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
Active involvement in gambling 2022 to 2025
The long-term trend shows no change in the proportion of young people actively involved in gambling: 31 percent in 2022 and 30 percent in 2025.
The top 10 gambling activities that young people spend their own money on has also remained broadly consistent over time, with arcade gaming machines play the most common activity each year, as shown in Table 3.2. The exceptions are National Lottery online instant win games falling out of the top 10 activities over time, to be replaced with betting at a shop or bookies, and a slight dip in placing a bet for money in the intervening years of 2023 and 2024 (15 percent 2022, 11 percent 2023, 11 percent 2024 and 14 percent 2025).
Table 3.2: Top 10 gambling activities that young people spent their own money on within the past 12 months, in 2025 (with comparison data for 2022 to 2024)
GAMSPEND4. And when did you last spend money on [this activity or these activities]? Was it …?
Base: All answering 2022 (2,559), 2023 (3,453), 2024 (3,869), 2025 (3,666).
Note: multiple response question, therefore answers do not sum to 100 percent.
| Top 10 gambling activities young people spent their own money on within the past 12 months (list based on activities in 2025) | 2022 (percentage) | 2023 (percentage) | 2024 (percentage) | 2025 (percentage) | Statistical difference 2025 compared with 2022 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spent money on any gambling activity in last 12 months | 31% | 26% | 27% | 30% | No significant difference |
| Played arcade gaming machines | 22% | 19% | 20% | 21% | No significant difference |
| Placed a bet for money between friends or family | 15% | 11% | 11% | 14% | No significant difference |
| Played cards for money | 5% | 5% | 5% | 5% | No significant difference |
| Played fruit or slot machines | 3% | 3% | 4% | 4% | No significant difference |
| Played bingo at somewhere other than a bingo club | 2% | 1% | 2% | 2% | No significant difference |
| Placed a bet on a betting website and/or app | 1% | 1% | 2% | 1% | No significant difference |
| Placed a bet on esports | 2% | 1% | 1% | 1% | No significant difference |
| Played an online game on a casino website (for example online poker or online roulette for money) | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | No significant difference |
| Placed a bet at a betting shop or bookies | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | No significant difference |
| National Lottery scratchcards | 1% | 1% | 1% | 1% | No significant difference |
Experience of gambling 2022 to 2025 Next section
Trends in the DSM-IV-MR-J screen
Last updated: 13 November 2025
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