The Gambling Commission licenses and regulates commercial gambling in Great Britain, including online casinos, under the Gambling Act 2005. A licensed casino answers to that regulator and can be checked in a public register. This page explains what the licence means, how you can check one yourself and how Great Britain differs from Northern Ireland.
BonusOut is an information website. We do not operate gambling, we do not issue licences and nothing on this page recommends a casino. This page gives general information and is not legal advice.
What a Gambling Commission licence means
A licence is permission from the regulator to offer a named type of gambling. It is issued to a named company and it comes with conditions. The commission sets them out in its Licence Conditions and Codes of Practice, and it can suspend or revoke a licence when they are broken.
In practice, a licence gives you two things: a regulator that supervises the company and written rules the company can be measured against. If something goes wrong, there is a complaints route that ends with an independent service.
A licence is not a recommendation. It tells you who is responsible for a casino. It does not tell you that the casino is right for you, that gambling there is safe or that you will win.
What licensed online casinos must do
Licence conditions mean that a licensed online casino must, among other things:
- Check your age and identity first – ask you to prove your age and identity before you gamble.
- Refuse credit cards – not accept credit card payments for gambling. The commission banned credit cards for gambling on 14 April 2020.
- Join Gamstop – take part in Gamstop, the online self-exclusion register. Joining by 31 March 2020 was a requirement of the licence conditions for online operators.
- Handle complaints – deal with your complaint through a complaints process. The casino has eight weeks to resolve it. After that you can take the complaint to an independent Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) provider, and the casino should be able to tell you which one.
- Follow the bonus rules – since 19 January 2026 the wagering requirement is capped at 10 times and offers that make you gamble on two or more products, such as betting and slots, are banned.
Great Britain and Northern Ireland
The commission’s powers under the Gambling Act 2005 cover Great Britain: England, Scotland and Wales. In Northern Ireland gambling is a devolved matter, and the commission says it does not have powers to investigate and prosecute there. Remote gambling operators that have key equipment in Great Britain and offer gambling in Northern Ireland, or advertise there, must still hold a commission licence.
Gamstop works differently. It is available to anyone living in the United Kingdom, including Northern Ireland, and it blocks online gambling companies licensed in Great Britain.
This page describes the Great Britain system. It does not cover the law in Northern Ireland.
How to recognise a licensed casino
A licensed casino states its licence in the website or app footer. The commission gives this example of the wording: “[business name] is licensed and regulated in Great Britain by the Gambling Commission under account number [123456].” Look for three things:
- The company name – the company that runs the site, not only the brand name.
- An account number – a company with more than one licence for a site or app lists more than one number.
- A link to the public register – licensed businesses must display that they are licensed and link to the register.
None of these signs proves anything on its own, because a footer, a logo or a badge can be copied. Treat the site as a claim and the register as the check, and open the register by typing the commission’s address yourself instead of following a link from the casino.
How to check a licence in the public register
The commission publishes a register of licensed businesses that anyone can search. It shows whether a business is licensed, the activities it can offer and whether the commission has taken regulatory action against it.
- Open the register. Go to the commission’s public register and choose the gambling businesses register.
- Search. You can search by business name, trading name, domain name or account number. Start with the account number from the footer.
- Read the licence status. It should say ‘Active’. The other statuses are explained below.
- Compare the details. The account name and number must match the footer, and the domain name of the site you are on should be listed for that business. Domain and trading names are supplied by the businesses and the commission says it cannot guarantee that they are accurate, so the account number and company name matter most.
- Look at regulatory actions. A licensed business can still have been sanctioned. The record lists any sanctions or settlements.
| Status in the register | What it means |
|---|---|
| Active | The licence is active and up to date. |
| Pending | A new licence has been applied for, or one is being varied, and it is not yet active. |
| Suspended | The licence is suspended while an investigation takes place. |
| Revoked | The licence was taken away through regulatory action or because its conditions were broken. |
| Revoked (non-payment of fee) | The licence was taken away because the annual fee was not paid. |
| Expired | The company did not apply for a new licence when the old one ended. |
| Surrendered | The company gave up the licence. |
| Lapsed | The business has been liquidated, sequestrated or declared bankrupt, or the licence holder is unable to carry out licensed activities. |
| Forfeited | A court has ordered that the licence no longer has effect. |
If the business is not listed, the details do not match or the status is not ‘Active’, do not deposit. You can tell the commission about a business you think is operating without a licence through its ‘Tell us something in confidence’ page. Our section on unlicensed casinos and scams explains what to do next.
Why we do not list individual casinos
This page does not list or recommend individual casinos, and it does not link to any. A register entry can change at any time: a licence can be suspended, revoked or surrendered, and a new one can be issued. A list would only show what the register said on the day somebody looked. The steps above let you check the current position yourself in a few minutes.
Casinos without a Great Britain licence
A licence from another country is issued under that country’s rules. It is not a Gambling Commission licence, whatever the footer says.
The commission’s guidance says that a business without its licence “is acting illegally” and that its payment facilities may be withdrawn by major payment providers. The commission has also said that the illegal market is “unlikely to operate in a way that is fair or safe”, and that people who have self-excluded are among those that unlicensed operators target.
For you as a customer, the main difference is protection. The commission says that if a business is licensed, you are covered by consumer and gambling protection rules in Great Britain. The licence conditions listed above apply to licensees, so they do not apply to a casino without a Great Britain licence, and you cannot rely on them or on the complaints route that ends with an ADR provider. Gamstop does not block such a casino either, because it covers only online gambling companies licensed in Great Britain.
Gambling more safely
A licence tells you who supervises a casino. It does not tell you how much it is safe for you to spend. Set limits before you start and gamble only with money you can afford to lose.
If gambling is causing harm to you or someone close to you, the National Gambling Helpline offers free support to anyone affected by gambling harms in Great Britain on 0808 8020 133. It is run by GamCare. Our page Safer gambling sets out the tools that exist, including Gamstop, and how they work. If you have a question about this page, write to us at info@bonusout-uk.com.
Sources
All sources are official and were checked on 9 October 2026.
- Gambling Commission – Public register and gambling businesses register
- Gambling Commission – Opening accounts (licensed status of the company, wording of the licence statement)
- Gambling Commission – Checks you can do to stay safe
- Gambling Commission – What to look at before you gamble
- Gambling Commission – Make sure that the gambling business is licensed
- Gambling Commission – What we regulate
- Gambling Commission – Age and ID verification
- Gambling Commission – Gambling using a credit card
- Gambling Commission – How to complain
- Gambling Commission – Gambling promotions to be safer and simpler (news, 10 times wagering requirement and mixed product offers)
- Gambling Commission – Two operators’ licences suspended for failure to participate in Gamstop (news, licence condition on Gamstop)
- Gambling Commission – Unlicensed gambling: our approach to tackling unlicensed gambling (blog)
- Gambling Commission – Tell us something in confidence
- Gamstop – Register
- GamCare – National Gambling Helpline
18+ Gambling can be addictive. Free support: National Gambling Helpline 0808 8020 133 (Great Britain).
Last updated: 9 October 2026