Statistics and research release
Gambling business data on gambling during Covid-19 July 2021 to December 2021 (published February 2022)
A collection of data provided by gambling businesses during the coronavirus pandemic.
Summary
Details
Data tables for operator data
The full dataset from the earlier months of the pandemic is available in the Excel document.
The following data tables 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.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Slots | 3,155,772 | 3,087,181 | 3,098,308 | 3,219,525 | 3,190,757 | 3,423,140 | 5% |
| Other gaming (including casino) | 2,239,918 | 2,213,702 | 2,183,279 | 2,263,187 | 2,211,877 | 2,401,391 | 4% |
| Betting (Real event) | 5,505,234 | 4,695,334 | 4,990,694 | 4,923,936 | 4,699,434 | 4,881,497 | -5% |
| Betting (Virtual) | 225,982 | 227,187 | 230,173 | 251,537 | 230,137 | 244,864 | 6% |
| Poker | 261,652 | 225,720 | 246,347 | 262,251 | 248,470 | 273,112 | 3% |
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.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Slots | 5,906,110,174 | 6,013,982,440 | 5,685,998,179 | 6,120,476,686 | 5,672,738,710 | 6,412,977,218 | 3% |
| Other gaming (including casino) | 282,261,076 | 292,255,536 | 309,682,378 | 335,585,894 | 300,142,049 | 324,600,766 | 9% |
| Betting (Real event) | 252,139,493 | 249,797,845 | 255,004,323 | 275,480,062 | 249,659,453 | 259,128,098 | 4% |
| Betting (Virtual) | 13,387,296 | 13,773,607 | 12,675,371 | 13,627,726 | 12,846,306 | 14,436,745 | 3% |
| Poker | 75,808,710 | 78,298,713 | 73,685,701 | 80,664,453 | 79,780,506 | 84,190,432 | 7% |
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.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Average session length (minutes) | 19 | 20 | 19 | 19 | 19 | 18 | 0 |
| Sessions >1hr | 2,453,848 | 2,492,219 | 2,592,759 | 2,762,397 | 2,541,310 | 2,836,813 | 8% |
| Total number of sessions | 31,463,152 | 31,527,073 | 35,034,858 | 37,187,666 | 35,499,030 | 41,527,216 | 17% |
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.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Slots | £187,235,663 | £192,475,115 | £182,038,985 | £189,963,814 | £177,900,355 | £200,186,689 | 1% |
| Other gaming (including casino) | £57,747,117 | £60,625,352 | £55,520,211 | £58,639,978 | £51,959,821 | £62,707,725 | 0% |
| Betting (Real Event) | £195,870,777 | £138,972,236 | £210,554,733 | £94,197,386 | £224,459,234 | £141,985,160 | -16% |
| Betting (Virtual) | £6,081,398 | £5,718,477 | £5,308,322 | £5,819,079 | £5,311,675 | £6,125,645 | 1% |
| Betting (eSports) | £1,180,269 | £1,024,770 | £1,072,047 | £1,061,177 | £780,976 | £1,531,662 | 3% |
| Poker | £6,054,086 | £6,425,752 | £6,341,035 | £6,563,409 | £6,348,420 | £6,962,644 | 6% |
| Other | £1,261,615 | £1,356,636 | £1,016,368 | £1,177,844 | £1,023,542 | £996,520 | -12% |
Licensed betting operator data
Please be mindful of the minor restrictions that were in place in Q3 as a result of the Omicron variant.
Table 5: Number of bets and or spins
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 85% of the retail betting market showing the number of bets/slips across available products.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Over the counter | 51,293,626 | 52,071,529 | 50,832,094 | 53,071,002 | 47,230,768 | 45,680,029 | -5% |
| SSBT | 6,626,573 | 7,917,388 | 8,847,425 | 10,035,819 | 9,168,759 | 8,937,954 | 20% |
| Machines | 987,313,003 | 1,031,496,251 | 1,027,968,621 | 1,094,992,385 | 1,052,680,332 | 996,137,836 | 3% |
Table 6: GGY
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 85% of the retail betting market showing GGY across available products.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Over the counter | £58,331,908 | £57,703,230 | £67,718,072 | £61,129,368 | £54,679,516 | £50,613,897 | -9% |
| SSBT | £24,799,273 | £18,752,437 | £33,656,785 | £18,481,765 | £37,635,859 | £26,694,523 | 7% |
| Machines | £88,845,343 | £93,420,043 | £93,189,823 | £99,266,591 | £94,779,707 | £90,080,535 | 3% |
Table 7: Machine sessions
Data from the biggest operators, covering approximately 85% of the retail betting market showing machines data.
| Q2 | Q3 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2021 | August 2021 | September 2021 | October 2021 | November 2021 | December 2021 | % change from Q2 to Q3 2021 | |
| Total number of sessions | 7,809,063 | 8,310,328 | 8,302,677 | 8,551,222 | 8,174,543 | 7,807,418 | 0% |
| Number of sessions > 1hr | 216,495 | 227,156 | 223,661 | 242,120 | 235,022 | 221,712 | 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.