read on whether the regulation reset has created a new pecking order; mid-season rounds (Silverstone, Spa, Monza) carry high-profile sprint weekends and high public interest; the flyaway run (Singapore, Austin, Mexico, Brazil, Las Vegas) compresses four races into five weeks and tests the bankroll harder than any other stretch. The Qatar and Abu Dhabi rounds close the calendar and are the final inputs to both championship markets.

How a bookmaker builds its odds — and what the margin costs

Every price on a bookmaker’s slip carries the margin the bookmaker takes. The mechanic is straightforward: in a two-way market (race winner, yes/no; podium or not podium) the two prices sum to exactly 2.00 if the bookmaker were running a fair exchange, because the two outcomes cover everything. A bookmaker’s price sums to more than 2.00 because the margin is baked in. The easiest way to see the margin is to invert the prices, add them together and divide 1 by the sum.

A worked example makes the mechanic concrete. Take an illustrative two-way market priced at decimal odds 1.90 on each side — that is the example used throughout this page because it sits squarely in the range real F1 prices fall into, and because the symmetry makes the arithmetic easy to follow. The inverse of 1.90 is 0.5263, the sum of both sides is 1.0526, and dividing 1 by the sum gives a payout share of 0.9501 — 95.01% of every dollar bet on this market returns to bettors in the long run. The margin is the remainder: 1 minus 0.9501 equals 0.0499, or 4.99% as a percentage. Round to one decimal place: 5% margin, give or take.

That 5% is not a fee. It is the slice of every dollar bet on this market that the bookmaker keeps, on average, across many bets. For a $10 single bet at 1.90 the return is $19.00 on a win (stake times odds), so the net profit is $9.00; for a $10 single bet to pay out the full stake plus the bookmaker’s slice, the price needs to sit closer to 1.95 even at the same probability. In a three-way market (a podium market with three named drivers, say) the sum of the inverses covers all three outcomes and the margin sits in the gap between 100% and the inverse sum; the maths is the same, only the denominator changes.

The price a punter sees on the betting slip has the margin in it before the bet is ever placed. The way to read it is to compare two operators on the same market: the operator with the higher payout share (or the lower margin) returns more of every dollar bet, on average, than the operator with the lower payout share. For a casual weekend bettor the difference between a 5% margin and a 7% margin over a season of bets is meaningful — over 200 single bets of $10 each, the lower-margin bookmaker keeps $40 less across a year. The catch is that price alone does not pick the bet; the bet is what the bettor thinks will win, and a cheaper-looking price on a less likely outcome is still a worse bet. The margin is the slice of every dollar the bookmaker keeps; the bet is the bet.

The same mechanic applies in-play, and usually more steeply. Live F1 markets price two outcomes within a race (race winner, fastest lap) on a tick-by-tick basis, and the margin in those prices is often 6-8% rather than 4-5% — the bookmaker is buying itself room to react to what is happening on track. A bettor who only plays in-play markets is paying a higher slice to the bookmaker on average than a bettor who sticks to pre-match prices. That is not a recommendation against in-play betting; it is an honest description of what the in-play prices carry.

Placing a Formula 1 bet on the TAB NZ or Betcha app

The mechanics on both TAB NZ apps are deliberately similar, because they are the same operator. The bettor opens the app, verifies identity if it is the first session (a New Zealand address and ID, matched to the account holder’s name), and lands on the home screen. Formula 1 sits under Sports or Motorsport depending on the brand’s layout, and a current weekend’s race carries the markets described earlier. The bettor picks a market, chooses a runner, enters a stake in dollars, and confirms. The betslip carries the price the bettor accepted at the moment of confirmation; if the price moves before the bet is placed, the slip shows the new price, not the old one.

Three small details repay attention. The first is that the price moves sharply once qualifying ends and the grid is set; a bettor who waits until Sunday morning to back a favourite usually pays a worse price than the same bettor placed on Friday evening. The second is the same-game multi mechanic: all legs must win, a voided leg voids the whole betslip, and the multi price is the product of the individual prices (1.90 times 1.90 equals 3.61 for a two-leg same-game multi). The third is the settle-by start rule: bets placed after the race has started — in play, after the formation lap — are settled at the in-play price, which is its own market.

The payout process after a winning bet is straightforward. The return (stake times odds) lands back in the TAB or Betcha account wallet, available for withdrawal or for the next bet. A withdrawal goes back to the same method used for deposit, subject to TAB NZ’s own limits. The wallet is unified across TAB and Betcha — a winning bet on one app appears in the other the moment it settles. The minimum withdrawal amount, the time it takes, and the upper limit per transaction come from TAB NZ’s own terms; check those in-app before the first withdrawal rather than assuming.

Comparing the New Zealand-licensed options and the brands a NZ bettor will meet

Two brands hold a New Zealand licence to take sports bets online: TAB and Betcha, both part of the TAB NZ group. Eight other brands a New Zealand bettor encounters (Roobet, Spinbara, Sportaza, Thunderpick, Rooster, Glorion, RoyalistPlay and BetAlright) are not licensed to take bets from people in New Zealand, regardless of what other markets they hold licences in. The table below sets out what each brand offers on Formula 1, what its own terms say about the key subjects a bettor cares about, and where it sits on the New Zealand legal frame.

The split above is the structural truth of the New Zealand market in 2026: two licensed brands that sit under one operator group and offer a full motorsport programme, versus a long tail of offshore brands that carry F1 on their sportsbook but have no lawful footing in New Zealand. The next sections go through each brand on its own terms — what its offer actually looks like, where it shines, and where it falls short for the New Zealand bettor.

TAB

TAB is the established face of the TAB NZ group. It carries the full racing programme (thoroughbred, harness, greyhound — until 1 August 2026 after which greyhound markets close across the New Zealand industry) alongside the sports menu, which includes rugby union, rugby league, NBA, NFL, cricket, football, tennis, MMA and motorsport. The TAB app carries a 17+ age rating on the New Zealand App Store; the operator’s own terms make 18 the minimum age to bet, and the bettor’s identity is verified against a New Zealand address at account opening. The app was first released on 8 September 2014 and has been the single point of access for most New Zealand bettors since.

For a Formula 1 bettor the relevant strengths are the programme depth and the live betting product. Sprint weekends open up extra markets; race winner, podium finish, head-to-head driver matchups and same-game multis across qualifying and the race are all part of the menu. The TAB app also carries Trackside live race streaming for the racing codes — horses, dogs and trots — and an in-app betting slip on the stream; that is a racing product more than an F1 product, but it shows the depth of the in-app betting infrastructure that the F1 markets sit on top of.

The drawback is not a product gap so much as a single-operator effect: there is no licensed competitor to TAB. That means no price competition between licensed brands on F1 outrights, no second set of boosted odds to compare, and no rival’s same-game multi to weigh against. Within TAB NZ the choice is between TAB and Betcha, and they price the same markets through the same trading desk. A bettor who wants the licensed route uses TAB and gets the licensed price — and the bettor is not paying anything for the absence of competition because the absence is the law.

The verdict is straightforward. TAB is the only lawful route for a New Zealand punter who wants a comprehensive F1 programme with regulated harm-minimisation tools, a recognised complaints framework and New Zealand-domiciled company oversight. The price is the price TAB quotes; the alternative is not a higher price elsewhere but an unlawful one. For most readers, that’s the comparison that matters.

Betcha

Betcha is the second TAB NZ brand — the sports-first sibling to TAB, released on the New Zealand App Store on 6 August 2024 under the publisher Entain New Zealand Limited. The brand runs as a dedicated sports and racing betting app: horse, greyhound and harness racing (with the greyhound closure from 1 August 2026 carrying through), rugby union, rugby league, NBA, NFL, MMA/UFC, tennis, cricket, football, motorsports and esports. The app is built around a faster sports experience and a simplified wallet for deposits and withdrawals. Because it sits under TAB NZ, an exclusion set on Betcha also closes the TAB account.

For a Formula 1 reader, Betcha is essentially a different front door on the same product. The motorsport menu is the same scope as TAB’s — race winner, podium, head-to-head, fastest lap, same-game multis — and the live betting is priced by the same trading desk. The differences are surface-level: a sports-first layout, a quicker onboarding flow and a deposit-and-withdrawal experience built around the daily punter rather than the once-a-week horse-racing customer. A reader who bets on F1 most weekends and not at all on racing will likely find Betcha the cleaner experience.

The single-operator effect applies as it does to TAB. There is no licensed competitor to Betcha, and Betcha and TAB are not rivals — they are siblings. That distinction matters because it shifts the choice from “which operator” to “which app the bettor prefers to use”, which is a usability question, not a pricing question. A bettor who wants the licensed route opens both apps, picks the one that feels right, and checks the same price on the same market in case there is a small display difference.

The verdict: Betcha is the licensed option for the reader who bets mainly on sports, wants a clean app experience and is happy to back F1 from a single-operator group. The price is the same as on TAB; the difference is in how the betting slips look and how the in-play screen reacts in a race. Either brand is fine; mixing both is unusual.

Roobet

Roobet sits at the other end of the comparison. The brand is not licensed to take bets from people in New Zealand; the named licence is Curaçao (OGL/2024/687/0427, holder Raw Entertainment B.V.), which gives no right to take sports bets from a person in New Zealand. The sportsbook covers soccer, basketball, tennis, Counter-Strike, FIFA, baseball, ice hockey, MMA and table tennis — a list that notably does not centre on motorsport but does have the building blocks an F1 bet sits on. A New Zealand account has no complaints route and no harm-minimisation framework that reaches it; the responsible-gambling tools come only from the operator’s own policies, and the Department of Internal Affairs’s stated risks — limited consumer safeguards, no promise that unspent credits will be returned, no promise of large-win payouts — apply in full.

F1 coverage on Roobet is a presence rather than a programme. The brand markets itself as a crypto casino with a sportsbook attached; a bettor who navigates to the F1 section will find outright markets on the Drivers’ and Constructors’ championships and the standard race winner / podium / head-to-head lines, but the site does not run the same depth of in-race markets or the same condensed sprint-weekend coverage that the licensed brands offer. Live betting is on the site; cash-out is not stated in the publicly available terms. Bonuses are described only as the operator’s own terms state them; the page does not print codes, links or quantities.

The verdict: Roobet is an option for a New Zealand reader who has chosen to use an offshore brand despite the legal frame and is comfortable with the trade-off that the choice implies. A reader who wants the licensed route, the harm-minimisation tools, the Gambling Helpline and the DIA’s regulatory oversight does not have that on Roobet.

Spinbara

Spinbara is also not licensed to take bets from people in New Zealand. The brand publishes no licence that applies in New Zealand; the welcome pages reference casino-style offerings (a first-deposit bonus of 100% up to EUR 100, a sport crypto welcome bonus of 100% up to 200 USDT, a casino welcome bonus of 100% up to EUR 500 plus 200 free spins), which is the kind of packaging that the licensed New Zealand market does not have because no other licensed operator exists. New Zealand bettors using Spinbara have no recourse to the Department of Internal Affairs, no complaints framework here and no access to the Gambling Helpline through the operator’s own referral.

Formula 1 coverage is mainstream — outrights, race winner, podium and head-to-head on the named races, with live betting for the duration. The site does not advertise any F1-specialist tools; the value to a New Zealand bettor is that the price may differ from TAB NZ’s price, which matters only to a bettor using an offshore brand in the first place. Bonuses are described only as the operator’s own terms state them, and the terms reference bonuses attached to a deposit requirement, a minimum price and a turnover — standard bonus packaging that the page does not print.

The verdict on Spinbara is the same as the offshore sector as a whole. It is an option where the price on a market differs from TAB NZ’s, which is a real and visible thing. It is not an option where the reader wants the licensed route. New Zealand harm-minimisation tools and the Gambling Helpline do not run through this brand, and the Department of Internal Affairs’s stated risks apply.

Sportaza

Sportaza is an offshore brand with an Anjouan licence (ALSI-202606064-FI2), again giving no right to take bets from a person in New Zealand. No licensed New Zealand betting operator exists outside the TAB NZ group, so the same offshore caveat applies here too. The site’s terms state cash-out before an event or market is finalised, Bet Builder (with a void-bet-betslip rule where one voided leg makes the whole multi void), multiples, Asian lines and interval markets in 1, 5, 10 or 15 minute ranges. None of those features is specific to Formula 1; they describe the platform, and an F1 bet fits inside them.

F1 coverage is mainstream markets. Outrights on the Drivers’ and Constructors’ championships, race winner, podium, head-to-head driver matchups, fastest lap. The site also lists Cash Out as a feature available before an event or market is finalised, which is what the licensed brands offer too, and which adds little to a single-race F1 bet because most F1 markets settle at the chequered flag rather than before. The Bet Builder is the relevant differentiator: it allows a bettor to combine F1-specific markets into one slip, with the multi mechanics that a same-game multi carries.

The Sportaza verdict reads the same way as the other offshore brands: an option for a reader who has decided to use an offshore brand, with the same DIA caveats and no New Zealand harm-minimisation framework. Sportaza’s Bet Builder is the practical feature on top of the standard F1 menu, and is worth knowing about for a reader already in the offshore market.

Thunderpick

Thunderpick is esports-first. The platform covers CS2, League of Legends, Dota 2 and Valorant as its core, and the sportsbook adds a cash-out feature and markets from the Champions League to the NFL. The Curaçao licence is OGL/2024/677/0722 (holder Paloma Media B.V.); again, no right to take bets from a person in New Zealand. An F1 bettor who reaches Thunderpick will find the standard motorsport menu — race winner, podium, head-to-head — priced against the same calendar TAB NZ prices, with the live betting and cash-out features described in the operator’s own terms.

The brand’s centre of gravity is esports, and that is not a quirk for an F1 bettor. The sportsbook is functional rather than specialist; it covers the major codes and offers live betting and cash-out but does not layer in the sprint-weekend density or the same-game multi builder the licensed F1 books push. A bettor who wants a one-stop bookmaker for esports and an occasional F1 bet will find Thunderpick useful; a bettor who wants the deepest F1 product goes elsewhere.

The verdict reads the same as the offshore sector: an option for a reader who has decided to use an offshore brand and knows the DIA’s caveats. Thunderpick’s esports product is the differentiator; the F1 product is a mainstream sportsbook line.

Rooster

Rooster is an offshore brand with a Tobique Gaming Commission e-gaming licence (No. 0000002, holder Novatrix SRL). It is not licensed in New Zealand. The site’s home page describes a sportsbook with Live, Sports Promotions, Results, Schedule, E-sports and Predictions sections, with odds displayed in six formats (decimal, fractional, American, Hong Kong, Malay and Indonesian). The structure is functional — these are the standard sections of a modern sportsbook, and an F1 bet fits into the Sports section without any specialist wrapper.

F1 coverage on Rooster is the standard motorsport list: outrights on the Drivers’ and Constructors’ championships, race winner, podium, head-to-head, fastest lap. The site does not advertise any F1-specific tools or promotions in the sections a New Zealand bettor can browse. Live betting is present; cash-out and bonus packaging are not stated in the publicly available terms. A New Zealand bettor using the brand is in the same position as on the other offshore names: an account outside the regulated frame, no New Zealand complaints route, no Gambling Helpline referral.

The Rooster verdict: another offshore option, with the same DIA warnings, and a mainstream sportsbook menu rather than a specialist F1 product.

Glorion

Glorion publishes no licence that applies in New Zealand. The brand’s home page describes pre-match and live betting, virtual sports, horse racing and esports, with markets grouped into popular, niche, indoor and outdoor sports, plus entertainment events such as award shows and elections. The latter is a small but real point — markets on politics and entertainment events sit alongside sport on the same platform, which is the shape the F1 weekend fits into if the bettor chooses to use the brand.

F1 coverage is mainstream: outrights, race winner, podium, head-to-head. The site’s structure includes horse racing as a separate section, which means the racing menu sits next to the motorsport menu rather than being the entry point; a bettor who wants a motorsport product goes through the sports section. Live betting is present; cash-out and bonus packaging are not stated in the publicly available terms. The same New Zealand caveat applies: no licensed operator outside the TAB NZ group, no Department of Internal Affairs complaints route, no Gambling Helpline referral.

The verdict on Glorion follows the offshore pattern. It is an option for a reader who has chosen to use an offshore brand, with the same DIA caveats, and a multi-vertical platform that includes but does not centre on motorsport.

RoyalistPlay

RoyalistPlay also publishes a Tobique Gaming Commission e-gaming licence (No. 0000002, same holder Novatrix SRL as Rooster). It is not licensed in New Zealand. The brand’s home page describes a sportsbook with live betting, sports promotions, results and a schedule, with football, basketball, tennis, handball, ice hockey, volleyball and table tennis among the top sports, plus separate E-sports and Predictions sections. The Predictions section is the practical differentiator — it surfaces suggested bets the operator’s own desk publishes, which a reader using the brand reads alongside their own view.

F1 coverage is mainstream: outrights, race winner, podium, head-to-head, fastest lap. The Predictions tab can carry F1 outrights on a race weekend, but the predictions are the operator’s and are not a substitute for the bettor’s own read. Live betting is present; cash-out and bonus packaging are not stated in the publicly available terms. The New Zealand caveat is the same as the rest of the offshore group.

The verdict on RoyalistPlay follows the offshore pattern. It is an option for a reader who has chosen an offshore brand, with the Predictions tab as the differentiator and the standard DIA caveats to read alongside.

BetAlright

BetAlright publishes no licence that applies in New Zealand. The brand’s home page describes a sportsbook covering football, tennis, table tennis, basketball, ice hockey, American football and baseball, with Live Betting and Virtual Sports sections. The Virtual Sports section is the practical differentiator: computer-simulated events that run continuously, which a bettor uses to fill out a betting card between real F1 weekends. The implication for F1 specifically is that a bettor who wants a continuous betting product — one with markets running 24 hours a day, not just on race weekends — has a reason to know the brand.

F1 coverage is mainstream: outrights, race winner, podium, head-to-head, fastest lap. The site does not advertise any F1-specific tools. Live betting is present for the major codes; cash-out is not stated in the publicly available terms. The New Zealand caveat is unchanged from the rest of the offshore group: no Department of Internal Affairs oversight on the operator, no New Zealand complaints route, no Gambling Helpline referral.

The verdict follows the offshore pattern: an option for a reader who has chosen an offshore brand, with the Virtual Sports product as the practical differentiator.

Reading the choice clearly

The practical question a New Zealand reader faces is straightforward, and it answers itself on the licence alone. TAB and Betcha together are the only legal online route to a Formula 1 bet placed from New Zealand, and they sit under one operator group with the same trading desk, the same market depth and the same harm-minimisation tools. The choice between the two is the choice between apps, not the choice between operators.

The offshore brands in this comparison — Roobet, Spinbara, Sportaza, Thunderpick, Rooster, Glorion, RoyalistPlay and BetAlright — are not licensed in New Zealand, and they do not offer a route to a New Zealand bettor that the law recognises. The DIA’s stated risks (limited consumer safeguards, no promise of returned unspent credits, no promise of large-win payouts) apply across the group, and a New Zealand reader who uses one does not have recourse to the Gambling Helpline, the Department of Internal Affairs or any other New Zealand safeguard.

For a reader who wants the licensed route, the difference between TAB and Betcha is in app feel rather than price. For a reader who wants an offshore brand despite the legal frame, the comparison between the eight reduces to which features matter — Bet Builder on Sportaza, esports depth on Thunderpick, Predictions on RoyalistPlay, Virtual Sports on BetAlright, multi-vertical on Glorion. None of those features override the licence question.

Frequently asked questions about Formula 1 betting in New Zealand

Who may lawfully take online Formula 1 bets from people in New Zealand?

TAB NZ holds the licence under section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020, and its two online brands are TAB and Betcha. Both brands offer motorsport markets including Formula 1; they sit under one operator group with the same trading desk. No other operator is licensed to take sports bets from a person in New Zealand, and the Department of Internal Affairs told unlicensed providers to withdraw with immediate effect when the rule came into force on 28 June 2025.

What is the difference between TAB and Betcha if they are the same operator?

Both brands run off the same market data and price the same Formula 1 markets. The difference is in the app experience: TAB carries the full racing programme with Trackside streaming for racing codes and is structured around horse, harness and greyhound racing as well as sports; Betcha is sports-first, released in 2024, and is built around a faster onboarding and a simpler wallet. A self-exclusion set on either app closes both, because they are the same account group.

How is the return on a Formula 1 bet worked out from the stake and the odds?

Return on a single bet is the stake multiplied by the decimal odds. A $10 stake at decimal odds 1.90 returns $19 on a win, of which $9 is net profit (the original $10 stake returns with the bet). A combination bet, sometimes called a multi, multiplies the prices of each leg together — two legs at 1.90 each combine to 3.61 combined odds, and the same $10 stake returns $36.10 if both legs win.

What is the bookmaker’s margin and how does it show up in the price?

The margin is the slice of every dollar bet on a market that the bookmaker keeps on average. It is calculated by adding the inverses of each price together and subtracting the total from 100%. An illustrative two-way market at decimal odds 1.90 on each side gives a payout share of about 95.0% and a margin of about 5.0%; the bookmaker keeps roughly five cents of every dollar bet on that market in the long run. Live F1 markets usually run a higher margin than pre-match markets, often 6-8%, because the in-play trading desk needs more room to move prices as the race unfolds.

Can a New Zealand reader safely place a bet with an offshore Formula 1 bookmaker?

The legal frame puts liability on the operator — section 74AAA of the Racing Industry Act 2020 prohibits anyone other than TAB NZ from offering sports betting to a person in New Zealand — and no published penalty for the individual bettor was found. The Department of Internal Affairs’s stated risks (limited consumer safeguards offshore, no promise that unspent credits will be returned, no promise of large-win payouts) apply. New Zealand’s harm-minimisation tools (the Gambling Helpline at 0800 654 655, Safer Gambling Aotearoa) do not run through an offshore brand. A bettor using TAB or Betcha does so under New Zealand regulation with recourse to the Department of Internal Affairs; an offshore bettor does not.

Published by the Nzsitereviews team.