Report
Exploring online, illegal, individual-led lotteries and raffles
Exploring online, illegal, individual-led lotteries and raffles
Qualitative phase
The qualitative phase was designed to build a deeper understanding of how participants experience and perceive online individual-led lotteries and raffles encountered on social media. While the quantitative phase provided an indication of scale, exposure and participation, and the digital intelligence phase mapped how this activity appears online, the qualitative research explored how these journeys unfold in practice from the perspective of those taking part.
In particular, the qualitative phase focused on:
- motivations for taking part and the overall experience of participation, including trust cues, perceived ease and any points of friction
- routes into participation, including how content is first encountered and whether discovery is passive or intentional
- how participants move between TikTok and other social media platforms or external sites in order to participate
- how participants perceive the legality of these activities, including whether they recognise them as gambling and what they expect in terms of fairness and making complaints.
The qualitative research consisted of 10 online in-depth interviews, each lasting approximately 45 minutes, with 9 players and 1 host of online individual-led lotteries and raffles on social media platforms in the UK. The sample included 5 men and 5 women and covered those with experience of TikTok, Facebook and Instagram. Fieldwork was conducted between April and May 20264.
References
4The full qualitative discussion guide and detailed qualitative sample breakdown are provided in Appendix D and Appendix E of this report.
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Strengths of the approach
Last updated: 13 August 2026
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