Sorare Beginners Guide

Welcome to this Sorare Beginners Tutorial. This is the most in-depth article and a resource that will help you learn the ropes, and avoid any mistakes from the beginning of your Sorare journey. Our guide has been created to teach you all of the basics, helping you to understand what Sorare is & how you can fast-track your success. Let’s get into this one.

There’s no denying that Sorare cards look fantastic. However, for you to truly understand the platform, we need to ignore the design of the cards to a degree. In this Sorare Beginners guide, I will be discussing everything on the platform, the key points being scarcity, tournament prizes and the eco-system that Sorare has established.

In 2023, Sorare acquired the rights to the English Premier League meaning that their cards can be generated and used in fantasy tournaments. Take a look at these exquisite cards below. Then, the guide continues.

However, it’s not the easiest Fantasy Football game to explain, due to there being many different mechanics to explain about the platform. If you’re looking for a FPL alternative, we think you’ll be pleasantly entertained with the Sorare platform. If you’re looking for my Sorare Review, you can find that here.

In this Ultimate Beginners Guide, I aim to explain absolutely everything, enough so that if you have any single question about Sorare, this guide will have the answers.

It’s going to be perfect for beginners, or those that haven’t joined yet. Note, if you haven’t yet joined Sorare, you’re in good hands, as you can receive an extra free card once you’ve purchased Five from the new signings area.

I never tend to push referral links, but you only get the free card once you’ve used a referral link… so please use one! We wouldn’t be much of a brand ambassador either without offering our audience something special.

Oh, and let us know if you land a card like Kylian Mbappe, Joao Felix or others. I won’t be jealous, honest.

Our Exclusive Sorare Guide Sign Up BonusThe Free Card will be Awarded automatically by Sorare, with no requirement to contact support. I love playing FIFA & FUT specifically, so if you manage to ‘pack’ a quality card, please let me know!

Haven’t started playing yet?

New Sorare players will receive a Free Referral Reward, when they purchase 5 Cards from the Primary Market. This is an additional Free Card, which is yours to keep… or sell!

Get a Free Limited Card when you use this Link & Purchase 5 Cards

What is Sorare?

Sorare is a Fantasy Football Game based upon Blockchain, where you can win rewards for picking the best lineups. On Sorare, you can manage your teams, enter tournaments, trade your cards and build the perfect collection.

Sorare has been gaining lots of interest recently, due to the product attracting many different players. Some people simply want to collect the cards, as though they’re collecting old Pokemon cards from 1999. Others are actively trading the markets, making money every single day.

Most users are attracted to the tournaments on offer, as this gives users a chance to win cash prizes, alongside winning other rare players.

Sorare isn’t a gambling platform, when you purchase the card, you own it until you decide to sell it. As it’s a registered NFT, this will live on the Blockchain forever. If there’s a few words here you haven’t heard before such as NFT, Blockchain etc, I will be explaining everything in depth.

The idea of Sorare is to build an epic collection of the best players, which will in turn help you to win your fair share of the Thousands of Pounds / Dollars that are available each gameweek.

How to Play Sorare

It wouldn’t be much of a guide, if we didn’t add a full breakdown of how to play. There are 4 main things to complete when getting started on Sorare:

• Get Your Free Cards
• Complete the Onboarding Process
• Start Scouting & Building Your Team
• Enter a Tournament

Getting Your Free Cards

There’s multiple free cards that you can get from Sorare. In addition to getting your Free Rookie Cards, you’ll be able to claim a Free Rare Card when you use our referral link, which is automatically credited by Sorare. The difference with the Rookie and Rare card, is that the Rare Cards can be sold. The Rookie Cards are tied to your account, to be used in the rookie tournaments.

Remember to claim your free sign up bonus here, as you have to go through a referral link in order to get the free rare card.

After you’ve signed up, you don’t have to rush in buying players. You’ll need to complete the onboarding process next, which is pretty fun!

Completing the Onboarding Process

Completing the onboarding process is essential to starting your Sorare journey. In addition to verifying your email and a phone number, you’ll be given the task of picking your three favourite teams. Although this may seem an easy task, this will determine which free cards you receive.

You’re asked to choose three teams, although I actually selected four. I chose Liverpool, PSG, AC Milan and Genk. After choosing these teams, the next stage was to reveal which players I’ve received.

I didn’t receive the best cards, but these are only my free cards, so it doesn’t matter too much!

After you receive your free cards, you’ll be taken to the onboarding list. This is a list of tasks, which will earn you rewards if you complete the full list.

You’ll have the exact same tasks as me set above, which are created to help you understand the platform. For the purposes of this Sorare tutorial, I have completed the onboarding process. 

Below, you will see the free cards I received for doing so. These cards are pretty good, with long term utility.

If you have signed up from my referral link, you’ll also see the notice advising that you will soon win a rare card. This will count up to five cards, then award you with your free card. 

Scouting & Building your Team

There’s a good chance that you already have a keen eye on footballers, which is one of the many attractions of Sorare. 

Entering a  Sorare Tournament

Before you enter a tournament, it’s important to understand which one your players are best suited to. There are currently the following Leagues available:

• Global All Star. This is known as the Flagship tournament, with no entry limits. You can enter any players from your collection. 
• Global Under 23. Only players under the age of 23 are allowed in this tournament.
• Champion Europe. This tournament is limited to players from Bundesliga, La Liga, Ligue 1, Premier League & Serie A.
• Challenger Europe. This tournament is open to all European teams which aren’t currently eligible for the Champion Europe tournament.
• Champion Asia. This is limited to players from the K-League & J-League
• Global Unique. This is a tournament which is limited for Unique Cards only.
• Special Weekly. Sometimes, Sorare run special promotions where you can win a specific one-of-a-kind card. The entry requirements vary for this.
• Special Training. Any unused players can be sent here to gain XP towards their Card Level.

One league that I haven’t added to the above is the Rookie League. This is something that’s available for a Limited time to new players. New Managers can play for 8 game weeks with common cards and a maximum of two rare cards.

Each of the above have 4 Divisions which can be entered. The Division Rules are below:

League	Division 4	Division 3	Division 2	Division 1
Playable Cards:	At Least 4 Rares	At Least 3 Rares	At Least 3 Super Rare	At least 3 Unique Cards
Fillable With:	1 Common (50% Point Penalty)	Super Rare	1 Unique / 1 Rare	Super Rares
Captain:	Must be Rare	Must be Rare	Must be Super Rare	Must be Unique

Now you understand the Tournament structure, it’s time to explain more about the cards, including how you can start purchasing yourself.

Sorare Scoring Matrix Explained

Whilst it’s good that you now understand all of the various tournament types, the next stage is to explain the scoring process. This will help you to identify how each player generates it’s score, and will help you to understand which players to buy.

The player score is calculated based on the players performance on the pitch, making it a true fantasy football experience. It does add an additional fun factor to watching football, although it’s painful to see your player substituted early!

A player can score between zero and 100. Their actions are counted during a game an converted into a final point score. The scoring matrix is listed below:

How Rare are the Cards?

Before entering the market and deciding what cards to purchase, it’s important that I explain the scarcity of such cards. You might be looking at one card, and it costs thousands more than another card… although it seems to be exactly the same.

All player cards on the platform are Non-Fungible Tokens. There is a limited supply of cards, which means that demand will exceed supply, causing prices to rise further.

Every season, there will only be a maximum of 111 cards minted for each player. This may sound like quite a lot, but it’s important to remember that there are 45,000 teams lined up for the rookie tournaments, alongside 20,000 training squads and almost 10,000 entries to the Global All-Star this weekend alone.

The 111 cards are distributed as following:

• 100 Rare Cards
• 10 Super Rare Cards (SR’s)
• 1 Unique Card

Each card has a numbered release, just like a Topps or Panini collectible. Each card also comes with specific bonuses, and will never expire or be deleted. You can sell these on the market to another player/collector, it’s completely your decision.

Typically, the rarer the card, the more expensive it will be. Part of this is thanks to the Tournament Structure and Online Economy that Sorare have built, which I’ll start explaining shortly.

Although these cards aren’t physically in your hand, they are fully licensed and you do own them. Although 100 Rare cards seems like it’s a lot at first thought, it means that over a 5 year period only 500 rare cards would be produced. It’s inevitable that this won’t be enough supply for all of the demand, which means the better performing cards arrive with a higher premium price. As I stated above, there’s over 40,000 players currently learning the ropes in the rookie tournaments. 100 cards over 40,000 players isn’t going to cause an over-supply anytime soon.

In addition to the rare cards, the Super Rare cards & the Unique cards are even harder to achieve. It would take a serious bankroll to buy a Unique Kylian Mbappe, but this is going to be the exact sort of card that you need if you want to compete in the Global All Star Division 1. I haven’t left the Division 4 leagues yet, so unless you have a huge bankroll, I’d stick to the lower leagues to begin with.

How to Deposit Money into Sorare

Depositing has become a lot easier in the last few months, thanks to Sorare teaming up with Ramp (an online payment provider). Previously, you would have to deposit into a cryptocurrency site such as Binance, Coinbase or another of your choice). You can still use these for your deposits, but it’s much easier, and fee-friendly to use Ramp. Let’s run through a deposit now, so you can see just how easy this is.

• Navigate to your wallet, which you will find at the top right of the account (once you’ve logged in).

• Once you’ve opened up your wallet area, you’ll see the below screen. This gives you information such as your current wallet balance. You’ll also see a blue deposit button, but we aren’t looking for that one.
• Instead, choose the Ramp option, which I have highlighted below with the arrow.

• On your first deposit, you will need to provide identity documents such as your driving licence, passport or address documentation. This is to adhere to strict money laundering laws etc.

• Verifying your documents is really fast, and you can do this via a mobile using the live verification process. My identity documents were verified within three minutes.

• It’s important to be aware of the fees that Ramp charge. It’s not possible to deposit without some sort of fee, as you have to pay the Network Fees / ETH Gas fees. 
• The Network Fee is fixed, depending on the rate at that time. As I dislike paying fees, I would advise to do all of your depositing in one go, to pay as little fees as you can. It’s only £11, but it’s better to pay it once rather than twice!

Once you’ve added your bank details to Ramp, you will be able to make your deposit.

As soon as you’ve made this deposit, you’ll be able to track the status. It usually takes a few hours for the money to be transferred to your Sorare account, which is still pretty impressive. 

You can check exactly what stage you’re on, as you can see with my deposit below it was just over 90 minutes before the money was in my account. 

I’m really glad that Ramp is available for deposits, as it takes out quite a lot of the struggle when depositing. You can use your Debit Card directly on Sorare too, but the fees are much higher than using Ramp.

We will shortly be adding the guide here for the other deposit methods, so you can see a full rundown of every option.

Buying a Player on Sorare

This is by far the most fun aspect of Sorare, scouting for your next additions. There’s definite Football Manager vibes with this, and you get a wealth of tools for player analysis.

If you know exactly which player you want to purchase, you can type his name in the searchbar.

For this example, I’ve decided to show you the left back sensation Alex Grimaldo. He’s a consistent performer, that offers quite a good return for a fairly decent price of 0.226 Ethereum. You can search for any player that you want to check out, by typing their name. 

The Sorare database uses Ajax search functions too, which means that if you spell a players name incorrectly, it will still show you the player that it thinks you want.

When you select the player, you are taken to the Player Profile page. This includes an area full of detailed information. You can find:

• The players most recent scores, over the last five games.
• The Total Supply of a Player. You can see exactly how many Rare, Super Rare or Unique Cards are in circulation.
• Current Club information, plus a detailed overview of the player nationality, age and other personal information.

Once you’ve confirmed that your players scores are good, and you’re interested in buying him you can select the ‘cards’ tab. This area will then show you the cards for sale.

Again, you see a detailed hub with the following information:

• Current Sales, Previous Sales & Detailed Pricing information
• You can see the identity number of each card (Top left of card for 2020/21 season)
• The name of the manager that is selling the card
• The card level of the card on sale (higher card level tends to be a more expensive card)

As you can see below, there are currently no auctions for Alex Grimaldo, which means that there are no freshly minted cards on offer. All of the below sales, are sales from a Manager/player on the platform.

I have added the below image of Ryan Gravenberch, as you can immediately notice the difference in colour of button. This card can be ‘bid’ on, which means that it’s a newly minted card by Sorare. It’s never been owned before, and you have a chance to win it via auction.

 Sometimes, you aren’t certain which player you want to purchase. It’s nice to sometimes just browse, to see who’s available. You can do this, too.

On the menu, navigate to either:

New Signings

The new signings area contains players which have never been owned before. They’re freshly minted cards by Sorare, which are opened up at public auction. There’s no set times for these auctions, so be sure to check back regularly.

Transfer Market

The Transfer Market is where you’ll be buying from existing players. There is no minimum or maximum price that a player can be sold for, it’s a completely free market. There’s also no commission paid, so the figure that you set to sell, is the figure you receive.

The final thing regarding buying players that I advise you should look out for, is real professional footballers that play the game. There aren’t a huge number of players at present, but we’ve spotted Daley Blind who’s active on Sorare. Antoine Griezmann is also building a collection of stars.

You can tell if a player is active on Sorare, as it’s listed on the Player Profile Hub. In addition to this, they get their very own signed version of a card. They’re fantastic, and the ultimate card for a fan. Unfortunately, I’m not sure what it would cost to take this from the player itself!

Selling a Player on Sorare

Sometimes, you might just want to realise the profit in your card, or you’ve decided to part ways with someone in your collection. You don’t have to tell anyone your reasons for selling & it’s really easy to get the player listed for sale.

To sell your player, navigate to your gallery & select the player in question. I’ve chosen one of my favourite youth players, Myron Boadu. Note, I’m not selling him, this is just an example.

Simply select the ‘Sell My Card’ option, which will then open up the popup box for deciding how much you want to sell the card for. There’s no limit, you can choose however much you want to sell it for.

I’ve selected a whopping price for my Boadu card, but that’s because I don’t want to sell it. Nobody will pay this much, which means I’m safe to set this amount, for demo purposes.

When you’re selling a card, it’s important to set a realistic price, as there’s no guarantee that your card will sell. When it’s listed, it’s on the market for 48 hours before it expires. You can then decide to adjust the price, and re-list it.

Sorare Training: The Secret to Earning Extra XP

I’ve been showing you the basics of Sorare, but I also feel like I need to let you in on this secret about Training.

Well ok, it’s not quite a secret but it’s definitely an under-utilised aspect of Sorare. It definitely deserves to be in the Sorare beginners guide. You’re probably wondering what training is, or what it does.

The first thing you may be drawn to of these cards is the price. That’s not a dumb thing, as it’s definitely the #1 thing I look for. However, the next thing on your mind should be the player XP percentage, in the above case the first card has a 3.5% bonus, but the second card has a 6% bonus.

Whilst the bonus doesn’t appear to be much, it will take you quite a while to obtain and in some cases it’s the difference between winning a card, or narrowly missing out.

Your player does need to enter a Gameweek tournament in order to earn XP. If he’s left on your bench (not entered) then he earns nothing. Quite often, players will forget that there is a dedicated league setup for earning XP! It’s the Sorare Training league! Even if your player doesn’t feature on the weekend, he can still gain a minimal amount of XP from being entered in the Training league.

I wouldn’t always opt to purchase the player simply based on his XP percentage. It’s a fantastic bonus to have extra experience, but not if the cost is too high.

How to Withdraw Money from Sorare

Once you’ve sold your player, you can decide to re-invest or withdraw your money.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Sorare Gambling?

Sorare is not a gambling platform. This question has been raised quite a few times, especially in regard to the fact that the Ethereum prices can rise or fall quite quickly. In addition to this, there is the risk that a player could transfer out of a league that is covered by the game rules, rendering your card a collectible card only.

Legally, Sorare doesn’t need a gambling license. Below, is a snippet of Nicolas, the CEO, explaining why Sorare doesn’t need a gambling licence.

“A trigger for gambling is the notion of financial sacrifice”.

To be as transparent as possible, if Sorare tournaments were pay to enter contests, it would be seen as a gambling product. 

Football Index Alternatives: Does Sorare fill the void?

With all of the recent fallout from Football Index, Footstock and Sportstack ceasing to operate it’s been a difficult time for anybody that’s into their ‘Alt-Gambling’ products. 

I have been affected myself, as a player of both Football Index & Footstock. I’ve also been on Sorare since 2020.

This post is for those that have also been affected by the other platforms having closed, and I’m here to tell you that there is a fantastic football index alternative in Sorare, although you do have to be prepared for a slightly different game.

Football Index was always pushed as an investment platform, although it was a gambling product. I don’t believe that Sorare has the feeling that you’ve made an investment, but at the same time you own these cards forever. It’s also your duty to build the best team possible, and instead of winning dividends you can win more free cards & Ethereum payouts.

There is undoubtedly a void left as Football Index really had an excitement factor, and multiple people could win at once. With Sorare, you have to adapt to the fact that there can only be one winner (multiple prize positions available) but the payouts are fantastic. 

Sorare definitely fills the void, and adds the Fantasy Football style excitement that we all crave. However, at the same time you have to be ready for a different experience. It doesn’t feel like an investment, but more-so like a game where you can win new cards and crypto prizes.

How to Win Free Rare Cards

Winning Rare Cards is the aim of the game on Sorare. There’s also super rare & unique cards on offer each gameweek, but these will require you to have a larger team, and that will typically come with experience on the platform.

If you are interested in winning rare cards, it’s definitely worth looking at the prize pools. For example, winning the Global All Star will earn you a solid amount of money, alongside a Star Rare card.

This would earn you a player such as Joshua Kimmich, Robert Lewandowski or Memphis Depay (there’s also many more players available).