Best Horse Racing Systems

A horse racing system is a fixed set of rules for choosing bets: which races to look at, which horses qualify and how much to stake. Followed consistently, a system takes emotion out of betting and gives you a record you can measure.

What a system can’t do is guarantee a profit. Plenty of systems are sold with headline figures that never survive contact with real betting, so the most useful thing this guide can do is explain the main types of system, the staking plans that do the damage and how to test any system before you trust it with money. This guide covers UK and Irish racing. For North American systems, see our guide to horse racing handicapping systems.

How to judge a horse racing system

Before you follow a system, free or paid, look for three things.

• A large, honest record. A system that has worked for 30 bets tells you almost nothing: a run of good luck looks exactly like a good system over a small sample. Look for hundreds of bets, ideally recorded as they happened rather than worked out afterwards.
• Results proofed somewhere you can check. The best records are proofed to an independent site or published bet by bet, with the price taken, so you can see the losing runs as well as the winners.
• A reason it should work. Good systems rest on a logical idea, such as a type of horse the market tends to underrate. If nobody can tell you why a system wins, it may have been fitted to past results by chance and won’t keep working.

Judge a system by its return on investment (ROI), the profit as a percentage of everything staked, not by its strike rate. A system that wins 60% of the time at short prices can still lose money, and one that wins 15% of the time at big prices can make it. Our odds calculator shows the implied probability of any price, which tells you the strike rate a system needs just to break even at those odds.

The main types of system

Systems built around favourites

Favourites win roughly a third of UK races, according to Matchbook’s analysis of favourite win rates. That means they lose about two races in three, which is the idea behind systems that take on the favourite: either laying it on a betting exchange, or backing other horses in races where the favourite looks vulnerable. Laying means you pay out at the favourite’s odds when it wins, so the price you lay at matters as much as the selection.

Each way value systems

Each way systems look for horses at bigger prices that have a realistic chance of finishing in the places, so a placed finish returns something even when the horse doesn’t win. They work best in races where the place terms are generous for the size of the field, and when the bookmaker is paying extra places. Our each way calculator shows what the win and place parts return at 1/4 or 1/5 odds.

Dutching systems

Dutching means backing two or more horses in the same race, with the stakes split so that you make the same profit whichever of them wins. It suits races where you can narrow the winner down to a few runners but can’t separate them. Our dutching calculator works out the stakes for you.

Form filter and ratings systems

These systems apply a list of filters to the racecard, such as days since the last run, course and distance form, the trainer’s recent strike rate or a speed rating, and bet on whatever is left. They are easy to build yourself, and our guide to free horse racing systems explains how.

Staking plans: where systems go wrong

The selection rules get the attention, but the staking plan decides how much a losing run costs you.

• Level stakes: the same stake on every bet. Simple, and the fairest way to measure whether a system has an edge at all.
• Percentage of bank: a fixed percentage of your current betting bank on each bet, so stakes shrink during a losing run and grow during a winning one.
• Progressive plans such as Martingale and Fibonacci: these raise the stake after every loser to win back what has been lost. They don’t change the odds of any bet. They just make each losing run more expensive, and a long enough run, which every system eventually hits, wipes out the bank. Wikipedia’s article on the Martingale system explains the maths.

If a system only shows a profit with a progressive staking plan, treat that as a warning sign.

How to test a system before you trust it

1. Write the rules down so precisely that two people would pick the same horses.
2. Paper trade first. Record every qualifying bet, at the price you could actually have taken, without staking money.
3. Keep going for long enough. Aim for a few hundred bets before you draw conclusions, and note the longest losing run.
4. Use level stakes while you test, so you measure the selections rather than the staking plan.
5. Account for costs, such as exchange commission or the price moving against you before you can get on.

Paid systems and services we link to

If you’d rather follow a ready-made approach than build one, these are the paid UK and Irish racing services we currently link to. Each one fits one of the system types above. The figures are the sellers’ own and we haven’t verified them, so apply the same tests: ask for the full record, paper trade it first and use level stakes.

For North American racing, HorsePlayerHaven sells a handicapping system for US tracks, covered in our guide to horse racing handicapping systems. For UK racing software and data tools, see our guide to horse racing software, and for tipsters rather than systems, our guide to the best horse racing tipsters.

Betting always carries a risk of loss and no tipster, system or staking plan can guarantee a profit. Only stake what you can afford to lose, and set a budget before you start. Gambling responsibly.