SBC News Voice of the Sports Betting Industry
UK gambling has registered a 21% increase in online gambling yield, reaching £1.54bn during the Q3 reporting period of October to December 2024.
The GGY figure leads the update of operator datasets published by the UK Gambling Commission (UKGC), tracking changes in online gambling by segment in the UK. Research reflects data gathered from the UK’s largest gambling licensees, covering 80% of the online gambling market, showing the number of active players in each vertical.
Matched against year-on-year comparatives, datasets reveal a new peak in total bets/spins, as online wagering reached a record £25.9bn. Peak wagering was registered whilst the average monthly active accounts in the quarter grew by 1%.
Q3 2024’s growth in online gambling GGY reflects a 38% YoY increase in online ‘real event’ betting, reaching £647m (Q3 2023: £593m). Online betting GGY in Q3 2024 reached its highest yield since the ‘COVID-inflated’ period of Q2 2021, which generated a yield of £752m.
The Commission observes that the inflated online betting GGY is due to bookmaker-friendly results recorded in the period, as “the number of bets decreased by 7%, whilst the average monthly active accounts decreased by 3% compared to the same quarter last year.”
Q3 data comparatives on betting wagers reflect £853m in 2024 vs £915m in 2023 and total betting actives of 16.3m players in 2024 vs 16.9m players in 2023
Online Slots reach new highs on reclassification
In the online casino segment, Q3 online slots registered a ‘new high’ of £709m, recorded during Q3 2024, up 13% on 2023 comparatives of £618m.
Of distinction, online slots reached a new peak of £23.9bn wagered, as the number of average active accounts in the segment grew by 10% to 4.4m.
The month of December 2024 generated a peak of activity, with 4.6m active accounts wagering total spins of £8.3bn.
The Commission noted that the GGY increase in slots is reflective of reclassified products entering the slots vertical during the quarter, which has had an impact on data inputs.
Further data on slots revealed that the number of spins per session has fallen from 151 to 145 year-on-year, whilst the GGY per session has fallen from £4.10 to £4.13 in the equivalent timeframe.
Other online segments, such as ‘gaming (including casino)’, maintained a monthly consistency of average active accounts at 2.5m players, registering a Q3 GGY of £152m (1% change on 2023 comparatives).
Online Safer Gambling Indicators
The number of online slot sessions lasting over an hour saw a 6% year-on-year increase, reaching 107 million. Meanwhile, the total number of sessions rose by 13% over the same period, totaling 170 million.
The Commission notes that approximately 6% of all sessions exceeded an hour during the quarter, compared to 7% in Quarter 3 of the previous year. Additionally, the average session length increased to 18 minutes.
During Q3, the total number of customer interactions grew by 23% year-on-year, reaching 3.5 million, with the majority continuing to be automated. Direct interactions undertaken by operators in this dataset increased by 12% year-on-year.
Some operators refined their markers of harm algorithms in Quarter 4 (2023–2024), resulting in a higher number of interactions this quarter.
UKGC Continues Data-First Approach
On datasets monitoring gambling activities, the UKGC maintains its notice to researchers, stating: “Comparisons should not be made with the industry statistics dataset, as this dataset may include free bets and bonuses and does not include data from all operators.”
Moving forward, the Commission is currently investigating the categorisation of certain products, which will result in changes to some data between verticals; however, this should have no impact on the overall totals.
Deemed a regulatory objective, the Commission continues to prioritise and restructure its data gathering for UK gambling, providing transparent information and resources for stakeholders.
Key projects see the UKGC leading the monitoring of gambling behaviours and prevalence via the new format of the Gambling Survey of Great Britain (GSGB) – cited as the largest survey on gambling behaviours conducted by a regulatory authority, with 20,000 respondents.
Last week, the Commission published new insights on gambling motivations, deemed “critical for researchers to comprehend both general gambling behaviours and their consequences.”
