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- Online gambling now accounts for almost 60% of the Belgian market
- Gaming halls and cafés face another difficult year
- New registrations on legal gambling sites fall by 43%
- Are Belgian players moving to illegal casinos?
- Belgium steps up its fight against illegal gambling
- A stable market, but growing pressure on regulation
Belgium’s regulated gambling market generated €1.62 billion in gross gaming revenue in 2025, virtually unchanged from the previous year. But the figures published by the Belgian Gaming Commission reveal a market undergoing significant change. Online casinos continue to expand, traditional gambling venues are losing ground, and the number of new players joining licensed platforms has fallen sharply. Meanwhile, the regulator is becoming increasingly concerned about the appeal of illegal gambling websites.
Online gambling now accounts for almost 60% of the Belgian market
According to the Belgian Gaming Commission’s annual report, regulated gambling operators generated €1.621 billion in gross gaming revenue (GGR) in 2025, a marginal decrease of 0.07% compared with 2024.
That apparent stability conceals a growing divide between online and land-based gambling. Revenue from online gaming and betting increased by 5.41% to €964.5 million, while land-based activities declined by 7.17% to €656.1 million.
Online gambling now represents 59.51% of the regulated Belgian market, up from 56.42% a year earlier.
The strongest performance came from licensed online casinos in Belgium. Operators holding an A+ licence saw their online GGR rise by 12.99%, from €490.4 million to €554.1 million. These operators alone now generate 58% of all regulated online gambling revenue.
Belgium’s nine physical casinos also reported growth, with their combined GGR increasing by 5.85% to €152.3 million. Together, land-based casinos and their online operations generated €706.4 million in 2025, an increase of 11.37%.
Gaming halls and cafés face another difficult year
Not every part of the gambling industry benefited from the move online.
Gaming halls operating under B licences and their associated B+ websites experienced a combined revenue decline of 8.90%, bringing their total GGR down to €350.5 million.
The online segment performed particularly poorly, with B+ revenue falling by 13.66% to €165.8 million. This stands in sharp contrast to the continued growth of A+ online casinos.
The decline was even more pronounced in cafés, where revenue from bingo machines and other permitted gambling machines dropped by 17.77% to €196 million.
The number of active C licences also continued to fall, from 4,272 in 2024 to 3,992 at the end of 2025.
Sports betting remained relatively stable. Total betting revenue increased by 0.92% to €367.6 million, supported by a 5.18% rise in online betting. Revenue from physical betting locations, however, fell by 6.60%.
New registrations on legal gambling sites fall by 43%
Beyond the financial results, one of the most striking findings concerns the number of players using legal gambling websites in Belgium.
In 2025, 528,706 people gambled at least once on a regulated online platform, compared with 602,288 in 2024. This represents a decline of more than 12%.
The fall in new players was considerably sharper.
Only 110,032 people joined the regulated online market for the first time in 2025, compared with 193,342 the previous year. That is a drop of approximately 43%.
The increase in the minimum legal gambling age in Belgium from 18 to 21, introduced in September 2024, explains part of this decline. In 2024, players aged 18 to 20 still accounted for more than 33,000 new registrations.
However, the Gaming Commission stresses that the age restriction cannot explain the entire decrease.
Interestingly, the average number of daily active online players actually rose by 3%, reaching 160,144.
The figures suggest that while fewer people are participating in the regulated market overall, those who remain continue to generate substantial activity.
Are Belgian players moving to illegal casinos?
This is where the Commission’s concerns become particularly relevant.
A reduction in the number of people gambling on licensed websites does not necessarily mean that gambling participation is falling across Belgium. Some players may simply be turning to illegal online casinos that operate outside Belgian supervision.
A survey commissioned by the regulator in 2025 offers a worrying indication of the problem.
Among 1,000 respondents aged 18 to 30, 53% reported having gambled recently. Of those who gambled, 28% said they had used an illegal gambling website.
The survey also found that 39% of respondents aged 18 to 20 reported continuing to gamble despite the increase in the legal age limit.
These findings concern a specific group of young adults and cannot be applied to the Belgian population as a whole. Nevertheless, they underline the difficulties regulators face in keeping gambling activity within the licensed market.
Belgium steps up its fight against illegal gambling
The Belgian Gaming Commission has made tackling unlicensed gambling a central part of its enforcement strategy.
In 2025, its control department conducted 9,842 checks, including 9,500 carried out remotely.
A considerable proportion involved illegal gambling advertisements circulating on social media. The Commission submitted 8,528 reports to Meta, many concerning advertisements that impersonated legitimate Belgian operators or misused their branding.
The regulator has also changed how it deals with illegal websites.
Rather than depending primarily on financial penalties, which are often difficult to recover from operators based abroad, it has placed greater emphasis on website blocking, blacklisting and cooperation with internet infrastructure providers.
Its partnership with DNS Belgium is intended to make it easier to take action against illegal gambling websites using Belgian domain names.
However, enforcement remains challenging. At the end of 2025, the Commission had only 33.4 full-time-equivalent staff effectively available, compared with the 57 positions included in its staffing plan.
A stable market, but growing pressure on regulation
Belgium's gambling industry remains substantial, and online casinos are clearly driving much of its activity. Yet the Commission's latest figures raise questions that go beyond revenue.
The 43% fall in new players entering the licensed market is particularly significant. Although tighter restrictions may explain some of the decline, they do not establish whether those players have stopped gambling or moved elsewhere.
For Belgian gambling regulation, the challenge is not simply to impose stricter rules. It is also to ensure that people who choose to gamble can do so within an environment where operators are licensed, monitored and required to provide safeguards.
At CasinoRating, we believe the distinction between licensed and illegal operators deserves particular attention. Strong player protection matters, but so does the ability of the regulated market to retain players.
The central question is whether Belgium can continue strengthening its gambling rules without pushing more activity beyond the reach of its regulator.
The central question is whether Belgium can continue strengthening its gambling rules without pushing more activity beyond the reach of its regulator.
