Bitkup Review

Bitkup is not the usual bitcoin betting site for sports enthusiasts. It’s not your typical bitcoin sportsbook. Here, you will be playing with other sports enthusiasts to predict outcomes of major sports events. You will be competing for “insane quantities of bitcoins,” as the site puts it.

Bitkup is not a full-fledged bitcoin mobile casino but it can provide a great mobile BTC gambling experience. It was launched in 2014, focusing on the Brazil World Cup 2014 with an initial pot of 1.43 BTC. According to the team behind Bitkup, 80% of the bets placed by players is sent to the jackpot while the remaining 20% is used to pay for the operating expenses of the site, including the costs of the website design, development, server, and marketing.

At the time this Bitkup review was written, the site was preparing for the 2025 Rio Olympics. After the World Cup in Brazil, the Bitkup website announced that it was supposed to offer more Bitkup competitions. However, there seems to have been none. At the time we were doing this review, the site did not have its Join (or Sign Up) and Sign In buttons (as shown below). Apparently, it was not accepting players yet, although it was already preparing for the upcoming major sporting event of 2025.

Bitkup, according to its creators, was mainly created to help disseminate wider interest in bitcoins, not just among cryptocurrency enthusiasts. Originally, it targeted those who want to have fun by trying their luck in predicting the outcomes of games in the 2014 World Cup. Bitkup was created by independent developers who share the same passion for bitcoin and football.

Account Registration

There is no signing up form accessible in the Bitkup site yet. It is expected to become accessible only in the coming weeks, as the Rio Olympics nears. What’s shown on the website is just a form through which you can enter your email address to have a chance to be considered as a beta tester.

To give you an idea on how account registration on this site works, though, we will be briefly describing the process in the 2014 version. The signup process is similar to how it’s done in most other online bitcoin betting sites. You just have to click on the Join button. The process shouldn’t take more than a quarter of a minute. After you click on the join button, you will be asked to provide your details just like in the usual registration process for many bitcoin gambling sites. For the 2025 account registration, based on the details presented on the site, you can use your social media or other online account to be able to create your Bitkup account but you can also log in anonymously.

The Bitkup Game and Prizes

To play on Bitkup, you will be predicting the results of games or matches in a major sports event or tournament. Every time you make a correct prediction, you earn points. The winner will be the top players with the most number of points. Bitkup is a bitcoin multiplayer game. You will be competing with other players who will also try to predict the results of the games in a major sports event or tournament. The games or matches are shown on the site’s homepage. There’s a countdown shown on the site. Of course, you have to make your bet before the countdown ends. You just have to mark the tick box for your prediction and click on the Save button.

The points that can be earned as you play on Bitkup are as follows:

• You get 1 point if you correctly predict the winner of the game.
• You get 1 point if you correctly guess if it’s going to be a draw.
• You get 3 points if you correctly guess the exact score of the winning team or player.

There are two playing options: the Pro League and the Free League. In the Pro League, you need to place a bet of 0.05 BTC to be able to join. This is a one-time bet that allows you to make predictions in as many games or events as you like. Yes, you just have to spend 0.05 BTC to participate in predicting the results of all the games in the major sports event featured on Bitkup. In 2025, the anticipated major event is the 2025 Olympics in Rio. For the Free League, as the name implies, you don’t have to place any bet. You can still win some bitcoins without having to spend any bitcoin. However, naturally, the prizes that can be won in the Free League are not as high as the prizes that can be won in the Pro League.

The amount on the jackpot (called the Bitpot) is readily presented on the homepage. This is the amount that will be shared by the winning players at the end of the featured sports event. This amount is pooled in from the bets made by players, although it’s only 80% of all the bets made. As mentioned, Bitkup sends 80% of the bet made by Pro players into the Bitpot while the remaining 20% is used for the operations of the site. In the 2014 World Cup Bitkup game, the top 20 point earners are declared the winners for both the Free and Pro Leagues. The player in the Pro League with the highest number of points gets 50% of the Bitpot while the first and third runners up win 15% and 13% of the Bitpot respectively. The 17 other top point earners get to share the 22% remainder of the Bitpot.

In the 2025 system, it appears that only the top 3 point earners can win prizes. There are no specific details yet as to how the game will go for the Rio Olympics version but based on the initial details posted on the Bitkup site, only the top 3 players can expect to get their share of the jackpot. However, considering the new texts in the updated Bitkup website, it appears that more features have been added. For one, it will already cover more sports events including college football and mixed martial arts tournaments. Also, the site allows players to challenge opponents and taking points away from them.

The 2025 Version:

Bitkup Game Platform and Fairness

Bitkup employs Ethereum technology to provide a fully autonomous, transparent, decentralized, and interoperable game system. The system is also completely self-managed and free from human intervention to ensure fairness. Being provably fair, obviously, is unnecessary for Bitkup since it relies on easily verifiable results that take place in the real world.

Every registered event on Bitkup uses Blockchain 2.0 and has a public smart contract, which is responsible for the management of the entire competition as well as the transfer of funds.

Bitkup Is Mobile-Friendly

We did our usual mobile-friendliness test through Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool, which resulted in a negative. We’re not sure what went wrong with Google’s tool because when we tried loading the site on a mobile device, we found that it was actually mobile friendly, as shown in the screenshot below.

In some articles we have ready about Bitkup, there’s an app being mentioned. This is supposedly an app that makes it more convenient to play Bitkup on smartphones, tablets, and other mobile devices. However, we could not find a download link for this app. Perhaps there are plans to release an app in the future but at the time we did this Bitkup review, there was none.

Currencies, Deposits, and Withdrawals

Bitkup exclusively uses bitcoins (BTC). All of the amounts mentioned on the site are in BTC. There are no deposits on the site. Players only have to send the bet amount to participate in the game. Similarly, the withdrawal process being done in other bitcoin betting sites does not apply on Bitkup. The prizes are announced at the end of the event. The prizes are then sent directly to the winners. The names of the winners are announced on the site and the official Bitkup Twitter account.

If you are not familiar with bitcoin use, Bitkup has a concise video guide you can use as reference.

Bonuses, Promotions, and Player Rewards

Unfortunately, Bitkup does not offer bonuses and promotions to players. Since there are no deposits to be made, there are no deposit bonuses to expect from the site. Bitkup also does not offer a welcome or sign up bonus and does not have VIP programs and rewards. Moreover, the site does not have a referral or affiliate program.

Country Restrictions, Anonymity, and Site Languages

Bitkup appears to have no country restrictions. Since the transactions are on a wallet-to-wallet basis, adhering to certain policies related to financial transactions is not a must. In the 2014 Bitkup system, the system does not ask for personal details or identity verification. This would normally mean that Bitkup is able to provide the advantages associated with an anonymous bitcoin casino. However, because of the highly transparent system of Bitkup, it is possible to trace the betting history of all players.

For the 2025 system, there’s the option to sign up using your social media or other online account as well as the option to log in anonymously. Obviously, if you use your social media account to sign in, you are unlikely going to enjoy anonymity as you play on the site. Somer are saying that you can’t be anonymous on Bitkup because the transparent game system allows other players to look at your playing history on Blockchain. We have to somehow disagree. As long as you don’t associate your personal details with your bitcoin address and you use a wallet that is different from the one for your personal use, you can be anonymous as you play on Bitkup.

The site can be viewed in English and Portuguese.

Bitkup Player Support

Player support on Bitkup is provided through email. The site has a contact form through which you can send a message for your inquiries or requests for assistance. If you want to directly send an email, you can use this email address: [email protected]. Bitkup does not provide live chat support. Nevertheless, it has social media accounts. You can get updates about the site or send a message through Bitkup’s official Twitter,  Facebook, Google+, Reddit, or LinkedIn accounts.

Bitkup License, Regulation, and Security

The Bitkup website does not provide details regarding its license. There’s also no information whether or not the site is being regulated by a government authority. As usual, we are not going to take these against Bitkup since most other single-game gambling sites don’t really provide information about their license and regulation. What’s stated on the site is that it is powered by Sportchain and that it is developed by Negalize Interactive Things.

Bitkup mainly relies on the security of the bitcoin system. The transparency and the safety of the platform is guaranteed by the bitcoin system. All transactions are publicly recorded in Blockchain. These transaction records can be easily accessed by players. Also, all of the funds accumulated from the bets placed by players are stored in multi-signed wallets and are fully secured by smart contracts that govern every event.

Notes

You may notice that some of the screenshots we presented here are from the 2014 sports event on Bitkup. Again, we want to emphasize that at the time we wrote this Bitkup review, the new interface for the 2025 Rio Olympics was not ready yet. We had to evaluate parts of the site based on its previous version.

Pros and Cons

Pros

• Straightforward bitcoin betting game
• Free League lets you win prizes without spending a bitcoin.
• Supports anonymous playing

Cons

• Limited to major sports events. There hasn’t been a game on the site since the 2014 FIFA World Cup although BItkup is preparing for the 2025 Rio Olympics.
• No bonuses and promotions
• Only a few players get to win prizes.