CINCINNATI — Ohio is off to a sizzling start in sports betting and Cincinnati leads the way, according to GeoComply, a Vancouver-based company that verifies the location of bettors for the gambling industry.
The company recorded 11.3 million “geolocation transactions” in Ohio in the first two days of the New Year, more than any other state. Cincinnati led Ohio with 1.9 million transactions, followed by 1 million in Columbus, 772,000 in Cleveland and 619,000 in Toledo, according to the company's press release.
The transactions are not bets, but they are a strong indicator of betting activity because a bettor’s location has to be verified before a sportsbook can take a bet.
“Our figures are a very good indicator of what the market size is going to be,” said John Pappas, GeoComply’s senior vice president of government and public relations. “You’re going to see ebbs and flows with this, but I predict that Ohio will be a top 5 market for many years to come.”
The company identified 784,000 unique accounts for 16 sports-betting operators in Ohio on Sunday and Monday. Those operators processed 234,000 transactions during the first hour on New Year’s Day.
Each transaction represents a verification by GeoComply that a cellphone, tablet or other computer is actually in Ohio while communicating with sportsbook operators. Because that verification takes place continuously, a single unique account could be responsible for many transactions.
So, it’s difficult to tell from GeoComply’s data how many bets were placed in Ohio’s opening weekend. But the number of unique accounts also shows Ohio had 70% more bettors active in the first 48 hours of 2023 than New York, which is the nation’s largest sports betting market with nearly double Ohio’s population.
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