Colorado’s gamblers set a new record for game-day wagering on Super Bowl LIX, betting almost $30 million on the day the Philadelphia Eagles destroyed the Kansas City Chiefs in New Orleans.
The game-day bets accounted for 61% of all the money wagered on this year’s Super Bowl. The total handle for the game was $48,273,381, according to statistics provided by the Colorado Division of Gaming. Of that total, $47 million was bet online.
That $48.3 million is enough money to buy the 1,700-acre Caribou Ranch in Nederland where famous musicians recorded classic rock songs in the 1970s. But it is more than what Pat Surtain II, the Denver Broncos’ highest-paid player, earned last season at $24 million, and it’s more than Nuggets point guard Jamal Murray will make this year — $36 million.
In Super Bowl betting, gamblers don’t just place money on the game’s final score but also wager on specific possibilities that could happen during a game, such as how many receiving yards a player will tally, how many points a kicker will score or how many fourth-down conversions will be made. Colorado’s sports betting rules do not allow bets on nonathletic feats such as whether the coin toss will be heads or tails or which songs the halftime artist will perform.
The odds of winning remain low — the win percentage in Colorado was 29%.
Colorado continues to see Super Bowl wagering grow in popularity. This year’s bet total was 4% more than the $46.4 million bet on the 2024 Super Bowl, according to the gaming division.
That increased betting on the Super Bowl reflects an overall trend of Colorado residents increasing the amount they’re willing to bet each year on sports.
As of Dec. 30, Colorado’s total handle for sports gambling this fiscal year was $3.2 billion, a nearly 6% increase over the same period in the 2023-2024 fiscal year, which runs from July 1 to June 30.
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