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EKG Projects $40 Billion in 2026 NFL Wagering, With Prediction Markets Capturing 21% Share

By jili tutorial · September 22, 2026

EKG Projects $40 Billion in 2026 NFL Wagering, With Prediction Markets Capturing 21% Share

A New Era for NFL Betting: The Rise of Prediction Markets

The 2026 NFL season is poised to be a watershed moment in American sports wagering, according to a new analysis by Eilers & Krejcik Gaming (EKG). The research firm’s combined forecast projects Americans will wager roughly $40 billion on NFL games this season, with prediction markets—platforms like Kalshi, Polymarket, and others—capturing an unprecedented share of that action.

This marks the first season “in which prediction markets compete alongside regulated sportsbooks at scale,” according to the EKG Sports & Emerging Verticals Team, the authors of the September 16 note titled “NFL Wagering To Hit $40bn This Season.”

The forecast breaks down as follows:

On this basis, prediction markets would account for approximately 21% of combined NFL wagering, with traditional sportsbooks taking the remaining 79%.

Why the 2026 Forecast Matters: Understanding the Numbers

The Definitional Divide in NFL Wagering Forecasts

EKG’s combined figure sits at the intersection of a broader debate about how to measure America’s rapidly evolving sports betting ecosystem. The challenge lies not just in predicting the future, but in fundamentally agreeing on what counts as “wagering” in an increasingly fragmented market.

The American Gaming Association (AGA), the industry’s primary trade group, projects a more conservative $29.5 billion in legal NFL handle for 2026—essentially flat against last season’s $29.4 billion. The AGA attributes this stagnation to “backdoor sports betting on so-called ‘prediction markets,’” suggesting these platforms are siphoning action that would otherwise flow to regulated sportsbooks.

H2 Gambling Capital, another industry forecaster, similarly projects $31.4 billion in sportsbook handle, representing a 0.8% decline—which would mark the first contraction in the legal sports betting era. Their assessment reflects mounting concern that prediction platforms are fundamentally altering the competitive landscape.

At the more aggressive end of the spectrum, RotoWire’s analysis projects a record $32.3 billion in sportsbook handle, alongside $36.8 billion in prediction market trading volume on NFL outcomes. However, that latter figure represents notional trading volume, which RotoWire itself concedes “does not equate to sports betting handle.”

Why EKG’s 21% Figure Demands Scrutiny

Among the forecasters surveyed, EKG stands alone in publishing a like-for-like combined figure that harmonizes sportsbook and prediction market activity into a single, comparable metric. This is precisely why their method warrants close examination.

The sportsbook component of EKG’s forecast follows conventional methodology. The projected $31.7 billion implies roughly 8% year-over-year growth, outpacing the firm’s underlying assumption of approximately 5% handle growth (excluding World Cup effects). The premium reflects aggressive acquisition spending across the industry: bet365’s headline $365 welcome offer, $350 offers at both FanDuel and Fanatics, and DraftKings’ $200 promotion.

The prediction market projection, however, is where EKG’s model does its heavy lifting—and where the analytical assumptions become both more complex and more consequential.

Inside EKG’s Prediction Market Methodology

Building the Prediction Markets Monitor

EKG constructs its analysis through what it calls its Prediction Markets Monitor, which aggregates daily trade-level data from five primary sources:

The firm then harmonizes this diverse data around two key measurement frameworks:

The crucial analytical step comes next. EKG applies its proprietary “PM-OSB Handle Translation” model—short for Prediction Market to Online Sportsbook Handle Translation—to convert the raw exchange activity into a sportsbook-comparable stake figure. The resulting $8.4 billion Handle Analog for NFL represents EKG’s best estimate of what these prediction market wagers would equate to if they were placed at traditional sportsbooks.

The “Handle Analog” Concept: A New Metric for a New Market

The Handle Analog concept deserves special attention because it represents an attempt to solve a genuinely novel measurement problem. Traditional sportsbook handle is relatively straightforward: it’s the total dollar amount wagered. But prediction markets operate differently in ways that complicate direct comparison.

When a bettor places money on a traditional sportsbook, that entire stake is at risk. In prediction markets, however, the structure is different—contracts can be traded, positions closed early, and the underlying mechanics involve buying and selling digital contracts rather than placing single-direction wagers.

The evolution of the Handle Analog series shows how rapidly this segment is growing:

MonthHandle AnalogShare of Combined Handle
March~$2.0 billion11%
April~$2.2 billion13%
May~15%15%
June~$5.6 billion30% (World Cup-inflated)
July~$6.0 billionNot specified

EKG’s own note acknowledges the inherent imprecision, stating that the prediction market estimate “carries a wider uncertainty range than our regulated sportsbook forecast, reflecting both the category’s rapid growth and the inherent uncertainty in translating prediction markets activity into sportsbook-comparable handle.”

Questioning the Consensus: Four Critical Assumptions

1. The Translation Ratio Problem

EKG does not publish the specific conversion rate used in its HM-OSB translation model. The inputs and outputs are disclosed, but the analytical bridge between them remains proprietary—available only to Enterprise subscribers. This creates a transparency gap that makes independent verification of the $8.4 billion figure impossible for those without specialized access.

The stakes of this opacity are significant. Exchange volume data counts both sides of every trade, includes market-maker flow, and—critically at platforms like Kalshi—values every contract at $1 or $100 regardless of the actual premium paid. Gambling Insider’s analysis of Kalshi’s August trade data found that this convention produces figures 3.5 times larger than actual premium staked across the exchange, and 16.3 times larger on parlay products specifically.

Small adjustments in how these effects are stripped out of raw data can shift the final market share calculation by multiple percentage points—enough to move the entire narrative from “prediction markets are making inroads” to “prediction markets are fundamentally reshaping the industry.”

2. Week 1 Data Suggests the Number Could Be Higher

The first week of the 2026 NFL season provided compelling evidence that prediction markets may be capturing more action than EKG’s full-season projection implies.

Financial services firm Needham counted $14.6 billion in sports and parlay volume across eight major exchanges during the Tuesday-to-Monday Week 1 window. More importantly, they calculated the “consumer equivalent handle” at $2.1 billion—what those wagers would equal if placed through traditional sportsbooks. On this metric, Kalshi dominated with 76% of volume, followed by Polymarket at 12%, and DraftKings’ DKeX at approximately 3%.

Jefferies’ analysis of the same period counted $3.12 billion across eight exchanges on Sunday alone. Of that, Kalshi’s $963 million in NFL-related activity was notable, though their taker-side volume—a closer proxy for handle—came in at $596.7 million for the day.

EKG’s own chart data shows football contract volume on tracked exchanges reached 2.94 billion contracts from September 1-14, nearly four times the 746 million contracts recorded in the same period a year earlier. Kalshi’s volume grew 2.5 times year-over-year, while Polymarket U.S. exploded from effectively zero to roughly half a billion contracts.

The math tension is striking. EKG’s $8.4 billion forecast, annualized across approximately 23 weeks of NFL action, implies roughly $365 million in weekly NFL Handle Analog. Yet Needham counted $2.1 billion in all-sports activity for Week 1 alone—a figure that includes college football but still dwarfs EKG’s weekly run rate.

Even accounting for seasonal strength and definitional differences, the gap is substantial. The discrepancy suggests two possibilities: either EKG’s translation model is significantly more conservative than Wall Street’s approaches, or the $8.4 billion figure represents a floor rather than a midpoint estimate. EKG had not responded to Gambling Insider’s inquiry about which interpretation is correct as of publication time.

3. The New York Data Point: A Reality Check

Only one state has published a hard sportsbook data point against which the Week 1 estimates can be tested. New York’s statewide weekly report showed $594.6 million in mobile handle for the week ending September 13—a Week 1 record, up 11.4% year-over-year, albeit with a low hold of just 2.85% after a bettor-friendly weekend.

Using New York’s historical share of national handle (approximately 15–16% based on 2025 figures), Gambling Insider’s back-of-envelope calculations suggest national sportsbook handle would be around $3.8 billion for Week 1.

If correct, that would place Needham’s $2.1 billion prediction market “consumer equivalent handle” at approximately one-third of the combined wagering pool—closer to H2 Gambling Capital’s “about 35%” estimate and substantially above EKG’s 21% projection.

It’s important to note these are Gambling Insider’s calculations, not EKG’s own figures, and the comparison isn’t perfect: it sets an all-sports prediction market figure against an NFL-heavy—but not NFL-exclusive—sportsbook week. Still, the directional signal is difficult to dismiss.

4. The Substitution Question: Are Prediction Markets Growing the Pie or Slicing It Differently?

Perhaps the most consequential analytical question—for regulators, operators, and policymakers alike—concerns substitution: what portion of prediction market activity would otherwise have been wagered at traditional sportsbooks?

The distinction matters enormously. If prediction markets are pulling from the existing pool of sports betting dollars, sportsbook operators face a genuinely disruptive threat. If they’re expanding the overall pie—capturing demand from people who previously wouldn’t have wagered at all, or drawing in casual bettors with lower minimums and more flexible interfaces—the net effect on industry-wide revenue is more complicated.

EKG’s modeling “suggests low-single-digit impact in the most competitive OSB states,” meaning sportsbook handle in those markets is 1% to 3% lower than it would otherwise be. This aligns with DraftKings’ public claim of “no discernible impact,” but contradicts BetMGM’s characterization of a “more meaningful negative impact.” The spectrum of publicly stated views underscores how unsettled this question remains.

H2 Gambling Capital projects substitution of 4% to 6%, while EKG says it is “not yet making a directional call” on whether substitution rates will rise or fall as the season progresses. The agency is, in effect, declining to predict whether the 2026 season will ultimately be remembered as the year prediction markets proved themselves as legitimate competitors or as something more ambiguous.

The State-by-State Battleground

Any analysis of prediction markets’ trajectory must contend with the regulatory whiplash currently characterizing the space. EKG’s data shows just how geographically concentrated prediction market demand has become—44% of Kalshi’s retail demand originates in California and Texas, with 69% of demand coming from states without legal sports betting.

This geographic concentration creates a precarious foundation for EKG’s forecast, because the regulatory landscape is evolving rapidly and in conflicting directions:

The Ninth Circuit has now ruled against Kalshi twice in three weeks, creating immediate legal jeopardy in the western states under its jurisdiction.

Connecticut has issued cease-and-desist orders to nine separate prediction platforms, taking an aggressive enforcement posture that could presage similar actions in other states.

Michigan has issued a preliminary injunction against Kalshi’s sports contracts, with a judge finding that the platform’s NFL and other sports event contracts likely violate state law.

New Jersey, along with Robinhood and Crypto.com, has filed petitions with the U.S. Supreme Court, setting up a potential high-court review of the legality of these markets.

This regulatory turbulence creates what EKG itself describes as “an important read on how the two channels interact,” while cautioning that the season should not be viewed as “a final verdict.”

If prediction market access narrows disproportionately in non-sportsbook states, EKG suggests, activity “could become concentrated in states where regulated sportsbooks already operate” —a scenario that could actually increase the measured share of prediction markets in those states while leaving the national picture relatively unchanged.

Conversely, a concerted legal effort to shut down prediction platforms could render the entire forecast moot, or shift significant volume back to traditional operators.

What the 2026 Season Really Tells Us

The debate over EKG’s methodology—and the variety of competing estimates—reveals how much uncertainty remains in this rapidly evolving space. The firm’s 21% figure could prove too conservative or too aggressive; the truth is that nobody yet has sufficient historical data to make definitive judgments about how prediction markets will interact with traditional sportsbooks over a full NFL season.

Several factors give EKG’s forecast particular weight:

First, their approach to measurement is more rigorous than alternatives that simply quote exchange volumes without adjustment. The distinction between notional contract volume and actual consumer investment is not academic; it’s the difference between a $36.8 billion prediction market and an $8.4 billion one.

Second, the Handle Analog concept, while imperfect, represents a genuine methodological advance. It acknowledges that prediction markets and sportsbooks are different products with different economics, and attempts to find a meaningful point of comparison.

Third, the inclusion of multiple data sources (Kalshi, Polymarket U.S. and International, Nadex, and CME) reflects the actual diversity of the prediction landscape, rather than cherry-picking the most remarkable numbers.

At the same time, the gaps between EKG’s forecast and other credible estimates are wide enough that the final result will likely shape—rather than simply confirm—industry assumptions for years to come.

The Bottom Line: A Market in Transition

The 2026 NFL season represents something genuinely new in American sports wagering: a genuinely competitive landscape in which prediction markets and traditional sportsbooks are fighting for the same customer dollars, under different regulatory frameworks, with different products and different economics.

For sportsbooks, the threat is existential. If prediction markets ultimately prove to be superior products—offering better odds, more flexible trading, faster payouts, or simply a more engaging interface—the 79/21 split EKG projects could prove to be a midpoint on the way to something much more disruptive.

For prediction platforms, the opportunity is equally significant. With the right legal outcomes and continued product development, they could emerge from this season with a permanent foothold in American sports culture.

For regulators, the challenge is to maintain consumer protection without stifling innovation or creating the kind of regulatory arbitrage that simply drives activity to less transparent venues.

And for bettors, the competition is likely to mean better pricing, more product choices, and more ways to engage with the sports they love—even if the ultimate picture of who wins and who loses in the new landscape remains very much in play.

The 2026 season, in other words, isn’t just another football season. It’s a stress test for a fundamentally new approach to sports wagering, and the results are likely to be examined and debated for years to come.