Statistics and research release
Gambling business data on gambling during coronavirus (COVID-19) April 2021 (published June 2021)
A collection of data provided by gambling businesses during the coronavirus pandemic.
Summary
Also published recently
This release contains incorrect information provided by an operator and should be read with caution. We advise users to refer to the most recent coronavirus (COVID-19) data release, which contains corrected data.
Details
Data tables for operator data
As a result of lockdown restrictions and the furloughing of many staff we did not request data from land-based operators for the month of April and will restart collecting this data shortly
Data from the last 6 months can be found on this page. The full online dataset from the earlier months of the pandemic is available in the Excel document.
The data tables below cover online gambling activity.1
Table 1: Total number of active players per vertical
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 80% of the online gambling market showing the number of active players on each vertical.
Note: a player may be active in more than one product, so these columns must not be summarised to give an overall total number of players.
| Nov 2020 | Dec 2020 | Jan 2021 | Feb 2021 | Mar 2021 | Apr 2021 | % change from Mar to Apr 2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Slots | 2,810,429 | 2,975,936 | 3,000,939 | 2,971,058 | 3,276,184 | 3,241,249 | -1% |
| Other gaming (including casino) | 1,869,531 | 2,122,875 | 2,131,321 | 1,943,868 | 2,194,757 | 2,175,055 | -1% |
| Betting (Real event) | 4,804,643 | 4,955,310 | 4,832,868 | 4,823,408 | 6,015,626 | 6,708,655 | 12% |
| Betting (Virtual) | 225,427 | 246,689 | 239,021 | 227,622 | 269,984 | 256,233 | -5% |
| Poker | 342,070 | 338,669 | 382,261 | 351,046 | 338,903 | 300,520 | -11% |
Table 2: Total number of bets placed per vertical
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 80% of the online gambling market showing the number of bets placed on each vertical.
| Nov 2020 | Dec 2020 | Jan 2021 | Feb 2021 | Mar 2021 | Apr 2021 | % change from Mar to Apr 2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Slots | 5,246,868,661 | 5,893,170,607 | 5,868,553,027 | 5,504,664,429 | 6,159,504,899 | 6,068,410,824 | -1% |
| Other gaming (including casino) | 271,828,657 | 313,175,960 | 313,886,879 | 279,104,076 | 305,651,899 | 295,558,021 | -3% |
| Betting (Real event) | 286,115,739 | 293,042,135 | 301,081,387 | 296,906,794 | 375,179,182 | 344,317,080 | -8% |
| Betting (Virtual) | 16,519,741 | 17,444,643 | 17,812,994 | 16,415,134 | 18,399,418 | 17,077,927 | -7% |
| Poker | 106,836,365 | 110,945,805 | 131,403,728 | 121,773,855 | 116,471,757 | 94,675,061 | -19% |
Table 3: Session length
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 80% of the online gambling market showing average slots session length in minutes and the number of sessions that lasted an hour or longer.
| Nov 2020 | Dec 2020 | Jan 2021 | Feb 2021 | Mar 2021 | Apr 2021 | Change from Mar to Apr 2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Average session length (minutes) | 22 | 22 | 21 | 22 | 21 | 20 | -1 |
| Sessions >1hr | 2,274,666 | 2,535,564 | 2,637,616 | 2,524,347 | 2,728,438 | 2,610,843 | -4% |
Table 4: Gross Gambling Yield2
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 80% of the online gambling market showing the gross gambling yield (GGY) from each vertical.
Note: March data includes the Cheltenham Festival.
| Nov 2020 | Dec 2020 | Jan 2021 | Feb 2021 | Mar 2021 | Apr 2021 | % change from Mar to Apr 2021 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Slots | £176,809,692 | £199,747,383 | £193,887,006 | £176,884,970 | £202,921,192 | £202,022,041 | 0% |
| Other gaming (including casino) | £66,449,370 | £73,945,196 | £72,726,396 | £64,284,074 | £71,247,185 | £70,950,541 | 0% |
| Betting (Real Event) | £209,232,147 | £319,600,149 | £279,753,688 | £263,863,756 | £250,567,294 | £267,393,328 | 7% |
| Betting (Virtual) | £7,173,437 | £7,946,792 | £7,894,519 | £7,121,871 | £8,408,173 | £7,621,729 | -9% |
| Betting (eSports) | £1,414,539 | £1,326,568 | £1,688,147 | £1,565,682 | £1,838,879 | £1,902,862 | 3% |
| Poker | £9,109,098 | £9,371,478 | £10,614,669 | £9,298,371 | £9,215,691 | £8,390,140 | -9% |
| Other | £1,315,936 | £1,706,035 | £1,747,570 | £2,159,197 | £2,087,213 | £1,993,048 | -5% |
Notes
1 Changes in data could be due to a variety of factors impacting the market since March 2019.
2 This should not be directly compared to GGY published in our Industry Statistics because this data is taken from a sample of approximately 80% of the online market.