Can Fanatics really challenge DraftKings and FanDuel?

DraftKings and FanDuel have dominated US online sports betting for years, leaving everyone else fighting for third place. Michael Rubin thinks Fanatics can change that.

The Fanatics CEO is preparing to dramatically increase investment in the company's betting business, with advertising spending potentially reaching $1 billion in 2027 as it attempts to close the gap on the two market leaders.

Fanatics remains a distant third in betting market share, but proprietary Dimers data suggests the gap may already look considerably different when measured by online interest rather than betting market share.

Fanatics plans $1 billion push

Fanatics expects to spend around $350 million advertising its betting and gaming business this year before potentially increasing that figure to between $800 million and $1 billion in 2027, Rubin told Bloomberg.

The company has captured more than 10% of the US betting market in roughly three years, according to Rubin, but still trails DraftKings and FanDuel by a significant margin.

Rubin has no intention of settling for third.

"FanDuel and DraftKings competed with themselves two years ago. Now they have Fanatics, Kalshi and Polymarket. All the marketing costs are up. Everything is more complicated in this business. All of that said, we ask ourselves: Is this a business that we can be better than the competition long term? The answer is yes," Rubin told Bloomberg.

Fanatics' wider business gives it a potentially important advantage. The privately held company expects approximately $14 billion in revenue and $2 billion in free cash flow this year, giving it considerable capacity to invest in a betting business that has yet to become profitable.

Dimers data shows strong interest in Fanatics

While Fanatics has plenty of ground to make up in betting market share, new Dimers data suggests bettor interest in the brand is already much closer to DraftKings and FanDuel.

Over the past 12 months, Fanatics pages on Dimers have generated almost as much traffic as DraftKings pages, while comfortably exceeding FanDuel's total.

That does not mean Fanatics is close to overtaking either company in US sports betting market share. The data measures engagement with sportsbook content on Dimers rather than betting handle, revenue, or even sportsbook visits. There is also an important caveat: many bettors may already have established DraftKings and FanDuel accounts, potentially giving them less reason to research those brands.

Still, the data offers an interesting window into bettor interest. Fanatics may remain well behind the leaders in actual betting activity, but Dimers users are researching the brand at a rate comparable to DraftKings.

Fanatics has something its rivals don't

Fanatics also enters the fight with an ecosystem neither DraftKings nor FanDuel can replicate directly.

Its relationship with sports fans extends beyond gambling into licensed merchandise, collectibles, and trading cards, while FanCash allows customers to earn rewards that can be used across different parts of the Fanatics business.

Being privately held gives Rubin additional freedom to invest aggressively without the same quarterly shareholder pressures facing publicly traded DraftKings and FanDuel parent Flutter.

Prediction markets have complicated the picture further. Kalshi and Polymarket are competing for sports customers, while Fanatics has launched its own prediction market product, Fanatics Markets, giving it another way to reach customers in states without traditional regulated sports betting.

Can Fanatics actually catch DraftKings and FanDuel?

Spending up to $1 billion on advertising does not guarantee Fanatics will break the DraftKings-FanDuel duopoly. Both market leaders have large existing customer bases, mature products, and years of brand recognition that they have built over time.

But Fanatics is no longer just another challenger trying to establish itself behind the leaders.

It has reached double-digit betting market share, has a broader sports ecosystem from which to acquire customers, and is preparing to dramatically increase spending. Dimers' own data also suggests Fanatics is already competing for bettor attention at a level much closer to DraftKings and FanDuel than its market share alone might indicate.

The question is whether it can turn that attention into sustained betting activity.

For the first time since the US sports betting hierarchy became established, dismissing the possibility of someone breaking into the top two looks increasingly difficult.