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    Editorial

    How we test & rank prediction market apps

    The full editorial standard behind every Top-Apps list, app review, and Florida legality page on this site. Written so you can hold us to it.

    Last reviewed: August 7, 2026

    Hands-on testing

    No platform is added to a Top-Apps list until our editorial team has tested it with real money, on real markets, end-to-end. We do not rely on press releases, vendor demo accounts, or a competitor's writeup.

    Why we test from Miami: every account is opened with a Florida driver's license, funded from a Florida-chartered bank via ACH, and accessed on AT&T and Xfinity FL residential IPs. That mirrors the exact sign-up experience a reader in Miami-Dade, Broward, Tampa, Orlando, or Jacksonville will hit — geofence, KYC document quirks, and all.

    What "tested" means

    • Funded with at least $250 of editorial capital per platform — never the operator's house money or a sponsored account.
    • A minimum of 25 live trades placed across three or more market categories (sports, politics, economics, crypto, weather, culture).
    • At least one deposit and one withdrawal tested per supported rail (ACH, debit card, crypto where applicable).
    • KYC flow tested with a real Florida ID — we document any friction, document re-uploads, and time-to-approval.
    • Customer support contacted at least twice through each channel the operator advertises (in-app chat, email, Twitter/X), with response time logged.

    Test details — including the exact dollar amounts, contracts traded, and rails tested — are documented at the top of each platform's individual review.

    Regulatory tracking

    Prediction-market law moves fast — sometimes weekly. We treat regulator action the same way a financial newsroom treats an SEC filing: as a primary source that overrides anything an operator's PR team says.

    Sources we monitor

    • CFTC press releases, no-action letters, enforcement actions, and DCM order books.
    • PACER court filings for any active Kalshi / Polymarket / KalshiEX litigation, including state AG suits.
    • State gambling regulators in all 50 states — cease-and-desist letters trigger a same-week update on our state legality tracker.
    • Florida-specific channels: the Florida Gaming Control Commission, the Office of the Attorney General, and the Seminole Tribe's compact filings.
    • SEC filings for any prediction-market-adjacent tokens, custodians, or settlement rails.

    When the law is unsettled — which it often is — we say so plainly. We will never present a contested legal interpretation as a settled fact, and we will not editorialise away genuine risk to make an affiliate link more clickable.

    Editorial independence

    We earn affiliate commissions when readers sign up for prediction-market platforms via our outbound links. That revenue does not — and cannot — influence our rankings, scoring, or editorial language. Here's how we enforce it.

    Journalists covering this beat can find pre-cleared quotes, brand assets, and contact details in our press kit.

    Firewall

    Commission rates and contract terms are kept in a separate, access-controlled system. The writers and editors who set rankings do not see them.

    No paid placement

    Operators cannot pay for inclusion, premium positioning, sponsored sections, or favourable language. We have turned down five-figure offers to do exactly this.

    Critical coverage

    An app can be a top affiliate partner and still get a 3-star review or a critical news story. We have done both.

    Disclosed always

    Every page that contains an affiliate link carries a plain-English disclosure above the fold. See Affiliate Disclosure.

    FTC-compliant disclosure

    We follow the FTC's Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising (16 CFR Part 255). In practice that means:

    • Affiliate relationships are disclosed above the fold on every page that contains commercial links — not buried in a footer.
    • Bonus claims are quoted from the operator's own published terms. We do not invent dollar figures or rollover requirements to make an offer sound better.
    • Language like "guaranteed," "risk-free," or "easy money" is never used. Trading involves real loss risk and we say so on every page that promotes a platform.
    • We do not market to anyone under 18. Every sign-up CTA carries the 21+ trade-responsibly badge with a link to Responsible Trading.

    Sourcing standards

    Every factual claim on this site falls into one of three tiers. We tag each source by tier internally and surface citations in the Sources block at the bottom of every guide.

    Tier 1 — Primary

    Regulators, courts, operators

    CFTC press releases and rulemaking, court dockets (PACER), state AG opinions, the operator's own published terms and SEC/CFTC filings. Used for any legal claim, fee schedule, or regulatory status statement. Always linked.

    Tier 2 — Major newsrooms

    Reuters, Bloomberg, WSJ, NYT, AP

    Used for context, valuations, and reporting on private operator behaviour we cannot verify directly. We prefer outlets that publish staff bylines and corrections policies.

    Tier 3 — Specialist trades

    Industry publications, academic research

    Used sparingly, for technical detail and historical context. Affiliate-funded competitor sites are never cited as sources.

    Numbers we do not invent

    User counts, trading volumes, valuations, and bonus values are quoted from the operator's own materials or a Tier-1/2 source — never estimated. If a number cannot be verified, we either omit it or describe it qualitatively ("deepest US liquidity in 2025") instead of inventing a figure.

    Scoring rubric

    Every app is scored on a 0–5 scale across five weighted dimensions. The headline rating is the weighted average — no editor can override the rubric to push an app up or down without documenting the override on the review page.

    DimensionWeightWhat we measure
    Trust & regulation25%CFTC status, fund segregation, custodians used, history of enforcement actions or material complaints.
    Liquidity & pricing25%Bid/ask spreads on flagship markets, daily traded volume, depth at the top of the book, slippage on a $1k market order.
    User experience20%Mobile + web app polish, charting, order entry, portfolio P&L view, support response time.
    Florida availability15%Geofencing behaviour, full market access from FL, FL-specific markets (Heat, Dolphins, Marlins, Panthers, hurricanes).
    Bonus value15%Net of rollover requirements, real-cash convertibility, fairness of terms, expiry windows.

    Freshness policy

    Prediction-market regulation, operator availability, and bonus terms change frequently. We publish a freshness commitment so readers know exactly how recent the page they are reading is.

    • Top-Apps list & individual reviews: reviewed at minimum every 30 days; bonus terms re-verified each cycle.
    • Florida + state legality pages: reviewed monthly; same-week updates when a regulator action, court ruling, or cease-and-desist is published.
    • News articles: dated at publication and not silently rewritten — material updates are added as a "Update:" block at the top.
    • Evergreen guides: reviewed quarterly; obviously dated content (e.g. discontinued products) triggers an immediate revision.

    Every page carries a "Last updated" date. The freshness chip near our bylines turns from cyan to grey once a page is more than one month past its last review.

    Corrections policy

    We will get things wrong. When we do, we want the correction process to be visible, fast, and honest.

    1. 1.Acknowledge. Reader-reported errors are confirmed within 48 hours.
    2. 2.Fix the page. The inline error is corrected in place — we do not silently delete the original wording.
    3. 3.Add a correction note. A timestamped "Correction (May 2026):" block is added at the top of the page describing what changed and why.
    4. 4.Material errors are escalated. If a mistake materially misled readers, we say so on the home page and on social.

    Report an issue

    Email editorial@miamipredictionmarkets.com with the URL and a one-line description. We respond to every report.

    Frequently asked questions

    Read more about the team behind this work on our About page, see the full affiliate disclosure, or jump straight to the latest rankings.

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