Belgium Online Gambling Grows as New Player Registrations Fall 43%

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Altay Celikkaya

Content Manager

Updated: 18/09/26

Reading Time: 3 minutes

Belgium’s regulated gambling market remained broadly flat in 2025 as online growth offset a further decline across land-based gambling. Figures from the Belgian Gaming Commission, or KSC, show total gross gaming revenue of €1.62 billion, down 0.07% year-on-year. Online GGR increased 5.41% to €964.46 million, while revenue from physical gambling fell 7.17% to €656.09 million. The shift came alongside a sharp fall in customer acquisition, with new online player registrations dropping 43.1% to 110,032.

Belgian flag and Brussels skyline with a 43% drop graphic highlighting the fall in new player registrations as Belgium’s online gambling market grows.

Markets & Regions

Key Takeaways From Belgium’s 2025 Gambling Market

Total regulated gambling GGR reached €1.62 billion in 2025, representing a 0.07% annual decline.
Online GGR increased 5.41% to €964.46 million and represented 59.51% of the regulated market.
Land-based gambling GGR declined 7.17% to €656.09 million.
New online player registrations fell 43.1% from 193,342 in 2024 to 110,032.
Online casino GGR increased 12.99% to €554.1 million despite weaker overall player acquisition.

Online Growth Offsets Land-Based Revenue Decline

According to the Belgian Gaming Commission’s 2025 annual report, online GGR increased 5.41% to €964.46 million, while land-based GGR declined 7.17% to €656.09 million.

The results mark a change from the pattern recorded in Belgium’s 2024 gambling market contraction, when both the broader market and online sector came under pressure. The KSC has since revised its 2024 financial figures following additional accounting checks, meaning the latest annual comparison uses an updated baseline.

Land-based gambling moved in the opposite direction in 2025. Combined physical GGR dropped 7.17% to €656.09 million. Casinos were the exception, with venue revenue increasing 5.85% to approximately €152.3 million. Gaming arcades, cafés and retail betting locations all recorded declines.

Online Casinos Lead Digital Market Growth

Online casino operations were the strongest contributor to digital growth. GGR generated by A+ casino licence holders rose 12.99% to €554.1 million, giving the segment around 58% of Belgium’s total online gambling revenue.

Online betting also expanded, increasing 5.18% to €244.6 million. By contrast, online operations connected to gaming arcades fell 13.66% to €165.8 million.

The figures therefore show that online growth was not distributed evenly across the regulated sector. Casino platforms increased revenue at a double-digit rate even as the overall number of people entering the licensed online market declined sharply.

New Player Registrations Drop 43%

Belgium recorded 110,032 first-time online players in 2025, compared with 193,342 a year earlier. The 43.1% decline came after the country raised its minimum gambling age from 18 to 21 on 1 September 2024, removing the 18-to-20 age group from the licensed market.

The regulatory environment for customer acquisition has also tightened through measures including Belgium’s restrictions on online gambling advertising. The Constitutional Court confirmed in April 2026 that the national advertising restrictions also apply to online gambling.

The number of unique players who used a licensed online operator at least once during 2025 fell 12.2%, from 602,288 to 528,706. However, average daily online participation moved in the opposite direction, rising from 155,643 to 160,144, an increase of around 2.9%.

This divergence means fewer individuals entered or used the regulated online market during the year, while average daily activity remained resilient among those who continued to participate.

Registration Decline Does Not Establish Black-Market Movement

The fall in licensed registrations has increased scrutiny of Belgium’s channelisation rate, but the figures alone do not show where players who did not register with legal operators went.

Industry group BAGO has linked tighter restrictions with concerns about unlicensed gambling. Citing a separate KSC survey of people aged 18 to 30, BAGO said:

The fact that 28% of respondents aged 18 to 30 state they have already played on an illegal gambling site is an alarm signal.

That industry interpretation should be considered separately from the annual market figures, which do not establish that the 43.1% fall in new registrations translated directly into black-market activity.

Licensed operators are also operating under an enhanced duty-of-care framework for online gambling, adding behavioural monitoring and intervention requirements to Belgium’s wider player-protection regime. Against that regulatory backdrop, the 2025 figures show a market in which digital revenue continued to expand despite a smaller pool of new licensed-market entrants.