2024/2025 FA Cup Betting — Free Bets, Betting Tips, and Odds
FA Cup is the oldest football competition in the world, having debuted back during the 1871/1872 season, and it is only second to the EPL trophy in terms of prestige. The tournament features 12 rounds, the semi-final, and the final match, usually played on famous venues like the Wembley.
Participating teams go down to the 9th tier of English football, so it’s a perfect opportunity for punters to hit it big. After somewhat of an upset, Manchester United beat the rival side Man City in the 2023/2024 final, so the bets are closed until the 2024/2025 season.
That gives you just enough time to get on the right page with FA Cup betting odds, free bet offers, and the best sites to wager on. With pointers from our FreeBets expert team laid out in this guide, you’ll be ready for the start of the next edition of the Emirates FA Cup.
Best FA Cup Free Bets and Betting Boosts in the UK
We’ll get on with the main options for FA Cup betting in a bit, but first, let’s focus on UK sportsbooks with the best free bet deals and odds. Our team of experts hand-picked these UK bookies as the best options, so you can draw inspiration from our list to help with your decision:
- Rewarding and frequent promotional offers
- A large variety of casino games are available
- The ever-expanding sportsbook and varied markets
- Very strong odds
- Simple and user-friendly website and app
- Very limited payment options are provided
- Fewer live streams, when compared to peers
- Well-reputed and one of the biggest brands
- A wide variety of markets and sports are available
- Swift withdrawals
- Safe and secure
- Live chat support and proactive gambling support
- Regular promotional offers and free bets
- Many restricted countries
- Average website design
- Dedicated mobile app is present along with a mobile responsive site that is easy to use.
- Football betting markets are extensive allowing users a wide range of choices
- Gigantic Jackpots offer huge winnings
- Help Desk feature with its FAQs and guides provides useful information about all aspects of the bookmaker
- Promotions offered are minimal
- Betting margins are not generous
- User-friendly web interface
- Mobile responsive casino and sportsbook
- Diverse selection of games and sports
- Exemplary customer support
- Diverse and hassle-free payment options
- Does not support crypto payments
- Limited to only a few select countries.
- Great customer service
- Exciting free bets and promotional offers
- A wide variety of niche and popular sports and games are available
- Many payment methods are accepted
- Top-notch casino games
- Comprehensive FAQ section
- No mobile application is available
- Fewer welcome offers
- Limited live streaming options
- One of the most reputed and trusted bookmakers in the industry
- A vast number of payment methods are accepted
- Promotes safe gambling
- Excellent in-play betting and live-streaming service
- New and attractive promotional offers and bonuses
- Heavily information-loaded website
- Customer support is offered only through live chat and X
- New users keep their stake from welcome bonus
- Chance to get supercharged sports betting odds
- Cash out can also be supercharged
- Margins can be high for the industry
- Limited payment options available
- Few boosts offered on the sportsbook
- Smaller stakes are pooled and offer huge payouts
- Safe and secure
- Interesting bonuses and rewards
- Various bet types are available due to pool betting
- User-friendly app and website
- Top-notch racing live coverage
- Only debit cards are accepted for payments
- In-play betting is not offered
- Attractive welcome offers and scratch cards
- Amazing app and website experience
- Quick withdrawals with no extra charges
- Safe and secure
- Interesting Esports options
- Fewer payment methods as compared to other sites
- Fewer live streaming options
FA Cup Boosts and Betting Offers
There is no better place to bet on the FA Cup than the UK, and exclusive FA Cup betting offers confirm that. If you choose the right UK sportsbook, you will be able to bet on FA Cup matches from the preliminary rounds, and not just championship games.
Here’s a brief overview of the main offers that allow you to get the most out of your FA Cup betting experience:
- Free Bets — The best way to kick off your FA Cup betting session is by grabbing a free bet offer on one of the UK sportsbook sites. Luckily, there are plenty of offers like the £50 Paddy Power free bet package or the £30 free bet on William Hill.
- Enhanced Odds — Boosted odds are yet another way to start your gaming session with a bang, and our recommended sites have specific odds boosts for FA Cup matches. These can come in pretty handy, especially in upsets like Coventry beating Wolverhampton in the 2023/2024 Quarter-Finals. The odds of Coventry pulling it off were 4.50, but sites from our list of recommended sportsbooks even listed the match at odds as high as 5.20.
- Multi Boosts — Last but not least, you can also get some multi-parlay boosts for placing three or more FA Cup matches on the same ticket. This is especially important for preliminary games where the offer is abundant, and there are a lot of matches from lower-tier teams. Multi boosts give you an increase in odds percentage depending on how many events you decide to place on your bet slip.
Claiming Your FA Cup Free Bets
The new season and FA Cup knockouts are still a long way ahead, but Extra Preliminary matches hit the market as early as August 3rd. To get you ready on time, we’ve included a list of sites offering outrights and preliminary round odds as soon as late July.
All you’ll need to do to grab the best free bet deals on the market is follow these simple steps:
1. Pick the Bookie Site
Here at FreeBets, we understand that it’s always tough to find a good bookie site to bet on, so we wanted to help you with the process. To do that, we’ve compiled dozens of the best UK bookmaker reviews, and you can use our guides and reviews to avoid some common mistakes and get the most out of your FA Cup bonuses.
Once you’ve scrolled through the selection of betting platforms, you can proceed by clicking on the one that seems most appealing to you.
2. Join as a New Player
Next up, you’ll need to register as a new player to access the best FA Cup free bets and other bonus deals. It’s easy to sign-up on most of the sites offered among our recommended sportsbooks, as you just need to provide a few personal details.
Sometimes, it’s even possible to complete the registration with just your email address, username, and password. Make sure to follow the registration steps by clicking on “Join Now” or “Register,” and proceed by filling in the necessary details.
3. Use Our Link to Deposit and Grab the Bonus
With a little bit of help from the FreeBets team, you no longer need to search for UK sportsbook sites manually. Simply check our reviews for the latest information, and use our links to sign up, deposit, and grab your welcome bonus.
FA Cup Betting Options
Before you start with your FA Cup betting sessions, you will need to know a bit more about the main betting options you’ll have. Our recommended bookies offer unique FA Cup specials, including qualification bets, outrights, and in-play bets, so let’s take a look at some of the main options:
- 1×2 Bets — These are basic match-winner bets available in almost every UK sportsbook with FA Cup events. You can bet on the home team to win, away to win or place a wager on a draw.
- Qualification Bets — Unlike match-winner bets, qualification bets reflect team qualification through FA Cup rounds. You can bet on a team to have a preliminary round exit or to advance all the way to quarter-finals, semi-finals, or finals.
- Totals — Totals give you a chance to bet on the number of goals scored by both teams or by any particular team for the duration of the game or halftime.
- Double Chance — Double chance lets you bet on two out of three possible match-winner outcomes, so it can either be home to win or draw, away to win or draw, or either team to win, eliminating the draw outcome.
- Handicaps — Handicaps let you place a bet on a team to win at a pre-determined margin. For instance, a (-0.5) handicap means a team will win the game even though they are virtually starting with a minus of one goal, so they need to win at a difference of at least two goals for the bet to count.
- Halftime-Fulltime — These allow you to place a wager on total goals or the winner of the halftime-fulltime transition.
- Props — Proposition bets on FA Cup include goal scorer bets, yellow cards, corners, extra time yes/no bets, penalty shootout winners, and more.
- Live Bets — Last but not least, you can also bet on FA Cup matches while they are ongoing by placing live bets with a large number of markets.
Short History of FA Cup
As a competition, the FA Cup made a debut in the 1872/1873 season, and it has the longest run out of any active football club competition. It’s, therefore, one of the most prestigious cups in the world of football, despite having a lower following compared with the World Cup and some other tournaments.
The FA Cup is very popular in the UK, and it’s currently dubbed “Emirates FA Cup” due to a sponsorship agreement. One of the best things about this cup is that teams are not seeded but rather randomly allocated.
There’s a total of 14 rounds — 12 “regular” rounds, plus the semi-finals and the final game. Ever since 2008, final matches have been played on Wembley one of the most prestigious football venues in England, and the winner of the cup earned entry to European club championships in the past, and the UEFA Europa League in the recent past.
Arsenal FC is the most successful club in the history of the FA Cup. The “gunners” have snatched 14 titles in total, 7 of which were won under the wing of Arsene Wenger. The cup has its own “Magic,” which is a phenomenon that most fans refer to in case of an upset and lower-tier team eliminating EPL-rank teams.
One of the most recent big upsets was Wigan’s title run that ended with a 1:0 victory over Manchester City as a favored side at Wembley. The current title holders are Manchester United, having won over their local rivals Man City 2:1 for the 2023/2024 FA Cup throne.
The List of FA Cup Winners
More than 40 different teams have won the FA Cup, and these are the most successful ones that hold more than one title:
- Arsenal FC — 14 titles
- Manchester United — 13 titles
- Liverpool — 8 titles
- Chelsea — 8 titles
- Tottenham Hotspur — 8 titles
- Manchester City — 7 titles
- Aston Villa — 7 titles
- Newcastle United — 6 titles
- Blackburn Rovers — 6 titles
- Everton — 5 titles
- WBA — 5 titles
- Wolverhampton — 4 titles
- Sheffield United — 4 titles
- Bolton Wanderers — 4 titles
- West Ham United — 3 titles
- Sheffield Wednesday — 3 titles
Teams like Nottingham Forest, Sunderland, Preston, Portsmouth, Bury, and Old Etonians are among the teams that won the title twice, while more than 20 teams have won it once. Even teams like Notts County, Huddersfield, Coventry, Clapham Rovers, and Charlton have won it in a series of upsets and giant killings. So, our tip is to never focus on odds alone and account for that “FA Cup Magic” when crafting your bets.
Key Dates for the 2024/2025 FA Cup Season
As always, the 2024/2025 season of the FA Cup will feature hundreds of teams racing to the grand final game on May 17th at Wembley Stadium. Until then, you can take a look at the key dates to help you plan ahead with your wagers:
- Preliminary Round — August 17th
- First Round Qualifying — August 31st
- Second Round Qualifying — September 14th
- Third Round Qualifying — September 28th
- Fourth Round Qualifying — October 12th
- First Round Proper — November 2nd
- Second Round Proper — November 30th
- Third Round Proper — January 11th
- Fourth Round Proper — February 8th
- Fifth Round Proper — March 1st
- Quarter Final — March 29th
- Semi-Final — April 26th
- Final — May 17th
As always, the Extra Preliminary round will take place before the first preliminary round, so the FA Cup officially starts on Saturday, August 3rd, for the 2024/2025 season