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Basketball Insiders
Basketball Insiders
David Evans

Best March Madness Bracket Contests: Prizes and Biggest Pools 2025

March Madness is here, and with it comes a chance to turn your basketball knowledge into real money. If you’re looking for the best March Madness bracket contests with the biggest prizes, here’s where you should be entering this year.

Best March Madness Brackets Contests For 2025

BetOnline – $200,000 Bracket Madness

Best March Madness Bracket Contests: Over $1.5 Million in Prizes and a Chance For a Trip to Mars!

  • Entry Fee: $20 per bracket, with discounts for multiple entries (as low as $5 per bracket if you enter 20 times).
  • Top Prize: $50,000 for first place.
  • Additional Prizes: The top 1,250 brackets win cash prizes, with payouts down to $20.
  • Scoring: Standard format with increasing points for later rounds.

Bovada – $50,000 March Madness Bracket

Best March Madness Bracket Contests: Over $1.5 Million in Prizes and a Chance For a Trip to Mars!

  • Entry Fee: Free, but you must have made a recent deposit via crypto or MatchPay.
  • Top Prize: $25,000 for first place.
  • Additional Prizes: 2nd place gets $15,000, 3rd place gets $10,000.
  • One Entry Per Person.

Everygame – $25,000 Bracket Contest

Best March Madness Bracket Contests: Over $1.5 Million in Prizes and a Chance For a Trip to Mars!

  • Entry Fee: Free with at least $100 in sports bets between 17-30 March.
  • Top Prize: $25,000 free bet for a perfect bracket.
  • Additional Prizes: The top 25 participants win free bets.
  • Betting Requirement: You must wager at least $100 on sports between March 17-30 to qualify for winnings.

BetNow – $1,000,000 Bracket Madness

  • Entry Fee: Free for active users (must have placed at least 16 bets of $10 or more in the past month).
  • Top Prize: $350,000 for a perfect bracket.
  • Additional Prizes: The top 30 brackets win cash prizes, with second place taking home $200,000.

Best Free March Madness Brackets

X Bracket Challenge Delivered by Uber Eats

  • Prize: Trip to Mars (yes, you read that right) if you submit a perfect bracket. If no perfect bracket exists, the best one wins $100,000.
  • Entry Fee: Free.

USA Today Bracket Challenge

  • Prize: $1 million for a perfect bracket. $25,000 to the best overall bracket
  • Entry Fee: Free

ESPN Tournament Challenge

  • Prize Pool: $135,000 in total prizes.
  • Entry Fee: Free (up to 25 entries per person).

Yahoo Sports Bracket Mayhem

  • Prize: $25,000 for the best bracket.
  • Entry Fee: Free.

CBS Sports Bracket Challenge

  • Prize: Trip to the 2026 Final Four.
  • Entry Fee: Free.

Which Contest Should You Enter?

If you’re serious about winning, BetOnline and BetNow offer the biggest shot at a realistic cash prize. If you’re looking for a free contest with good rewards, Bovada, ESPN, and Yahoo are solid choices. And if you just want to shoot for the moon (or Mars), the X Bracket Challenge is worth a shot.

The key is entering multiple contests. No bracket is perfect, so increasing your exposure across different competitions gives you the best chance to win something.

Good luck, and may your bracket survive the first round!

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