Totals betting for regular-season wins in the NFL is a popular futures bet. It gets a lot of attention if only for the fact that it is one of the few ways you can wager on the success (or failure) of a single team.

The focus of betting on wins is simple: Before the season starts, a sportsbook will set a line for total wins by a team. You can then wager whether the team will have wins totaling over or under that line.

Below we dig into NFL regular-season win totals odds at legal online sportsbooks in Massachusetts.

Live NFL season win totals odds

Where can I bet on NFL season win totals?

Betting on the National Football League is easy at legal online sportsbooks or MA sports betting apps. Here’s a quick look at some of the top sportsbooks in Massachusetts.

DraftKings Sportsbook MA

The MA-based company has one of the most popular online sportsbooks in the country. It’s not too hard to see why, as DraftKings is filled with features.

NFL bettors will be more than covered with options from preseason win totals straight through to the Super Bowl.

• Slick platform with innovative features.
• Awesome menu layout for win totals and other NFL futures. 
• Huge menu of player props, alternate lines, and more.

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FanDuel Sportsbook MA

FanDuel is another top shop that’s at or near the top of the charts in all of its currently available markets. The smooth and easy-to-use platform certainly helps, as does a wide range of features.

NFL win totals are readily accessible, and the same holds true for every other bet type all season long.

• One of the smoothest online interfaces that you’ll find.
• Futures and win total odds are typically on point.
• Same game parlays, live betting, and more.

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BetMGM Sportsbook MA

BetMGM is squarely in the middle of the battle for market supremacy in several legal states.

There are more than enough options to keep you busy with the NFL all year round, including win totals and other top futures bets like the winner of the next Super Bowl.

• A steady stream of NFL betting promos.
• Dedicated section for NFL win totals and futures.
• Easy parlay, edit my bet, and other features.

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Caesars Sportsbook MA

T

he presence of Caesars Sportsbook has been growing by leaps and bounds in recent times, and there are no signs that’ll be slowing down anytime soon.

NFL bettors will find a regular array of promos to consider, as well as competitive odds for win totals and all other bets.

• A simple betting platform that lets you get down to business quickly.
• Competitive odds for win totals and all NFL bets.
• Regular odds boosts and other promos.

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How do you bet NFL over/under win totals?

NFL win totals are popular bets for the reasons we went over above. While this is also true for sports other than the NFL, here is an example of what you might see if you’re looking to bet on football win totals:

• New England Patriots: Over 10.5
• New England Patriots: Under 10.5

In this example, the oddsmakers have set an over/under line of 10.5 on the Patriots’ regular-season wins. Once you’ve done your research, you can bet on whether the Pats will win over that total (11 games or more) or under 10.5 (10 wins or fewer).

The sportsbook odds on a futures bet like this one will come out fairly soon after the end of the Super Bowl, giving oddsmakers, experts and everyday fans something to talk about as the offseason begins.

Betting strategies for NFL season win totals

Below are three aspects to look at if you’re considering betting on a team’s total wins for the season. Beyond our advice, we suggest you take the time to develop your own betting strategies to use. Keep in mind that some strategies that may work for others might not work for you. Don’t be afraid to change things up and try new tactics:

• Previous season: How did the team do last year? While this starts with the team’s overall record, you’ll want to go beyond that. Did the team win more early or come on strong later? Were key players relatively new with more growing to do or veterans who might be on the decline? Did the team make the playoffs, and if so how did it eventually lose? All of that information can be useful when considering potential win totals for the upcoming season.
• Offseason: Remember how terrible the Tennessee Titans used to be before they turned things around? That can be any team in the NFL (well, maybe not the Detroit Lions). With the right moves, an organization can turn its entire outlook around. Of course, teams can go the other way, as well. Key players can leave via trade or retire, for instance. It doesn’t matter what is happening that changes the dynamic of a football team. What matters is that you pay attention and take note when changes occur.
• Preseason: A lot of NFL fans view the preseason as a waste of time. However, even if a team’s preseason record may not mean much, you can still pick up some key info. How do key players look? Do players with injury concerns look healthy and ready to go? Do new additions appear to be fitting in? All of these things can help inform your research on the upcoming season.

For bettors who bet as soon as the win totals lines come out, the only one of the above that will really apply is the first one. The rest is just guessing. For the most part, there is no way to tell which players a team will add and subtract.

Early bettors take on more risk by not having that information, but the truth is NFL win total odds are going to shift based on every bit of news and information that becomes available. The longer you wait to bet, the more information you and the sportsbooks will have a chance to investigate, and the more accurate everyone’s predictions are likely to be.

Do you wait until the picture is beginning to look clearer, or do you gamble based on the knowledge of how a team did last year? It’s all about weighing the risks versus the potential reward.

Is it better to bet the NFL win total over or under?

If you listen to enough experts on the subject, you’ll find that the majority of bettors typically believe the under is the easier bet to win with. Why? Well, we can chalk that one up to Murphy’s law, which is that if something can go wrong, it will.

In Detroit, the Lions had Matthew Stafford at quarterback for 12 seasons. He did all that he could to get his team wins, but very little seemed to work. But then Stafford ends up going to Los Angeles, and the Rams win the Super Bowl.

For the Lions, it just keeps going bad, so it’s easy to understand why bettors might look hard at the under for whatever prediction comes out for them. The Rams, on the other hand, had far fewer season-altering hiccups, though all it would have taken was a couple of key injuries or player suspensions, and everything could have gone south in a hurry.

Teams see a lot more going wrong than unexpectedly right, which is why many bettors prefer to take the under when wagering on NFL season totals. Obviously, that doesn’t mean it is always the right choice, or we wouldn’t even need to be having this discussion, right?

Related pages:

• Bet on NFL Player Props

More sports where season win totals are offered

While legal online sportsbooks won’t list season win total bets for every sport, they likely will have them for the major ones. This is true in Massachusetts as well.

While the NFL is the most popular betting target, here are some other options for betting on regular-season win totals:

• NCAA football: College football is also pretty big in terms of both popularity and the number of betting options you will find. Futures bets, including win totals, are usually available, though not for every college team out there. Expect to find such lines for the most popular teams in the country.
• MLB: Lines for Major League Baseball tend to come out pretty early for those looking to wager on regular-season win totals. Baseball isn’t quite as volatile as other sports in terms of the swings in how well a team will do, so oddsmakers tend to have more confidence in releasing MLB betting lines sooner than for most other sports.
• NBA: You’ll need to have plenty of patience for season win total lines for the NBA. Nearly every sportsbook waits until after free agency has come to a close and the NBA draft has finished before they release their basketball lines.
• NCAA basketball: You probably already know this, but college basketball has a large number of teams playing at the highest level. In fact, there are over 300 of them, which is why you will not find futures bets for the majority of them. Like their college football counterparts, NCAA basketball teams that you will find futures bets for are generally going to be the most popular teams from the biggest conferences. You’ll still have more than enough teams to choose from if you want to bet on NCAA basketball, but don’t expect every single Division I school to be available.
• NHL: Leave it to the National Hockey League to just be different. When you first glance at season totals for the NHL, you may notice that the bets aren’t on wins but rather on regular-season point totals. In the NHL, a team gets two points for every win and one for every loss in overtime. You’ll find plenty of resources that focus primarily on points for hockey teams, so don’t fret about that aspect of it. Just keep in mind that overtime losses can be common in the NHL, so you’ll want to take that into consideration when doing your research and making your NHL bets.