A Full Guide to Betting on Table Tennis (2024)

Top 3 Table Tennis Betting Sites – Reviewed

Below are our top five betting sites for table tennis, with reviews based on the value of odds and the all-round betting experience. Some of these operators also feature prominently in our in-depth guide to cricket betting and the best cricket betting sites.

Marathonbet

Marathonbet offers a quick and straightforward sign-up process and operates a highly efficient customer service team.

(Source: Marathonbet)

Marathonbet has a simple layout, which makes it easy to digest the vast quantities of information accessible to bettors. The active offers can also be easily accessed, while new players benefit from free bets. New and existing users alike can find standard sportsbook offers such as enhanced markets, special parlays and guaranteed odds.

888sport

Launching in 2008, the 888sport site and app is amongst the newer additions. However, it has wasted no time in establishing itself as a much-loved operator, particularly in the UK and India.

(Source: 888sport)

Their blog is noted for going into great detail about niche stats that can be used in sub-markets for the most popular events. This enables users to make in-play decisions based on verifiable, well-informed facts. Stats and live streams are also available, while mobile users can also get an instant bonus, making 888sport one of the most popular mobile apps when it comes to gaming.

Unibet

Unibet launched in 1997, and within two decades, had a customer base close to eight figures spanning several continents.

(Source: Unibet)

That number continues to grow today, thanks in no small part to Unibet’s vast market offering and free live streams, which extend to table tennis. They also provide exceptional special offers, the most popular and readily available of which offers a risk-free bet to new customers. In this case, the user is refunded up to a certain amount if their very first bet loses. Like any other sportsbook, this offer is subject to a wagering requirement, but in general, Unibet’s requirements are small compared to many other operators.

Table Tennis Betting Odds & Predictions

Keep reading for key betting strategies and how they relate to our predictions.

Table Tennis Betting Odds

As of 1 March 2021, no outright odds were available for major tournaments, but they will be added here when live. All of the bookmakers listed in our top 20 are well known for providing them as and when they are available. However, there are daily matches which you can wager on, and here we have an example taken from one particular day which featured a large range of fixtures.

As shown above, certain athletes are more heavily favoured than others, with elements such as current form, world ranking and their history in particular competitions influencing their pre-match and live in-play odds.

Table Tennis Betting Predictions

Many countries have their own leagues, but the highlight of every year in the table tennis calendar is the World Table Tennis Championship (WTTC), which is usually held between April and May every year. As can be seen by our list of tournament winners below, China, Japan and Korea boast the greatest talents, and this monopoly from those three Asian countries has lasted for decades.

Naturally, seeded Table Tennis players from China are the most popular draw in the WTTC for bettors, and during the WTTC of 2019 (held in Budapest, Hungary), China swept every gold medal available. It was also the third WTTC edition in succession to see Chinese players claim gold in every single-sex event.

In turn, we predict that every Chinese player in the 2019 medals table who remains active will be favourites to experience successes in the future. This is how the singles participants were seeded going into that tournament:

The higher those that are still active stand, the more bookmakers will favour them in outright medal markets.

Table Tennis Betting Tips

Bet Early

If you prefer to place wagers pre-match, it is generally advisable to do so as early as possible. Odds can shift much more drastically in the build-up to matches, as can outright odds for a tournament, depending on how the bracket is structured and which seeded players survive.

Utilise In-Play Trends

On the other hand, if you like to bet on live, in-play odds, it is always useful to consider how players react to certain situations differently. Some players thrive off a good start and can use it to their advantage, while others play a longer game which focuses more on reading the opposition.

Consider Parlay Table Tennis Betting

In earlier rounds, the seeding system makes it easier to figure out which players are a near-certainty to win. Combining a number of heavy favourites into one bet can create a modest potential payout – not a life-changing one, but certainly something that can be used as a buffer against losses if you want to use the cash won to place more speculative bets.

Use Apps for Offers

As can be seen on the sites of operators that feature within our Sports Betting India guide, every worthwhile bookmaker out there has some form of special offer open to newcomers.

These are always worth checking out, but some operators focus especially on providing mobile customers and app users with a top-quality service. In turn, there may be some apps that have mobile-exclusive offers for new registrants. Mobile betting now comes with all the perks of desktop online betting, including seamless deposit and withdrawal procedures.

Popular Bets for Table Tennis

Below are some of the most popular markets for betting on the sport. Bookmakers have been highlighted based on their history of providing odds for this sport.

Handicap wins

Beyond the moneyline market where you simply pick a winner, this is the only sub-market that is readily available across all competitions. Here, you can wager on one player winning by a minimum margin of points in a specific game, or by a minimum number of games in a match.

The below screenshot was taken from one of the top 20 bookmakers listed earlier, which illustrates how the flow of the game can affect handicap odds:

(Source: 10bet)

Note that Merzilkin is leading by one game to nil against Zhelubenkov. The green arrows next to Merzilkin’s name below, and the red ones next to Zhelubenkov, respectively show odds that are shortening and lengthening. This is a direct reaction to Merzilkin winning the first game.

You can see that the handicap odds (“HC”) behave in the same way. “+1.5” and “-1.5” denote the necessarily margin of victory for a payout. In this case, Merzilkin’s odds of winning by “over 1.5 games” – or simply winning by two or more games – have also shortened drastically.

Handicap wagers are particularly popular in the earlier rounds of major tournaments, where top-seeded players go up against unseeded opponents. In such a setting, it is worth remembering that the odds (and their potential payouts) always lengthen as the minimum margin gets bigger, regardless of how much of a gulf in quality exists between the favourite and the outsider.

The below screenshot shows some of the most popular table tennis competitions in existence.

(Source: 10bet)

Other Betting Markets

These markets are less easy to find, and can often be found only for the very biggest table tennis events. However, they can be very rewarding if you do find them, especially if you combine them in a parlay bet.

Over / Under Points

Just as if you were using the best football betting sites to wager on a certain number of total match goals, you can also place a bet on a game containing over or under a certain number of points. For instance, if you chose ‘Under 14.5 points’, you would need the winning margin in a game to be 11-3 or lower for a payout. It may also be possible to wager on the number of games within a match.

Win Margin / Correct Score

Similar to handicap wagering, but the winning margin or score must match your prediction. Payouts for this niche market are much higher, as placing a winning bet within it is a much rare event.

First Game / Result

A simple bet placed on the result of the first game. Here, you have just one of two possible outcomes, although they can be used as a component within a ‘parlay bet’ to enhance the potential payout – e.g: “Smith to win first game / Jones to win match”.

Popular Table Tennis Tournaments

There are national, continental and international tournaments and leagues across the world, all of which have a following and are perfect for table tennis betting. Not including the Olympic games, here are some of the most popular Table Tennis tournaments.

World Table Tennis Championships (WTTC)

Organised by the ITTF, the WTTC dates back to 1926, with only the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939 disrupting its legacy. The very first tournament was held in London, UK, with Hungary taking the team gold medal, Austria claiming silver and England and India claiming bronze.

WTTC: Tournament structure

The WTTC is structured similarly to the major annual Tennis tournaments – such as Wimbledon, the French Open and the US Open – in which players are ‘seeded’ depending on their world ranking and success within previous tournaments.

The higher a player is seeded, the likelier they are to draw an unseeded opponent in the early rounds. The very top seeds are kept in separate ‘sections’ of the bracket to ensure they are protected as far as possible. From there it is a straight knockout, where the first to 11 points wins a game. The best across seven games is the winner of that round and proceeds onwards.

World Cup

The Table Tennis World Cup has been held every year since 1980 for men, and since 1996 for women. Participants include:

As for the team World Cup, it is comprised of the top seven WTTC teams and the host nation,

World Cup: Tournament Structure

1. The Preliminary Stage – Intercontinental Cup: The four participants from Africa, Latin America, North America and Oceania face off in a round-robin group. The overall winner proceeds to the first stage as the sixteenth finalist proper.
2. First Stage – The 16 players are divided in to four groups consisting of four players each. Again, there is a round-robin, with winners and runners up proceeding to the second stage.
3. Second Stage – Group winners each play a runner-up from a different group (e.g. Winner of Group A plays runner up of Group B). This stage is a straight knockout bracket, leading to semi-finals and the grand final.

ITTF Challenge Series

This is an annual series of smaller tournaments, primarily designed to give upcoming talents a chance to climb the rankings and compete on a more level playing field compared to the WTTC and World Cup. All tournaments are purely a knockout bracket, where the seeded participants are again deliberately separated in the earlier rounds. This was the schedule for the 2019 series:

Continental TTC tournaments

Every continent has its own flagship competition, and as mentioned earlier, they play a role in determining the lineups of major international tournaments. All employ the same knockout bracket structure seen in the WTTC and World Cup.

The most widely followed are the Asian Table Tennis Championships and European Table Tennis Championships. These are also the longest-held tournaments, having been inaugurated in 1952 and 1958 respectively. The list of winners this century for both contests can be seen further below.

History of Table Tennis

The origins of table tennis are said to lie in upper-class Victorian England, where it was played as a parlour game. Although India has never had a culture for table tennis to match the likes of China or Japan, historical sources trace the sport’s initial global spread back to the British occupation of India. According to some sporting historians, British army officers are said to have improvised tables and nets out of household objects, such as books.

Early Days

Since a table, a ball, objects for hitting and something acting as a net was all anyone needed, the game could be played by anyone, without the need for vast financial resources. This made it all the more inevitable that the game would grow over the latter decades of Queen Victoria’s reign, and after her death in 1901.

An unofficial world championship was held in 1902, with the same scoring system (15, 30, 40 and ‘Deuce’) as seen in regular tennis.

Thereafter, the evolution of the game led to the establishment of the WTTC. In the inaugural event of 1926, Hungarian players swept every gold medal available, with Roland Jacobi winning gold in both the men’s singles and the mixed doubles. Yet, in more recent years, Chinese, Korean and Japanese players have been the most successful by far.

Post-War Asian Dominance

The huge culture for table tennis in China dates back to military roots in the 1930s, but in post-war times, the 1970s political phenomenon known as ‘ping pong diplomacy’ –  and the advent of full-time professionals – is largely credited for it. Table tennis also made its Olympic debut at the Seoul games of 1988, ensuring that Korea would become a major source of talent on the global stage.

Japanese players still lag behind their Korean and Chinese counterparts, but the popularity of table tennis in Japan has boomed over the past two decades. Notably, in 2014, Japan hosted a WTTC tournament for a third time in the 21^st century alone.

Five years earlier, the country had hosted the 50^th edition of the Championships, claiming one bronze medal through Seiya Kishikawa and Jun Mizutani.

List of Tournament Winners

WTTC All-Time Medals (Top 10)

WTTC Singles Gold Medallists (2001-2019)

World Cup Singles Gold Medallists (2001-2020)

Asian Table Tennis Championships Medals (Top 10)

European Table Tennis Championships Medals (Top 10)

Table Tennis Rules & Key Facts

Rules

You can find an extensive guide to the rules online, but we've included some of the basics below anyway:

Key Facts

Table Tennis Betting FAQs

Which are the best sites for Table tennis betting?

If judged using our three core criteria – value for money, availability of odds and independent customer ratings – the best site for table tennis betting is Marathonbet.

Which payment methods are best?

Credit and debit cards are a popular and safe way to deposit funds, as are virtual wallets and PayPal. Withdrawals to virtual wallets and PayPal are also quick, safe and easy, as are paper cheques and bank wires, although these will take longer to clear.

Why do some table tennis medal totals end in 0.5?

Individuals winning in doubles events win half a medal. If they represent different countries, their country wins 0.5 medals. If both players on the winning team represent the same country, it counts as one medal.

Is it possible to live stream table tennis matches?

Yes, it is possible to watch matches while engaging in table tennis betting, just as it is for cricket live streaming. While there can be no guarantees regarding the availability of live streams, all of the top bookmakers we mentioned earlier – have an extensive range of live streaming opportunities. The wider their online presence across the world, the likelier they are to stream sports that are less widely watched.

CricketBettingAdvice Final Say

The popularity of table tennis betting has grown rapidly over the past several years, with the sport enjoying expanded airplay across the world, alongside the growth of existing tournaments and the evolution of new ones. Events such as the Olympic games of Seoul, Beijing and Tokyo (1988, 2008 and 2020 respectively) have boosted this process, and in turn, more people than ever are exploring the phenomenon of wagering on an oft-overlooked sport.

Vishnu Reddy

Match previews expert

Vishnu Reddy is a seasoned sports betting writer with two years of expertise in the field. His in-depth knowledge and proficiency extend beyond the general spectrum, with a particular focus on cricket betting, a passion he has cultivated for the past five years.

Vishnu has worked as a sports content writer for two years across Cloutnews, Sportslumo, Sportz18.com, GudStory.com, Sportsgyan.in, Fantasytips.in, and Sportscafe. Also, he has co-founded two Bollywood and cricket websites: SpiceBite.in and Cricketerstales.com.