The Gambling Commission has published a new estimate suggesting that 2.5% of adults who gambled online in the previous year used illegal gambling websites during the four weeks before they were surveyed. The findings, released on November 5, use reported behavior to identify activity that players may not recognize as illegal.
Across the wider population, including people who do not gamble, the corresponding estimate was 0.6%. These are estimates of participation, rather than the share of betting revenue or money spent with unlicensed operators.
Players May Not Know Which Sites Are Unlicensed
The research uses an Illegal Gambling Index built from seven behavioral indicators. Simply asking people whether they have used an illegal website can miss activity when respondents do not know how to identify one.
The indicators include joining a site specifically to avoid identity checks, using a VPN to reach a gambling website unavailable in Great Britain, and knowingly using a site outside GAMSTOP, the national online self-exclusion scheme. The index combines weighted scores with the timing of those behaviors.
The analysis covers survey data collected from April 2025 to April 2026. Another 4.6% of respondents showed limited indications of engagement, but the evidence was insufficient to classify them confidently as recent users. That group is separate from the headline participation estimates.
A New Dashboard Tracks Disruption
An accompanying illegal gambling dashboard identified 586 websites accessible from Great Britain in September. The Commission cautioned that its monitoring does not provide a complete count of the illegal market.
The regulator also reported disruption action against 311 websites in the second quarter of its 2026–27 reporting year. Among sites with enough data for comparison, 77% experienced lower estimated traffic afterward. Those changes do not establish that enforcement alone caused the decline.
Checking a Site Still Matters
For players, the practical step is to verify the business and website through the Commission’s public register. Licensed operators must display their regulated status and link to their register entry. The new index helps the regulator assess participation across the market, while that register lets an individual customer check the site they intend to use.
