UK gross online gambling yield (GGY) increased 5% year-on-year in the fourth quarter to £1.3bn (€1.51bn/$1.62bn), with land sector GGY also improving.
The latest Gambling Behavior Report released by the Gambling Commission covers activity in January, February and March 2023, including the Cheltenham Festival horse racing event.
The commission said the increase in online GGY was driven primarily by increases in real-event wagering and slots. The regulator also noted an increase in the total number of bets and spins, as well as the average number of monthly active accounts.
Online real event betting was up almost 13% to £555m, with bet volume up 19% and average monthly active accounts up 9% year-on-year. The commission attributed this to the popularity of the Cheltenham Festival and the retention of players from the 2022 FIFA World Cup late last year.
Meanwhile, online slot GGY grew 2% to £525m as spins increased 9% to 19.5bn and average monthly active accounts increased 15% to 3.9m.
Other activities saw online casino GGY down 4% to £153m, virtual betting down 3% to £12m and online poker down 7% to £18m, while esports betting It was flat at £2m.
land-based growth
Turning to land activity, total GGY in this area of the market increased 6% year-on-year to £585m.
Console GGY increased 5% to £292m, with average spend per session increasing to £12.26. The average number of spins per machine session was also up to 131 spins, with 3% of all machine sessions surpassing his hour.
The popularity of self-service betting terminals also continued to grow, with GGY up 28% to £125m. The commission also noted that the number of bets made on terminals increased by 28% to reach 37 million.
However, domestic GGY was down 5% to £167m and bets were down 4% to £138m.
