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Report

Understanding the consumer landscape in free draws and prize competitions

This short report explores consumer behaviour in relation to free draws and prize competitions

Published
22 January 2026

Last updated
22 January 2026 - Changes

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  1. Contents
  2. Introduction

Introduction

Background

In this report we take a closer look at consumer behaviour in relation to free draws and prize competitions, which are commonly referred to as prize draws. While free draws and prize competitions are not regulated under the Gambling Act 2005, they are relevant to our wider evidence priorities, particularly in relation to Evidence Theme 2: The range and variability of gambling experiences. This topic also forms a roadmap for this theme looking at how gambling fits into people’s lives.

Our aim was to better understand who participates in free draws and prize competitions, if and how they gamble, and and how this activity fits into the broader consumer landscape. By doing so, we can deepen our understanding of the world around the gambling sector and improve our insight into consumer behaviours that may share characteristics with gambling

This report draws on three distinct data sources:

  • Gambling Survey for Great Britain (GSGB) data1 to examine participation levels and demographic patterns
  • YouGov Finance open banking data2 to explore financial behaviours and spending
  • Similar Web web traffic data3 to understand online engagement with free draw and prize competition providers.

By triangulating these sources, we can generate richer insights than any single dataset could provide alone and enhance the robustness of our findings. This is also an example of using GSGB to identify and explore new and evolving consumer behaviours, by having a survey vehicle which is flexible enough to add topical and ad hoc questions to it. It also highlights how combining multiple data sources can support the Commission in understanding activities in context.

References

1 Gambling Survey for Great Britain online survey, April 2024 to April 2025

2 YouGov Finance (opens in new tab) , April 2024 to April 2025

3 SimilarWeb (opens in new tab), May 2024 to April 2025

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