Betting record and tracker spreadsheet: how to work out yield, ROI and break-even
A betting record is a simple table where for every bet you write down the date, the market, the odds, the stake and the result. With it, after a month you know how much you staked, how much came back to your account and what your yield is: your profit or loss as a percentage of turnover. Without it you rely on memory, which keeps the wins and loses the losses. The spreadsheet also shows the bar you have to clear: at odds of 2.00 you need to win more than half your bets just to break even, and at a typical 5% margin a bettor with no edge loses 4.8p of every pound staked.
Key takeaways
- 1
The break-even win rate is 1 / odds, so at 1.60 you need to win 62.5% of your bets, while at 3.40 29.4% is enough.
- 2
In the sample month 10 winners from 20 bets at average odds of 2.16 gave a yield of −1.0%, and two more winners would have made it +17.5%.
- 3
Record free bets and bonuses in a separate column, because entered as ordinary bets they inflate turnover and distort your yield.
- 4
After 100 bets even a bettor with a 5% edge is down in about 41% of cases, so judge your results over several hundred bets.
- 5
CLV, comparing your odds with the closing odds, shows the quality of your picks faster than profit alone.
Why keep a betting record
Most casual bettors do not know whether they won or lost over the past year. They remember the bet at 12.00 that came in in March, but not the thirty bets at 1.70 that went down along the way. This is not a question of character but of how memory works. We cover it in our article on betting psychology.
A spreadsheet answers questions you cannot settle by gut feeling:
- how much money went through your account (turnover) and how much of it is left,
- in which markets and leagues you lose the most,
- whether accumulators cost you more than single bets,
- whether you stick to the stakes you set yourself, rather than raising them after a loss as in a draw progression.
Keeping a record is also one of the foundations of protecting your bankroll. If you see in black and white that this month's turnover was three times what you planned, it is easier to stop.
Which columns a betting spreadsheet needs
An ordinary spreadsheet is enough. One row is one bet. Start with this set of columns and do not make it more complicated than you need to. The example column is one made-up bet:
| column | example | what for |
|---|---|---|
| date | 10/10/2026 | analysis over time, monthly summaries |
| bookmaker | the licensed bookmaker's name | comparing results and odds across bookmakers |
| league / competition | Premier League | where you lose, where it goes better |
| match | Arsenal – Chelsea | checking and settling the result |
| market | 1X2, over/under, accumulator | which markets cost you the most |
| selection | 1 | exactly what you backed |
| odds | 2.10 | the basis of every calculation |
| stake | £50 | turnover and yield |
| stake source | own money / free bet / bonus | separating promotions from betting with your own money |
| result | won / lost / void | strike rate |
| payout | £105.00 | how much really came back to your account |
| profit | £55.00 | payout minus stake |
| closing odds | 1.95 | optional, for working out CLV |
Copy the payout from your account rather than working it out from memory. That way it already includes anything that changed it: a half-won or half-lost quarter line on the Asian handicap, a void leg in an accumulator or a partial cash-out. A winning £50 bet at 2.10 pays £105.00, of which £55.00 is profit.
Bonuses and free bets in a separate column
A free bet is not your money, and its stake usually does not come back with the winnings (more in our guide to free bets). If you enter a free bet as an ordinary bet, you inflate your turnover and distort your yield. The simplest way is to mark such bets in the "stake source" column and count them separately. Only then can you see whether you make money from your picks or only from promotions.
Formulas: turnover, profit, yield and ROI
Every number worth tracking comes from a few simple formulas:
- Turnover = the sum of all your stakes.
- Profit = the sum of all payouts − turnover.
- Yield = profit / turnover × 100%. This is the most important number: it tells you how much you win or lose on every £100 you stake.
- ROI = profit / starting bankroll × 100%. It tells you how your budget has changed. With a turnover of £5,000 and a bankroll of £500, the same result gives a completely different yield and ROI. Many tipsters say ROI when they mean yield, so always check which one is being quoted.
- Strike rate = winning bets / all bets × 100%.
- Average odds = the average of the odds of the bets you placed.
A strike rate means nothing without the odds
A 50% strike rate at average odds of 3.00 is an excellent result, while 70% at 1.30 is a loss. So always compare your strike rate with the break-even point:
- break-even = 1 / odds, for example 1 / 2.00 = 50%,
- the bookmaker's margin is already in the odds: with a 5% margin a true 50/50 is offered at about 1.90 rather than 2.00 (2.00 / 1.05 = 1.905), and at 1.90 you need to win 52.6%.
At odds of 1.60 you need to win 62.5% of your bets, while at 3.40 29.4% is enough.
That is why the "80% strike rate" that apps with AI betting tips boast about tells you nothing without the average odds.
Example: a month of betting, 20 bets
Say that over a month you place 20 single bets of £50 each. It is a made-up example, but a very typical one for a casual bettor.
| odds group | bets | won | strike rate | break-even | payout | group result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| odds 1.60 | 8 | 5 | 62.5% | 62.5% | £400.00 | £0.00 |
| odds 2.10 | 8 | 4 | 50.0% | 47.6% | £420.00 | +£20.00 |
| odds 3.40 | 4 | 1 | 25.0% | 29.4% | £170.00 | −£30.00 |
| total | 20 | 10 | 50.0% | £990.00 | −£10.00 |
Step by step:
- Turnover: 20 × £50 = £1,000.
- Payout per winner: £50 × odds. At 1.60 that is £80.00, at 2.10 £105.00, at 3.40 £170.00.
- Total payouts: 5 × £80.00 + 4 × £105.00 + 1 × £170.00 = £990.00.
- Profit: £990.00 − £1,000 = −£10.00.
- Yield: −£10.00 / £1,000 = −1.0%.
- Average odds: (8 × 1.60 + 8 × 2.10 + 4 × 3.40) / 20 = 2.16. Break-even at those odds: 46.3%.
A 50% strike rate at average odds of 2.16 looks like a profit, since it is above the 46.3% break-even. Yet the month lost money, because most of the winners came at the short prices: the ten winning bets averaged odds of 1.98, and 50% × 1.98 = 0.99, so 99p came back for every pound. You do not see this until you write the numbers down.
In the long run the margin decides. If these odds carried a typical 5% margin, the 20 bets were worth −£47.62 on average before a ball was kicked (£1,000 / 1.05 − £1,000), a yield of −4.8%, so this month came out better than expected. Two more winners, say one at 1.60 and one at 2.10, would have turned it into +£175 (+17.5%). Over 20 bets with roughly even chances such a swing is ordinary variance, so one month, good or bad, tells you almost nothing.
How many bets before your results mean anything
Betting has huge variance. We checked this in a simulation of random 1X2 bets from our data (104,000 matches from 37 leagues, 2015–2026) at £100 a bet. The table shows the share of bettors in profit after a given number of bets:
| bets | fair odds | +5% edge |
|---|---|---|
| 50 | 47.0% | 54.9% |
| 100 | 47.0% | 58.9% |
| 500 | 46.4% | 71.3% |
| 1,000 | 45.2% | 79.1% |
What follows from this:
- After 100 bets even a bettor with a real 5% edge is down in about 41% of cases. A good tipster can have a bad quarter, and an average one a great one.
- With no edge at all, at fair odds, 47% of bettors are in profit after 50 or 100 bets, and 45% are still in profit after 1,000. A result like that is easy to mistake for proof of skill.
- The margin works on every bet. At a typical 5% margin each stake costs you 4.8% on average (1 − 1 / 1.05), so 1,000 bets of £100 lose £4,762 on average. Luck evens out over time; the margin only adds up.
So judge your results only after several hundred bets, not after one weekend.
CLV: a better measure than profit alone
If profit over a small sample is largely luck, you need a measure that shows the quality of your picks sooner. That measure is CLV (closing line value): comparing your odds with the closing odds just before kick-off. If you bet at 2.10 and the closing odds were 1.95, you took a price 2.10 / 1.95 − 1 = 7.7% better than the market's final one.
The closing odds are the best available estimate of the chances. We showed this in the test described in why a betting model is not enough. If you regularly get better odds than the close, it is a good sign even through a losing spell. If the odds usually move the other way after your bet, it is a sign you have no edge, even when the month ended in profit. For the same reason a genuine value bet is hard to find.
Where to get the data: exporting your account history
You do not have to start from scratch. Every licensed bookmaker shows your history of bets, deposits and withdrawals in your account. Some let you download it, at others you have to copy it out by hand. In the UK you can also ask a bookmaker for a copy of your personal data under UK GDPR with a subject access request; organisations usually have one month to respond.
A routine that works:
- Enter each bet as soon as you place it, and the result on match day.
- Once a week, compare the balance in your spreadsheet with the balance in your account.
- Once a month, add up turnover, profit and yield, and your results by market.
- Record deposits and withdrawals on a separate tab, so you know how much you have paid in overall.
If after a few months the spreadsheet shows a steady loss, that is not a failure but honest information. Treat betting as entertainment with a set budget, not as a source of income.
Summary
- One row is one bet: date, market, odds, stake, payout, profit.
- Yield = profit / turnover. It is the most important number in the whole spreadsheet.
- Break-even: 1 / odds. At 2.00 that is 50%, at 1.60 62.5%.
- Record free bets and bonuses separately, or you will distort your result.
- After 100 bets the result is largely chance. CLV tells you more than profit.
FAQ
Yield is profit divided by turnover, the sum of all your stakes. ROI is profit divided by the bankroll you started with. With a turnover of £1,000 and a loss of £10, your yield is −1.0%, whatever your budget. Many tipsters say ROI when they mean yield, so check how the figure was worked out.
Because the bookmaker's margin is built into the odds, even a result close to zero over a large sample is better than most bettors manage. At a typical 5% margin a bettor with no edge loses about 4.8% of turnover. A yield of more than a few percent held over several hundred bets is rare.
Divide 1 by the odds. At 2.00 that gives 1 / 2.00 = 50%, at 1.60 62.5% and at 3.40 29.4%. If you win less often than that, you lose in the long run.
At least several hundred. In our simulation a bettor with a real 5% edge was down in about 41% of cases after 100 bets. Only after 500–1,000 bets does the result start to tell an edge from chance.
Yes, but in a separate column or tab. A free bet's stake is not your money and usually does not come back with the winnings, so entered as an ordinary bet it inflates your turnover and distorts your yield.
CLV is the difference between your odds and the closing odds just before kick-off. If you bet at 2.10 and the closing odds were 1.95, your CLV is 7.7%. A consistently positive CLV says more about the quality of your picks than one month's profit.