Report
Young People and Gambling 2025: Official statistics
Gambling Commission report produced by Ipsos on young people and their gambling behaviour, attitudes and awareness in 2025.
Contents
- Executive summary
- Wider experience of gambling
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- Summary
- Wider experience and active involvement in gambling
- Experience of different categories of gambling activities
- Experience of different types of gambling activities
- Who young people were with when they gambled
- Being stopped from gambling for being too young
- Gambling in the context of what young people do in their spare time
- Gambling in the context of other risk taking behaviours
- Active involvement in gambling and experience of problem gambling
- Trends in gambling behaviours: 2022 to 2025
- Young people’s exposure to gambling
- The impact of gambling on young people
- Gambling activities and gaming
- Perspectives on gambling: Awareness, attitudes and behaviours
- Appendices
The impact of gambling on relationships
Young people who had gambled with their own money in the last 12 months were asked whether gambling had affected their relationships with family and friends.
Most young people who had used their own money to gamble, said this had never led to telling lies to family or friends (95 percent), or arguments (93 percent). However, around 1 in 20 young people who used their own money to gamble, had told lies to family or friends (5 percent), or got into arguments (7 percent) at least once because of gambling in the past 12 months.
Boys were more likely than girls to report that their gambling in the past 12 months had ever led to telling lies to family members or friends (7 percent, compared with 3 percent). Those from ethnic minorities were also more likely than those who are white to report ever telling lies to family members or friends as a result of gambling in the past 12 months (12 percent, compared with 4 percent). Young people from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) were more likely to report ever getting into arguments with friends or family in the past 12 months as a result of their gambling, compared with those to young people who are white (14 percent, compared with 4 percent).
Figure 5.5: Extent to which gambling had led to lying and arguing with family or friends or others within the past 12 months
Figure 5.5 information
GC_LEDLYING GC_LEDRISKEDFAM. In the past 12 months has your gambling ever led to the following?
Base: All 11 to 17 year olds answering who have spent their own money gambling in the last 12 months “Telling lies to family and/or friends or others” 2025 (1,058), “Arguments with family and/or friends” 2025 (1,058).
| Extent to which gambling led to lying and arguing with family and/or friends or others | 2025 (percentage) | |
|---|---|---|
| Telling lies to family and/or friends or others | Arguments with family and/or friends or others | |
| Never | 95% | 93% |
| Once or twice | 3% | 4% |
| Sometimes | 1% | 2% |
| Often | 1% | 1% |
Overall, the proportion of young people who told lies to family or friends or others in the past 12 months as a result of gambling, has decreased from 9 percent in 2024 to 5 percent in 2025. However, the proportion of young people who say their gambling led to arguments with family, friends or others, has remained consistent, as shown in Table 5.4.
Table 5.4: Extent to which gambling had led to lying and arguing with family or friends or others 2024 to 2025
GC_LEDLYING GC_LEDRISKEDFAM. In the past 12 months has your gambling ever led to the following?
Base: All participants (answering) who have spent their own money on gambling in the last 12 months “Telling lies to family or friends or others “ 2024 (935) 2025 (1,058), “Arguments with family or friends or others” 2024 (939) 2025 (1,058).
| Telling lies to family or friends or others | 2024 (percentage) | 2025 (percentage) | Statistical difference 2025 compared with 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|
| My gambling has never led to this | 91% | 95% | Significant increase |
| Once or twice | 5% | 3% | Significant decrease |
| Sometimes | 1% | 1% | No significant difference |
| Often | 3% | 1% | Significant decrease |
| Done so at least once in the past 12 months | 9% | 5% | Significant decrease |
| Arguments with family or friends or others | 2024 (percentage) | 2025 (percentage) | Statistical difference 2025 compared with 2024 |
| My gambling has never led to this | 92% | 93% | No significant difference |
| Once or twice | 5% | 4% | No significant difference |
| Sometimes | 1% | 2% | No significant difference |
| Often | 2% | 1% | No significant difference |
| Done so at least once in the past 12 months | 8% | 7% | No significant difference |
The impact of gambling on school attendance
Last updated: 13 November 2025
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