The online ode to gambling in the UK
Gambling has long been popular in the UK since it was legalized in the 60s. Visiting a casino, bingo hall or bookie is one of Britain’s favorite pastimes.
So as you can imagine, the advent of online gambling as a match made in heaven for the average avid Brit who enjoys a dabble every now and then. And due to major technological advancements online gambling is accelerating at a grand pace.
The past two decades have some radical changes to the gambling industry than ever before. Radical those changes were, they’ve improved the industry massive and made gambling more enjoyable and profitable. A huge part of those changes is down to online platform of gambling.
Now, online gambling is said to be the most popular form of gambling in the UK. Most users play the same games as the ones found in regular casinos and betting shops, bingo, sports betting, lotteries, table games, card games, slots, the works. And why not? More a lot of people, the convenience is the main attraction of online gambling. You can do it from your smartphone, on the move, from your bed, wherever you like! And with ever growing features such as in-play betting and cash-out options, the surge of online gamblers is ever growing.
The British gambling industry grew by 12.5%, or £12.6billion, in the period between 2014-15, a 3% rise from the previous period, and 30% of that total stems from online gambling. Remote gambling markets proved to be crucial in these final figures, a combination of sports betting, digital bingo and casino gaming generated over £3billion from October 2014 to September 2015.
The data from online operators seems to back up these growth figures as well. As this casino insights infographic from 888casino shows, the highest jackpot earnings were made at the end of this 2014-2015 period in the month of September, while the overall total for the year came in at a staggering $27,882,313. Interestingly, the highest paying day of the week was a Thursday while the luckiest day of 2015 was 9th December, despite that month having a relatively low jackpot payout.
Overall the most popular market of the online sector is football betting, with the added cash-out and in-play options aiding this. The accumulator, both teams to score, total goals scored and Asian corner bets available are just some of the features that draw in thousands of punters every week. The second most popular market of online gambling is horse-racing which is three times less revenue than football, followed by dogs betting which is over thirty times less revenue, highlighting the importance of the football market.
However, as successful as online there are of course repercussions for land-based operators. Whilst the online market is booming, there are some areas for concern among land-based counterparts. The number of betting shops decreased from 8,975 in March 2015 to 8,809 in March 2016, a decline of 1.9%.
That wasn’t the only area of concern for land-based operators as there were other areas of decline. The number of arcades fell by an alarming 11.1% from 1,937 in March 2015 to just 1,721 in March 2016. Concurrently, bingo-halls suffered a similar decrease of 10.1%, falling to just 599. Though the risk to bingo-halls is lessened as the total gross gambling yield from bingo did improve by 4.9%. So although the number of bingo-halls has decreased, statistics suggest that players are spending more money.
