What is being offered
A welcome bonus adds a percentage of your deposit to your balance and attaches conditions to the whole thing. The most consequential condition is that the money cannot be withdrawn until a certain amount of turnover has passed through the games. Until then the balance shows a figure you do not yet control.
That is not a criticism — it is what the product is, and it is disclosed. The problem is that it is disclosed in the terms while the percentage is disclosed in 48-point type, which leaves most people comparing the least informative number available.
The comparison that actually works
Take two offers and compute the turnover each demands. That single figure is comparable across sites in a way the percentage is not.
| Offer A | Offer B | |
|---|---|---|
| Headline | 100% match | 200% match |
| Deposit | KSh 10,000 | KSh 10,000 |
| Bonus | KSh 10,000 | KSh 20,000 |
| Wagering | 35× bonus | 40× deposit + bonus |
| Turnover required | KSh 350,000 | KSh 1,200,000 |
| Which is bigger? | the smaller headline | the larger obligation |
Both offers are ordinary. The one that looks twice as generous demands roughly three and a half times the turnover.
The case for declining
- You want to play briefly and withdraw. A bonus makes that impossible until the turnover is met.
- You prefer table games. Where they clear at 10%, the requirement effectively multiplies by ten.
- You dislike bet caps. A maximum bet while a bonus is active is easy to breach and expensive when breached.
- The window is short. Seven days is a schedule, not an offer.
The offer, converted into what clearing it costs
A welcome offer is easiest to judge after it has been turned into a single number: how much must pass through the games before the balance is ordinary money. Take a KSh 10,000 deposit matched in full, with a requirement of thirty-five times the bonus, and the answer is KSh 350,000 wagered. If the requirement is thirty-five times deposit plus bonus, it is KSh 700,000.
Those two offers carry the same headline and differ by a factor of two. That is the entire reason this site prints no bonus headlines anywhere: the number that varies most between offers is never the one on the banner, and the one that matters is three clicks into the terms.
The case for taking no bonus at all
A deposit without an offer attached is money you can withdraw whenever you like, at whatever stake you like, on whatever game you like. A deposit with an offer attached is money that cannot leave until a condition is met, at stakes capped by the terms, on games weighted by the terms. The second has a larger number on it and fewer rights attached.
Nearby
Where this page stops, these carry on: Wagering requirements, Free spins, Bonuses, read from the terms rather than the headline.