The UK Gambling Commission has reported an online total gross gambling yield (GGY) increase of over 10% year-over-year for the country’s gambling market in the second quarter of 2024, as the total number of bets and active accounts also increased during the period.
Slots GGY also increased by more than 15% in comparison to the same period last year, but the Commission did include the caveat that one operator has re-classified some of its products, impacting the data.
The UKGC’s data on the gambling industry features online and in-person gambling covering licensed betting operators found on Britain’s high streets. The Commission has been collecting data from March 2020 until September 2024 to date.
In addition, the UKGC continues to state that it is investigating the categorisation of certain products, which could result in some data between verticals changing, but added it should “have no impact on the overall totals”.
Publishing its Q2 data for the UK gambling market – July to September – the Commission noted that online operator GGY data, covering approximately 80% of the online gambling market, stood at £1.32bn, an 11% increase YoY.
However, the quarter’s figure was down on the £1.46bn reported during the Q1 data release earlier this year in August.
The number of total bets and/or spins increased by 12% YoY in Q2 to hit a new high for the third consecutive quarter of 25.2 billion. Meanwhile, the average monthly active accounts in the quarter increased by 8%.
Slots GGY hit a new high as well with £680m in the quarter, up 16% YoY, as the number of spins grew by 13% to 23.3 billion, while the average monthly active accounts rose by 16% to 4.4 million per month.
The UKGC noted that while the slots GGY was a new record in Q2, one operator had re-classified some of its products into the slot vertical this quarter, which had an impact on the vertical data.
The number of online slots sessions lasting longer than an hour rose by 9% YoY to 10 million, while the average session length remained at 17 minutes.
Approximately 6.1% of all sessions lasted more than one hour (Q2 2023: 6.6%), but the number of spins per session and the GGY per session has fallen in comparison to the same quarter the previous year to 142 (2023: 147) and £4.13 (2023: £4.20) respectively.
Real event betting GGY increased by 6% YoY to £453m. However, the number of bets decreased by 10%, while the average monthly active accounts in Q2 increased by 9%.
Across other verticals in terms of GGY, other gaming (including casino) stood at £153m, virtual betting was £9.5m, esports betting came in at £4.1m, poker was £13.1m and other stood at £1.7m.
As for licensed betting operator data, covering approximately 85% of the retail betting market, GGY decreased by 1% YoY to £533m, while the number of total bets and spins declined by 0.1% to 3.1 billion.
Across products in GGY, over-the-counter stood at £152.1m, self-service betting terminals came in at £100.6m and machines stood at £280.7m.
