Great Britain’s customer-facing gambling industry generated £17.5 billion in gross gambling yield in the year to March 2026, a 4.4% increase on the preceding financial year, the Gambling Commission’s latest annual statistics show. The total was a record and marked a fifth consecutive year of growth from the pandemic-affected 2020-21 period, when GGY stood at £12.67 billion, according to Focus Gaming News.
The Commission published the annual report on Sept. 17 alongside fourth-quarter industry statistics and the latest Gambling Survey for Great Britain data. Ben Haden, the regulator’s director of research and policy, said market movements were “complex” and reflected a mix of factors requiring more than one data source to understand.
Excluding the National Lottery and society lotteries, GGY reached £13.2 billion, up 4.7% year on year. The National Lottery accounted for £3.47 billion, or roughly one-fifth of the overall total. Revenue from remote casino, betting and bingo products rose 6.9% to £8.3 billion, while land-based gambling revenue edged up 1.1% to £4.86 billion.
Online casino was the principal source of growth. Its GGY rose 14.8% to £5.7 billion, with online slots contributing £4.79 billion, up 15.5%, and accounting for about 84% of online casino revenue.
The rise in casino revenue contrasted with declines in betting. Online betting GGY fell 6.6% to £2.45 billion and retail betting revenue dropped 3.3% to £2.42 billion. Focus Gaming News said wagers nevertheless increased by about 4.5%, indicating that the lower betting yield did not necessarily mean less betting activity. Football remained the largest online betting category at £1.17 billion, ahead of horseracing at £769 million. Online bingo GGY declined 13.8% to £148 million.
The number of licensed gambling premises fell 2% to 8,080 by March 31. Betting shops fell 3.6% to 5,617, a net reduction of 208 premises. The number of licensed operators also slipped 1.1% year on year to 2,154, holding licences for 3,097 gambling activities.
Gaming machines across land-based sectors generated £2.7 billion, up 4.3%, although that figure is already included within the revenue totals reported for the individual sectors.
