The New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement reported on Tuesday $114.3 million in gross sports wagering revenue for January, as operators rode strong parlay performance to a third consecutive nine-figure monthly windfall.
The $71.4 million claimed from multi-leg wagers accounted for 62.5% of all revenue from Garden State sportsbooks, which combined for a 21% hold against $340.1 million in handle.
Operators also fared better than expected for football wagering; their 6.9% hold was the highest of any month involving regular-season NFL games since attaining an 8.1% win rate in December 2023. The $15.2 million in revenue, however, was down 2.3%, when handle plunged 13.5% to $219.8 million.
The $1.03 billion wagered overall was down 10.3% from January 2025, but the 11% collective hold softened the decline in year-over-year revenue to 6.5%. Four of New Jersey’s 11 all-time monthly holds of 11% or better have come in the last eight months.
The state collected $23.9 million in tax receipts. The $148.5 million that has reached state coffers in the first seven months of the fiscal year is running $65.8 million ahead of the previous seven-month period. In addition to revenue being up 14.9%, taxes on digital revenue were raised from 13% to 19.75% on July 1.
The parlay train rolls on
January marked the third consecutive month the hold on parlays reached 21% or higher. New Jersey sportsbooks have reaped $264.8 million in winnings in that span. Year-over-year revenue also tailed off here, dropping by 10.9% and nearly mirroring the 11% decline in handle.
Operators did see revenue growth in basketball by 17.1%, thanks to better performance. The 4.8% hold that yielded $13.5 million in winnings was up more than 1.5 percentage points from January 2025. It also absorbed a 20.2% drop in handle to $280.7 million.
New Jersey’s catch-all “other” category, which includes hockey, tennis, golf, soccer, mixed martial arts, and table tennis, among others, had a notable bump in handle to $193.5 million. That was up 17.8% compared to the previous year, but the 5.7% win rate meant the $11.1 million kept by operators was 4.9% lower.
Fanatics regroups, FanDuel leads way
After a rough December, Fanatics regrouped to give New Jersey three sportsbooks with eight-figure revenue totals. The $10.9 million reported was a near three-fold increase and up 61.1% from the opening month of 2025.
FanDuel and DraftKings were out of reach in first and second, respectively, despite year-over-year downturns. FanDuel collected $45.6 million for a 14.1% decline, and the $30.6 million potted by DraftKings was also off by a 14.1% margin.
England-based bet365 was the other big winner when stacking up numbers from January 2025. Its $7.3 million haul represented a 51.5% increase, while completing the top five. BetMGM narrowly pipped it for fourth with $7.6 million, a more modest 3% bump higher.
