What Is a NAP?
In horse racing, a NAP is a tipster’s most confident selection of the day — the horse they rate as their single strongest bet across all the day’s racing. The term appears daily in the racing press, on betting sites, and in newspaper columns alongside other tips.
The word itself comes from Napoleon — a French card game in which a player who believed they had a winning hand would call “Napoléon” to signal maximum confidence. The connection to horse racing is indirect, but the logic is identical: when a tipster calls a NAP, they are declaring this is their hand worth playing.
NAP, NB, and Reserve
Most professional tipsters provide more than one daily selection and use a standard shorthand:
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| NAP | Best tip of the day — the tipster’s highest-confidence selection |
| NB | Next Best — the second-strongest selection |
| Reserve (R) | Third selection, sometimes called the each way or long-shot pick |
The NAP carries the most weight because it represents the tip the tipster is most prepared to stake their reputation on. A tipster who selects a weak NAP when no genuinely strong candidate exists is doing their followers a disservice — and the better ones acknowledge this.
Why the NAP Matters
Research Distilled to One Selection
Reading the racing card for a full day’s programme — covering multiple meetings, dozens of races, hundreds of runners — is a significant time commitment. A credible NAP condenses that analysis into one decision. For bettors who want informed exposure to racing without spending hours on form study, the NAP provides a starting point.
Market Impact
A well-followed tipster’s NAP can move the market. When a major publication or widely-trusted tipster publishes their selection, betting volume on that horse increases sharply — and the odds shorten accordingly. This is both a validation of the NAP’s analytical credibility and a practical problem: if you back a NAP after it has been published and the odds have already moved, you receive inferior value compared to early movers.
A Reputational Signal
A tipster’s NAP record is their primary performance metric. Strike rate, return on investment, and profit/loss over a rolling 12-month period are the figures that serious followers track. Consistent profitable NAPs are rare and genuinely valuable; erratic or loss-making NAPs tell you something important about the quality of the analysis.
Who Provides NAPs?
NAPs are published by a wide range of sources, varying significantly in quality, transparency, and potential conflicts of interest.
National racing press: The Racing Post, Sporting Life, and the racing pages of national newspapers (The Sun’s Templegate being the most famous) publish daily NAPs from named columnists with public track records. These are the most accountable source — the tipster’s name and record are attached to every selection.
Racing websites: Sites including OLBG, HorseRacing.net, and Racing Post’s online platform aggregate tips from multiple contributors and display individual track records. OLBG claims over 2,000 active contributors daily and shows annual profit, recent form, and strike rate for each tipster — giving followers the data to assess credibility before following.
Paid tipster services: Subscription-based services that provide NAPs and full daily selections. Quality varies enormously. Reputable services — assessed by sites such as Honest Betting Reviews — are evaluated on ROI (return on investment per £100 staked), bankroll growth, win rate, and longevity. An ROI over 10% sustained over 12 months or more is considered strong performance.
Social media tipsters: The highest-risk category. Anyone can claim to be a tipster on social media. There is no regulatory requirement, no audited track record, and significant potential for undisclosed conflicts of interest.
The Affiliate Problem: A Conflict of Interest You Need to Understand
This is the section of NAP culture that most guides gloss over. It deserves direct treatment.
Many tipsters — including some high-profile ones — operate as affiliates of one or more bookmakers. Affiliate arrangements typically involve the tipster receiving a commission on the net losses of customers they refer. At some bookmakers, this commission is up to 30% of referred customers’ losses, for the lifetime of those accounts.
The financial structure of this arrangement creates an uncomfortable dynamic. When a tipster posts their NAP alongside a link to back it, that link may be an affiliate referral link. If you click it, create an account, and lose your bets over time, the tipster earns a percentage of those losses — regardless of whether their NAP was accurate or not.
This does not mean all affiliate tipsters are dishonest. Many are genuinely attempting to build a reputation based on real analytical quality, because long-term credibility generates more affiliate income than short-term exploitation. But the incentive structure is not aligned in your favour, and it is something you should factor into how you assess tipsters who operate primarily through social media and promote bookmaker links alongside their picks.
How to identify potential conflicts: A tipster who consistently links to the same bookmaker, who promotes sign-up offers alongside their tips, or who does not publicly disclose their affiliate relationships is one to approach with caution. A tipster whose NAP record is independently audited and who publishes all results — wins and losses — is more likely to be operating in good faith.
Are Tipsters Regulated?
No. There is no regulatory body governing horse racing tipsters in the UK. Unlike financial advisers — who are regulated by the FCA and subject to legal requirements around suitability and disclosure — tipsters can operate with no professional qualifications, no audited track record, and no legal obligation to disclose commercial relationships with bookmakers.
This does not mean all tipsters are unreliable. It means you cannot assume accountability and must assess credibility yourself.
How to Evaluate a Tipster’s NAP Record
The following metrics are what matter when assessing whether a tipster’s NAP is worth following:
Strike rate: What percentage of NAPs have been winning bets? A 30–35% strike rate is realistic for a good NAP tipster at competitive odds. Higher strike rates at short odds (evens or shorter) suggest the NAP is consistently backing short-priced favourites — not necessarily bad, but worth understanding.
Return on Investment (ROI): Profit or loss per £100 staked, expressed as a percentage. A positive ROI over a 12-month sample is what you are looking for. An ROI of +10% or above, sustained over a meaningful sample (200+ bets), indicates genuine analytical edge.
Sample size: Six months of results means less than two years. Small samples are unreliable — a tipster can run well on luck for a short period. Look for a 12-month minimum and preferably longer.
Transparency: Does the tipster publish all results, including losing bets? A service that prominently displays winners while burying losses is not giving you an accurate picture.
Odds achieved vs. advised odds: Some tipsters record results at the odds that were available when they published the tip; by the time followers actually placed bets, those odds may have shortened significantly. Check whether the published track record reflects achievable prices.
Using NAPs in Your Betting Strategy
A NAP is most useful as a shortlist tool rather than a direct instruction. The most sustainable approach treats a professional NAP as a prompt for your own analysis rather than a replacement for it.
| Approach | Long-Term Profitability |
|---|---|
| Blindly backing all NAPs from multiple tipsters | Mostly unprofitable |
| Following random or unverified social media tipsters | Unprofitable |
| Using NAPs to shortlist, then applying your own analysis | Potentially profitable |
| Backing NAPs only when the odds represent genuine value | Potentially profitable |
| Following one consistently profitable, audited tipster | Potentially profitable — but genuinely rare |
What Your Own Analysis Should Add
Even if a NAP comes from a source you trust, the following checks are worth running before placing:
Going: Has the going changed since the tip was published? A horse suited to good ground tipped earlier in the week may be at a disadvantage if the going has softened materially.
Jockey change: Has the intended jockey been replaced? A significant jockey booking can signal stable confidence — or its absence.
Market movement: Is the NAP drifting in the market rather than shortening? Sustained drift (odds lengthening rather than shortening in the run-up to the race) often reflects informed money betting against the selection.
Race-morning news: Any significant late entry or withdrawal that changes the race dynamic? A race losing its pacemaker or gaining a prominent rival can shift the calculus significantly.
Practical Notes: Getting the Best from a NAP
Back early if you agree with the selection. A well-followed tipster’s NAP shortens when published. If you back before publication — having done your own analysis — you take the longer price. If you back after publication, you may find the value has already gone.
Use odds comparison. The NAP is one selection; the price you get on it varies across bookmakers. Even a half-point difference (5/2 vs. 11/4) compounds significantly over a season. Check at least two or three UKGC-licensed bookmakers before placing.
Apply Best Odds Guaranteed where available. If your bookmaker offers BOG, taking an early price on a NAP means you receive the SP if the horse drifts — which is the worst outcome from a market confidence perspective but the best from a BOG perspective. See our Best Odds Guaranteed guide for full details.
Keep records. If you are following a tipster’s NAP over time, maintain your own log of selections, odds taken, and results. This lets you assess the actual performance you are experiencing rather than the performance the tipster reports — which may differ if you are consistently getting worse prices.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the NAP always the most likely winner?
Not necessarily. The NAP is the tipster’s most confident selection — which usually corresponds to a horse with a strong chance, but not always the shortest-priced favourite. A tipster who consistently NAPs at value odds (longer than the market implies) can show better long-term profit than one who always NAPs the odds-on favourite.
Can I include NAPs in accumulators?
Yes. Multiple NAPs from different meetings can be combined in an accumulator. The usual accumulator caveats apply — each additional leg multiplies the potential return and multiplies the ways to lose. If you accumulate NAPs, use them from tipsters with independently audited long-term records rather than from sources whose track record you cannot verify.
Should I follow paid tipster services?
Only after assessing the published track record carefully. A legitimate paid service will have verifiable performance data, transparent results (including losses), and a realistic ROI figure over an adequate sample size. Any service that guarantees profits, refuses to publish losing bets, or operates without an audited track record should be avoided.
How is a NAP different from a regular tip?
The difference is one of confidence and designation, not analytical method. A tipster may provide several tips per day; the NAP is specifically identified as their single highest-conviction selection. It carries more reputational weight for the tipster, which is why some tipsters are conservative in what they call their NAP when no genuinely stand-out candidate exists.
Sources: Racing Post; Sporting Life; OLBG; Honest Betting Reviews. All information correct at time of writing.