A staking plan sets the size of each stake, never whether to bet. Flat stakes keep the same amount. Percentage of bankroll and fractional Kelly (see Kelly criterion) follow your current capital. Negative progressions (martingale, d'Alembert) raise your exposure after a loss without touching the expected value of the next bet. Example: on a £1,000 bankroll, a 1% flat stake is £10 on every bet, after wins and after losses alike. That's what makes it predictable.
What a staking plan decides, and what it leaves alone
A staking plan sets the size of your stake at each bet. It never says whether to bet, or on which outcome. It creates no positive expected value and corrects no wrong estimate. It only changes how your capital absorbs a run of results, good or bad.
The whole page rests on that. Every method is judged on its effect on risk of ruin and drawdown, never on a return none of them can guarantee.
A staking plan doesn't make profitable a method that wasn't already. It spreads exposure over time and leaves the expected value of the next bet untouched.
Flat stakes: the default choice
Flat staking keeps the same amount on every bet, whatever your bankroll balance. On £1,000, a 1% flat stake is £10 on every decision, before a winning run just as before a losing one.
It's simple, so it's easy to track (see tracking your bets). The limit comes with it: it doesn't cut your exposure by itself after a losing run. If your bankroll stays low for a while, lowering the stake is up to you.
Fixed percentage of bankroll
A fixed percentage recalculates your stake at each bet on the current balance of your bankroll. A 1% stake is £10 on £1,000, then £9.50 if you drop to £950. It shrinks after a loss and grows after a win.
A bad run therefore takes longer to drain your capital than with a flat stake, which never moves. The trade-off is that the amount changes from bet to bet, and that's harder to track.
Kelly and fractional Kelly
The Kelly criterion takes the percentage-of-bankroll idea further. The fraction is no longer picked at random: it comes from the odds and an estimated theoretical edge.
The formula, how sensitive it is to estimation error, and the f* ≤ 0 case →
There's one big catch. The formula doesn't judge the probability you feed it. If your estimate is too optimistic, so is the stake. That's why only the fractional version (half or a quarter of the calculated fraction) gets used in practice. It dampens an overconfident estimate.
Negative progressions: martingale and d'Alembert
A negative progression raises the stake after a loss, to win it back on the next win. The martingale doubles the stake after every loss. D'Alembert adds a fixed step. In both cases only exposure changes. The expected value of the next bet stays what it would have been without any progression.
"The martingale always wins in the end."
A martingale does recover a loss on the next win, as long as your bankroll and the bookmaker's stake caps hold out. Recovery isn't the issue. On a losing run, exposure grows exponentially and passes your bankroll or the cap well before a win arrives. Risk of ruin covers what an exposure that swells like that produces.
The tipsters page shows the same thing. A martingale sold as risk-free doubles exposure without ever changing the real edge of a bet.
Positive progressions: the paroli
The paroli does the opposite of a martingale: the stake goes up after a win, never after a loss. The extra exposure comes from profit you've already banked, not from extra capital. On a losing run, each stake stays at your starting stake.
It still follows the rule every plan follows: no positive expected value. It only changes how fast a profit builds up, or vanishes, over a run of wins.
One bankroll, five ways to expose it
Take £1,000 and three losses in a row: the five plans don't dent the capital the same way.
- Flat staking at 1% (£10) takes out £30 over three losses. You're left with £970.
- Percentage at 1% recalculates the third stake on £980, which comes to £9.80. The gap with flat staking is small over a short run, but it builds up over a longer one.
- Fractional Kelly depends on the estimated edge at each bet. The stake can rise or fall with no link to the balance alone.
- A martingale starting at £10 runs £10, £20, then £40. That's £70 committed in all, seven times the starting stake.
- D'Alembert starting at £10 runs £10, £20, £30. Growth is linear rather than exponential, and still unrelated to the expected value of the next bet.
- A paroli starting at £10 stays at £10 until a win is recorded. On a losing run, exposure never goes beyond the starting stake.
Lining these up, flat staking and percentage end up a few pence apart, while the martingale is already at £40 on its third stake. The difference doesn't show on a single bet. It shows in how fast each method exposes the same capital to the same bad run. The speed, not the recovery, is my reservation about the martingale: £70 is committed by the third loss, seven times the starting stake.
Comparing the plans
| Staking plan | Effect on exposure | Effect on risk of ruin |
|---|---|---|
| Flat stake | Constant, independent of the balance | Predictable; doesn't adjust itself after a loss |
| Percentage of bankroll | Shrinks after a loss, grows after a win | Slows down how fast capital is exhausted |
| Fractional Kelly | Derived from an estimated edge, deliberately reduced | Depends entirely on the quality of the estimate |
| Martingale / d'Alembert | Grows after a loss, sometimes exponentially | High: exposure can exceed the bankroll or the stake cap |
| Paroli | Grows after a win, from profit already banked | Capped at the starting stake on a losing run |
What no staking plan can do
None of these plans corrects a wrong estimate or turns a negative expected value into a positive one. They organise exposure over time, nothing more. The page on risk management draws the line between what you control and what you don't.
Responsible gambling: no staking plan guarantees a result. Sports betting carries a risk of financial loss. Set yourself a budget, don't chase your losses, and use the deposit limits and self-exclusion tools available. Learn more about responsible gambling.
Put it into practice
Apply this guide to real odds.
See a market reading
A real match with its odds, movements and 0-100 signal.
Open the demoMargin calculator
Measure a bookmaker's margin on any market.
Calculate the marginDig into the market
Odds movements are only part of the story. Here are the next topics to read.
Profitability and risk: the complete guide
The full picture: profit, ROI, expected value, variance, sample size, drawdown and risk.
Read the guideKelly criterion: what the formula sizes
The formula, how sensitive it is to estimation error, and the f* ≤ 0 case.
Understand the Kelly criterionBankroll in sports betting
The capital any staking plan applies to.
Understand bankrollRisk of ruin: exhausting a bankroll
What a staking plan changes, seen from the dark side.
Understand risk of ruinDrawdown: measuring the dips in a bankroll
The other yardstick for judging a staking plan.
Understand drawdownTracking your bets
The data to record so you can check what your staking plan actually produced.
See what to recordWhat budget should you set for sports betting?
What you can afford to lose, before you even talk about method.
Set a budgetFrequently asked questions
What is a staking plan?
It's the rule that sets the size of your stake at each bet: a fixed amount, a share of your bankroll, or a progression tied to earlier results. It never tells you whether to bet, or on which outcome.
Which staking plan should I use by default?
Flat stakes. The amount stays the same whatever your bankroll balance, so it's easy to track. The catch is that it doesn't adjust by itself after a losing run.
Is percentage of bankroll safer than flat stakes?
It slows down how fast your capital runs out, because the stake shrinks with the balance after a loss. In return, the amount changes from bet to bet, which is harder to track than a flat stake.
Why is the martingale discouraged?
It grows your exposure exponentially after every loss without changing the expected value of the next bet. You hit the limit of your bankroll or the bookmaker's stake cap long before the win that was meant to fix everything.
Is the Kelly criterion a staking plan like any other?
It's a percentage of bankroll worked out from odds and an estimated probability, instead of picked on a hunch. That makes it very sensitive to how good the probability is. The details are on its own page.
What is a positive progression like the paroli?
The stake goes up after a win, never after a loss. The extra exposure comes from profit you've already banked, not from your capital. On a losing run, each stake stays at your starting stake.
Can a staking plan make a strategy profitable?
No. No plan creates a positive expected value, and none fixes a wrong estimate. Each one only organises exposure over time, as the page on risk management explains.
Sources and methodology
This page compares common staking plans using Kelly's paper on the optimal size of a repeated stake, Thorp's work on favourable games and OddScore's odds-analysis method. The Gambling Commission and BeGambleAware cover regulation and player support.
- Each plan is judged on its effect on risk of ruin and drawdown, never on a return none of them can promise.
- Negative progressions (martingale, d'Alembert) are taken apart one by one: they change exposure, never the expected value of the next bet.
- The detail of the Kelly criterion stays on its own page, so the formula isn't duplicated here.
- Every plan is shown on the same bankroll and the same stake, to keep the comparison readable.