How these welcome offers are scored

Every figure on this desk is a weighted sum of the criteria below. None of it is a measurement — these are judgements, and the only honest thing to do with a judgement is show the working so somebody can disagree with a specific part of it rather than with a number.

Why two scores and not one rating

A single star rating forces two unrelated questions into one number and then hides which of them produced it. An offer crediting three free cases before you deposit is genuinely excellent at one thing and genuinely worthless at another, and averaging those into "4.3 out of 5" destroys the only information that was worth having.

So there are two. Day one is what you can reach immediately. Week three is what the offer is still paying once the welcome is gone. They are reported separately everywhere on this site, including in the register table, so the trade-off stays visible instead of being resolved on your behalf.

The criteria, and what each is worth

Each criterion is scored 0–10 against the facts in that operator's breakdown, then multiplied by the weight shown. Where a breakdown row says an offer has no rakeback, the rakeback criterion is a zero rather than a polite low number.

Day one

What the offer is worth immediately. Weighted toward what arrives before you have risked anything, because value you can reach without paying is categorically different from value you have to buy.

Before you payWhat is credited and playable before any money goes in?: ×0.40
First deposit addsWhat does the first deposit turn the offer into?: ×0.35
Getting it outHow much playthrough stands between the value and a withdrawal?: ×0.25

Week three

What is still arriving once the welcome has been spent. This is the half that decides the order of the register.

RateIs a share of every wager returned, and how generously?: ×0.40
SettlementDoes it credit as you play, on a weekly sweep, or slower?: ×0.25
RecurringIs there a reload, race or drop cycle beyond the welcome?: ×0.20
DurabilityDoes the rate run indefinitely, or reset and expire?: ×0.15

The one number that decides the order

62%

The overall figure the register sorts on is 38% day one and 62% week three. That single constant is the whole editorial position of this desk: a matched deposit is played through once and gone, while a wager-back rate is still paying on the day the match has been forgotten.

It is also the number to attack if you think the register is wrong. Raise it and the rakeback rooms climb further; lower it and the no-deposit offers overtake them. It is stated here rather than buried because a ranking whose weighting is secret is not a ranking, it is a recommendation wearing one.

Who writes this, and what that is worth

The desk is written and scored under the name The Assayer. That is a pen name, not a person you can look up, and it is said plainly here because the alternative — a stock portrait and an invented career — is a lie told to people who are about to make a money decision.

What that means in practice: nothing on this site asks to be believed on the strength of a byline. The things that can actually be checked are the ones on offer — the criteria above, the weights above, the breakdown rows on every review, and the date each set of figures was last read against the operator. The register was last read on 8 Aug 2026.

How an operator gets onto the register

An operator gets a page once the same route a visitor takes has been taken here first: account opened through the claim link, money in, the offer played, and a withdrawal requested and received. An offer that cannot complete that sequence does not get a score, and it does not get a page with the missing parts filled in from a press release.

When terms move — and they move often — the page is rewritten and the date at the foot of it changes. A short desk that is accurate beats a long one that used to be, which is why there are currently 19 offers here and not ninety.

How this is paid for

Claim links are partner links. If you open an account through one, the operator may pay this desk for the introduction. That payment comes out of their marketing budget and never out of your offer — you get exactly what the page says you get, and the same as you would get arriving any other way.

Position on the register is not for sale, and no operator has been shown a score before it was published. Beside every operator name there is a plain link to their own domain, carrying nothing: if you would rather not use the claim link, that one goes straight there.

None of this is advice and nothing here is a prediction. Decide the limit before the first deposit rather than during the third — begambleaware.org is free, confidential and open to anyone.