Want to know what’s even better than betting on March Madness? Betting on March Madness for free OR for big-time prizes. Both are on the table for this next NCAA Tournament and we’re about to tell you how to possibly make thousands of dollars off the tourney.

See, the online sportsbook marketplace is not short on March Madness betting promotions. However, after scouring the available options, we’ve hand-picked the deals most worth your time and possibly money. Included on this page are both guaranteed deals and offers you’ll have to earn. Let’s get right into it:

Best March Madness Free-Play Bonuses

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Free-play bonuses are how you’ll be able to wager on the basketball tourney for free. There’s no “catch” either, the money is really free. When it comes to these promotional bonuses, five of the best ones in the marketplace are detailed in the table below:

The five offers above are all sign-up deals. This type of offer is a staple of the online betting world and they all work in the same fashion: sign up for a betting account. Deposit money into said account. Boom, earn free play from the bookmaker based on that deposit amount. It’s really that straightforward across the board. The only variance between these deals is the match percentage AND max bonus. These two will differ from site to site.

Take for instance the deal over at BetUS. Without question, this promotion has the highest max bonus in the industry, and that includes regulated bookies like DraftKings or FanDuel. You can see on the table, but it bears repeating, BetUS’ welcome bonus is handing out up to $2500 in free play. That’s an insane sum of money, and you can surely imagine how long this can last you during the three-week frenzy that is the NCAA Tournament.

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There’s also MyBookie’s welcome bonus that has a 100-percent match on deposits. Essentially what that means is whatever money you insert gets matched back on free play dollar for dollar. They do have a $1000 cap on the award, but hey, this is still a “bang for your buck” promotion. Essentially, it’s a buy one, get one free type of promotion.

The best thing about these deals is the free play is earned right away. So it’s an incredibly fast way to build a betting bankroll — which you might need to do if the NCAA Tournament is right around the corner. Once the money is in your account, you’re free to spend it however you’d like on the tourney too.

Best March Madness Contests

There’s even more money to be made off March Madness contests. However, unlike the sign-up bonuses that are upfront, contests are not. In fact, there’s no guarantee you’ll earn anything because this money has to be earned! What’s that LeBron James quote, “earned not given.” Well, that applies here. Anyway, here are a few of the best March Madness contests going:

BetOnline’s $200,000 Bracket Madness

BetOnline has a March Madness pool worth $200,000 minimum. This is your classic bracket pool, meaning contestants fill out a bracket on all 63 games played. Correct picks get you points and whoever scores the most wins at the end.

The $200,000 pot will be split up to the top 1,250 contestants. Of course, the higher you finish, the better the payout. For instance, the top point-getter will bank $50,000 in free money, while those who finish 1,001 to 1,250 get $30.

This is not a free contest, however, nor should it be with this pot size. Contestants can join for $20 on the first entry. Additional entries will get cheaper ($15 then $10).

BetNow’s $1 Million Bracket Madness

All right, now this contest is crazy. BetNow is dangling a cold hard $1 million to anyone that can go perfect on a March Madness bracket. Yes, perfect — not one miss allowed.

We’ll be honest, we’re not even sure this is mathematically possible. But at the same time, we can’t rule out the possibility. We suppose there’s only one way of knowing: filling out a bracket and testing your luck.

The good thing is that MyBookie doesn’t charge a cent to join this contest. Therefore, there’s zero downside to this contest — only a million dollars worth of upside. Any active user of MyBookie gets free entry so pick wisely.

What we covered on this page is only the “tip of the iceberg.” Tip because there’s a bunch more March Madness contests and promotions out there. But again, we’d start with the sportsbooks listed in the table at the very top. What these sites offer will do the job for the vast majority of sports bettors out there so get to it!

Meet the author

Eric Uribe

Eric has been passionate about sports since he was 10 years old. He brings over 10 years of sports journalism experience to his expert coverage of sports betting. Hailing from the US, Eric leverages his diverse expertise covering sports at all levels – from high sch...