
Utah is one of the two states in the United States without any legal gambling of any form, which is a bummer for bettors in the state. While there’s no avenue for traditional sports betting in Utah, there’s an alternative.
Sweepstakes sportsbooks operate using sweepstakes law, allowing users to make their favorite sports selections across various markets without going against the legal restrictions in the state of Utah. In this guide, I’ll analyze the sports betting landscape in Utah, demonstrate how sweepstakes casinos work, and show you the best sites for social betting in the state.
Only two states in the United States currently offer no form of regulated gambling, and Utah is one of them (with the other being Hawaii). This restriction isn’t limited to online sportsbooks or casinos either—gambling is completely illegal according to the state’s constitution, and there’s currently no proposed legislation in the Utah State Legislature to relax or remove these restrictions.
Online Sports Betting | Unavailable, only social/sweepstakes sportsbooks |
Retail Sports Betting | Unavailable |
Alternative Betting Options | None |
Lottery | Unavailable. |
Gambling Age | Not yet legislated. |
Last Verified | January 16, 2025. |
The Utah Constitution completely outlaws all forms of gambling within the state, physical or online, so there are no regulations for Utah betting sites. What’s more, the state has no agencies or commissions for sports gambling regulation, which would make sense since there’s no reasonable expectation for the activity to take place in the first place.
You can’t use traditional online sports betting sites in Utah, but social sportsbooks are very much available. Here are my top picks for the best legal sportsbooks in Utah and what they offer to help you make an informed decision:
SportsMillions is one of the most popular sweepstakes sports betting sites among bettors from Utah, but sports betting is only the tip of the iceberg, considering the other packages the site offers. For starters, SportsMillions offers three game modes: Pick’em, Blitz’em, and a social casino. Blitz’em works like a conventional sportsbook, allowing you to make sports selections across various markets, but using Gold Coins and Sweepstakes Coins instead of real money.
Speaking of Gold Coins and Sweepstakes Coins, SportsMillions offers you an impressive bundle upon signing up: I got a 1,000 GC + 3 SC welcome bonus bundle immediately after signing up, allowing me to bet on my favorite sports during my SportsMillions review. All the social sportsbook’s feature works in Utah, offering a top-tier UT sports betting experience.
If you’re after a social sportsbook you can access without a mobile app in Utah, Legendz is a great pick, as it doesn’t even offer mobile apps. What it offers, however, is a social casino, a live casino, and a sweepstakes sportsbook all in one, as I discovered during my Legendz review. Additionally, you also get 500 Gold Coins and 3 Sweepstakes Coins as your welcome bonus and 50% extra Gold Coins bonus on your first optional Gold Coin bundle purchase.
The social sportsbook on Legendz is one of the most fully featured I’ve seen, featuring the most popular sports and leagues in the US—I was even able to back the Utah Jazz against the New Orleans Pelicans ahead of their upcoming NBA clash. If the absence of mobile apps isn’t a dealbreaker for you, Legendz is one of the best sites for sports betting in Utah.
Sportzino is another sweepstakes sportsbook with a built-in social casino with over 1,000 slots, scratch cards, crash games, and live dealer games. When you sign up on Sportzino, you get a welcome bonus of 170,000 Gold Coins + 7 Sweepstakes Coins, allowing you to play at the online casino and make sports picks in various sports, including football, basketball, tennis, and soccer.
During my Sportzino review, I used my bonus virtual currencies at the sweepstakes casino and sportsbook for the full experience.
Thrillzz is another popular mobile-based social sportsbook among Utahns, with dedicated mobile apps for both Android and iOS. When you install the app and sign up for an account on Thrillzz, you instantly get 3,000 Thrillzz Coins and 3 Thrillzz Sweeps, allowing you to bet on different sports and leagues, and in different markets, at least going by my experience during my Thrillzz review.
Thrillzz offers more features than most sweepstakes sportsbooks, from its sports stats widget offering live updates on your favorite sports to a community-based interface connecting users for a more social gaming experience.
Fliff offers two virtual currencies: Fliff Coins for fun, social sports betting, and Fliff Cash for its promotional sweepstakes, and I got both currencies in the site’s generous welcome bonus during my Fliff review. I got the welcome bonus of 5,000 Fliff Coins and 1 Fliff Cash as soon as I signed up on Fliff with promo code PROMOGUYSOCIAL, and I got an additional purchase offer of up to $100 in Fliff Coins and free Fliff Cash, with a condition of spending $50 on Fliff Coin bundles on the social sportsbook.
Fliff is available on Android, iOS, and as a web app, but you have to open it from a smartphone, or it doesn’t work. For bettors looking for legitimate online sports betting in Utah, Fliff is one of the few good options.
Social betting sites are for fun gameplay, so you can’t deposit, wager, or win real money on these sites. Sweepstakes sportsbooks in Utah only allow users to bet on available sports games and leagues using free-to-get virtual currencies like Gold Coins and Sweepstakes Coins, which you can get for free through bonuses and periodic betting promotions or by buying optional Gold Coin bundles.
However, most Utah betting apps offering sweepstakes sports betting will let you redeem your Sweepstakes Coins for real prizes like gift cards and merch after completing specified requirements and meeting a minimum threshold for Sweepstakes Coins.
Utah officially has the strictest gambling laws in the United States, so you shouldn’t expect to see state-sanctioned sports betting apps in Utah. However, sweepstakes sports betting sites offer a gateway to legitimate sports betting in the state, and there are a few great options accepting users from Utah. Here are my top sweepstakes sports betting apps in Utah to consider for a top-tier experience:
App name | App store rating | Play store rating | Top feature |
---|---|---|---|
SportsMillions | 4.6 | N/A | Feature Pick’em DFS contests |
Legendz | N/A | N/A | Impressive no-deposit bonus |
Thrillzz | 4.4 | 4.0 | Intuitive mobile interface |
Sportzino | N/A | 4.2 | Features a social casino |
Fliff | 4.8 | 4.7 | Generous first-purchase bonuses |
It doesn’t appear like we’ll see legitimate sports betting in Utah soon. For one, all forms of gambling are currently illegal in the state, including state-sanctioned lotteries and regulated horse racing. Utah has a deeply religious population with over 70% identifying as Christians and around 55% of the state’s residents identifying as members of the Latter-Day Saints Church.
This deep religious bias is reflected in the state’s legislative activity, with Utah being the only state in the United States to have never considered a bill for the legalization of any form of online or land-based casino or sports betting establishment.
Currently, Utah doesn’t seem open to legalizing sports betting, and I’m not holding my breath on the possibility of any future change. Even if Utah eventually elects to allow some form of gambling within the state, sports betting will likely be at the bottom of the list, with horse racing and state-sanctioned lotteries usually topping the list in states that have legalized gambling in the last few years.
As I mentioned earlier, gambling of any form is currently illegal in Utah, according to the state’s constitution. Moreover, there are no bills in the Utah State Legislature about legislation gambling of any form, so you shouldn’t hold your breath either.
However, the state has a history of tolerating sweepstakes casinos and sportsbooks. Although it hasn’t officially sanctioned any of those sites, it hasn’t meaningfully cracked down on any social gaming site so far. If you live in the state and would like to participate in the Utah online sports betting landscape, trying sweepstakes sportsbooks like Fliff and Sportzino is currently your best option.
As one of the few US states with no provisions for legal gambling, there’s currently no “official” legal gambling age in Utah. However, most sweepstakes sports betting sites that accept bettors from the state require new users to be 21 or older, due to a section in Utah sweepstakes law that requires Utahns to be 21 or older to participate in any sweepstakes contests.
Since sweepstakes sports betting is generally regarded as a form of lawful sweepstakes contest within the state, you’d want to at least be 21 before trying to access any social betting site in Utah, and most Utah sportsbook apps enforce this requirement.
Since online sports betting is not legal in Utah, you don’t pay taxes on sports betting winnings, and there’s no way to report gambling income. However, it’s essential to note that any real prizes redeemed from Sweepstakes Coins on social sportsbooks aren’t regarded as gambling winnings; they’re technically sweepstakes prizes, which are viewed differently according to the state’s local laws.
Sweepstakes are legal in Utah provided entrants are 21 or older, no alcohol purchase or promotion is involved, and it doesn’t meet the state’s definition of a lottery. Since most sweepstakes sportsbooks meet all three requirements, you usually can use social betting sites in Utah, and any real prizes you redeem on the site can be taxed.
However, this is not legal advice. Consider seeing a Utahn tax professional or lawyer, preferably specializing in sweepstakes, to gain clarity about the tax requirements on sweepstakes sports betting winnings in Utah.
While Utah isn’t one of the biggest sporting states in the United States, I’d expect to see widespread interest in basketball betting if you can bet in Utah legally, mostly thanks to the Utah Jazz’s exploits in the NBA. Most social sportsbooks targeting Utahns offer the NBA and college-level basketball leagues, as well as other top US leagues like the NFL and the NHL.
Utah Jazz currently plays in the Northwest Division of the Western Conference of the NBA, so the team naturally makes frequent appearances on conventional and sweepstakes sportsbooks. The state also has Real Salt Lake in the MLS and Utah Warriors Rugby in Major League Rugby. You’ll likely see those teams less when betting on sports, but you can often bet on them at every other social sports betting site.
You can claim generous bonus offers at sweepstakes sites offering online sports betting in Utah, allowing you to start making sports selections without an initial purchase. Here are some of the best Utah social sports betting bonuses you should expect from social betting site in the state.
Sweepstakes sportsbooks in Utah will generally let you bet on your favorite sports without an initial purchase, thanks to generous free coins you get from various bonus offers on the sites. However, you can always buy Gold Coin bundles when you run out of free coins for an uninterrupted social gaming experience, which brings the payment aspect into social sportsbooks in Utah.
Here is a breakdown of the most popular payment methods to expect from sweepstakes sportsbooks accepting users from Utah:
Payment method | Deposit time | Redemption time | Fees |
---|---|---|---|
Credit/debit cards | Instant | 2-7 days | None |
PayPal | Instant | 2-7 days | None |
Apple/Google Pay | Instant | 2-7 days | None |
Bank transfers | Instant | 2-7 days | None |
E-wallets | Instant | 2-7 days | None |
We put a lot of work into testing available options in various categories, from bonuses to customer support and sports variety to evaluate the overall user experience of individual sweepstakes sports betting sites. All the sites we ever recommend have passed our testing and are the best-in-class, and you can be sure to have an excellent experience with any of our options.
While we support exploring legal alternatives to sports betting sites in Utah, we only advocate safe and responsible gambling. All our recommended social sportsbooks offer responsible gambling tools, from limits to self-exclusion programs to ensure bettors are playing safely and responsibly. If you’re struggling with gambling safely, you can check out these responsible gambling resources for professional help and support:
Since the Federal ban on sports betting was lifted in 2018, more states have legalized sports betting offline and online, allowing residents to bet on predicted sports outcomes. Here’s a list of popular US betting sites you can use outside Utah but within the United States:
Utah offers no state-sanctioned lotteries, horse betting, or retail sportsbooks, as all forms of gambling activities are currently illegal in the state. However, sweepstakes remain legal in the state for residents 21 or older, making it legal to participate in sweepstakes sports betting in Utah. From how social sportsbooks work to the best sweepstakes betting sites available in the state, this guide has all you need to get started.
Unless you’re exclusively using sweepstakes sportsbooks, no, sports betting is currently illegal in the state of Utah. The state’s constitution bans all forms of gambling activities, including sports betting, and there’s currently no signs those restrictions will relax in the near future.
Most sweepstakes sportsbooks in Utah only accept people aged 21 or older, so that's a safe estimate for when sports betting eventually becomes legal in the state. I’d advise not holding your breath, however, there’s no pathway to legalizing sports betting in Utah, at least for now.
No, all forms of gambling activities are currently illegal in Utah, including lotteries and horse racing that most other US states allow. The only avenue for lawful sports betting is using a sweepstakes sportsbook, and I have recommendations for the best sites accepting Utahns in this guide.
21+ and present in VA. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.