CLV Sports Betting Calculator

BySamuel Kovacs

Closing Line Value (CLV) measures how the odds at which you placed your bet compare to the final odds offered before an event starts.

This metric is a key performance indicator for bettors aiming to achieve long-term profitability.

Understanding and calculating CLV helps refine betting strategies, track performance, and improve decision-making, making it an essential concept for serious sports bettors seeking consistent success.

Closing Line Value Calculator

For a more accurate CLV calculation, you need to use decimal odds format and no-vig closing odds.

What Does CLV Mean in Betting?

Closing Line Value (CLV) reflects the potential advantage of the bet you placed against betting sites.

The value of CLV shows how favorable the odds you used on bets are compared to the final odds offered just before the sports event begins.

Relevant article: Apps to find value bets

How Do You Calculate CLV in Betting with a Formula?

Calculating CLV involves comparing two key variables:

  1. The odds at which you placed your bet.
  2. The closing odds (odds at game time).

The formula for calculating CLV is crucial for understanding the value of your bets.

In its simplest form:

CLV = ((Decimal Odds at Bet – Decimal Closing Odds) ÷ Decimal Closing Odds) × 100

What is the meaning of a CLV calculation in betting?

  • A positive CLV in betting indicates that you have a statistical edge against bookies, which can generate long-term returns.
  • A negative CLV suggests that your odds were inferior to the final market odds, and the likelihood of losing with similar bets would result in losses.

Tracking your closing line value can give you a general picture of how your strategy would perform in the long term.

Calculating the CLV of your bets is a good strategy to increase your winnings, but it has many pitfalls.

Example for calculating the CLV of your bets:

  • You place a bet at odds of 2.50 (decimal).
  • The closing odds are 2.00.

CLV = (2.50 – 2.00) ÷ 2.00 × 100 = 25%

This positive CLV indicates you secured a better price than the market average. Using the market average for closing line value calculations is not always the most accurate strong point.

Bettors aim for consistently positive CLV, as it indicates the potential for long-term profitability. However, it is important to use sharp bookies or a group of accurate bookies to get the correct CLV of a betting opportunity.

To get a more accurate CLV of your bet de-vigging your odds (excluding the house edge of the betting site) is an additional but important step.

CLV Betting Calculator

A CLV betting calculator automates the process of calculating your CLV for each bet. Enter the odds of your bet and the closing odds for it, and the calculator will instantly display your CLV percentage.

Benefits of using a calculator include:

  • Saving time when analyzing multiple bets.
  • Identifying trends in your betting performance.
  • Helping you spot major mistakes in your strategies.

Relevant article: how to find dropping odds at Pinnacle

These are the main tools to beat the CLV of your bets and achieve profits even after several hundred/thousand bets are placed.

Advantages of CLV in betting

Placing bets with a positive CLV ensures you’re making decisions that align with market value and offer an edge against betting sites.

The advantages of CLV-driven betting include:

  • Higher Long-Term Profits: Positive CLV bets typically yield higher ROI over time and tend to cause a smaller variance.
  • Refined Strategies: Analyzing your CLV history allows you to identify patterns in your betting performance. The staking management software offered by BetMetricsLab helps to analyze your data.

Focusing on CLV helps bettors achieve sustainable success by ensuring their bets reflect a math and statistics-based true positive expected value.

Relation Between CLV and Value Betting (+EV)

CLV (Closing Line Value) and value betting are closely related concepts that reinforce each other in sports betting strategies. Here’s how they connect:

1. Comparison of definitions

  • CLV: Measures how your bet odds compare to the closing odds, indicating whether your bet had value relative to the betting market’s final odds before the start of the event.
  • Value Betting: Involves placing bets where the odds imply a lower probability of an outcome than the market average or the pricing from sharp bookmakers. This offers a positive expected value (+EV).

Both CLV and value betting (+EV) focus on identifying opportunities where the bettor has an edge over the bookmaker or market.

2. Positive CLV Indicates Value

Positive CLV is a strong sign that your bets truly hold value because the market lowered the odds since you placed them. A small odds movement can count as a value bet with a positive CLV. But bettors need significant odds movements until closing odds/lines to achieve a higher positive expected value and overtime profits.

  • Example: If you bet at odds of 2.50, and the closing odds are 2.00, the market determined the outcome was more likely than initially priced. This aligns with the core principle of value betting: finding and exploiting wrong/overpriced odds.

3. CLV as a Benchmark for Value Betting Success

Tracking CLV over time helps you evaluate the effectiveness of your value betting strategy. Although it can give you a good starting point, tracking CLV is not necessary for long-term success in betting.

For value bettors, maintaining a positive CLV is a great method to confirm that their bets exploit value. However, there are other methods that are more suitable for defining if a bet has value.

Comparing your betting odds to sharp bookmaker odds is a better method to define value than comparing to CLV.

4. Risk Implications

Both CLV and value betting help manage risk and bankroll effectively. The easiest method to determine the value of a bet is by the simple approach of value bets found with the help of sharp odds.

CLV requires monitoring the odds right before the start of the sports event. Simple value betting, on the other hand, can be practiced and calculated at any time.

For this reason, knowing the risk of your value bets based on sharps is instant. Positive CLV bets have to be placed way before the event starts.

So, in theory, bettors can’t know the true risk and value of their bets until they know the closing odds/lines.

Is it necessary to check the closing line value of every bet?

No, it is not strictly necessary to check the Closing Line Value (CLV) for every single bet. Sharp bettors often check CLV for various reasons.

Some of these reasons are somewhat important, while others may not be crucial.