The latest data from the UK Gambling Commission’s (UKGC) Gambling Survey of Great Britain (GSGB) has affirmed that young males are more likely to be drawn to traditionally higher risk gaming verticals.
The study found that when lottery draws are removed, males aged 18 to 24 had the highest rate of gambling participation, 47%, compared to the overall figure of 28% for the whole cohort.
Male participants showed a stronger preference for betting exchanges, in-play betting and virtual horse racing – all products that require repeated player interaction and have been flagged as higher risk verticals due to their rapid gameplay mechanics and highly engaging design features.
The data detailed that scratchcards (12%), sports betting (10%) and online instant win games (7%) ranked as the three most frequently used non-lottery activities – products that are typically associated with higher gambling risk.
Gambling rates stabilise
The GSGB was developed over a two-year period to transform research design for UK gambling, aimed at providing stakeholders with more frequent data on gambling prevalence and trends.
This current dataset is the fourth wave of the study and surveyed a nationally representative sample of 5,191 adults during the period from September 2024 to January 2025.
Overall, 46% of adults gambled during the previous four weeks, down from 49% in the previous wave.
19% of participants solely engaged in lottery draws, including the National Lottery and charity lotteries, reducing the overall prevalence to 28% when lottery-only players are excluded – a rate that remains stable compared to previous iterations of the study.
Online and in-person gambling participation rates were 37% and 28%, respectively, falling to 17% and 18% when lottery-only players are excluded, highlighting the large proportion of players who only gamble on lottery draws.
Outside of buying tickets for lottery draws, betting on sports and racing online via an app, 9%, was the most popular form of online gambling.
Gambling ‘for the chance to win big money’ and ‘because it’s fun’ were cited as the most popular reasons given for why respondents gamble, remaining in line with previous datasets.
Financial risk assessments pilot
Alongside publishing the results of the GSGB, the UKGC also released an update on the ongoing pilot of financial risk assessments.
Implemented as part of reforms recommended by the 2023 Gambling White Paper, the UKGC is trialling the use of financial risk assessments as a way to identify high-spending online gambling customers who may be financially vulnerable.
The pilot is a three-stage process, and data from stage 2 revealed that approximately 1.7 million checks across three credit reference agencies were undertaken, encompassing approximately 860,000 accounts.
The commission notes that 97% of these were done in a “frictionless manner”, up from 95% in stage one, and above the 80% rate estimated by the white paper. It estimates that if the proposed thresholds were introduced, 0.1% of accounts would require an assessment and be unable to receive one in a frictionless manner.
It also highlights that the number of accounts checked in the pilot is not indicative of how many accounts would be checked if the financial assessments were to be introduced in a live environment.
On the pilot, Helen Rhodes, Director of Major Policy Projects for the UKGC, said: “These further findings from the pilot have helped us understand the extent that assessments could be conducted in a frictionless manner.
“Building on our staged approach to the pilot, we will now further explore data consistency across credit reference agencies, as well as how to support operators to identify the severity of financial difficulties that a customer may be experiencing and how they could support these customers.”
The UKGC emphasised that these checks are not the same as ‘affordability checks’ and the Commission does not have any regulatory requirements for or is proposing such checks.
