Online slots drive Great Britain Q1 online GGY, retail decline mirrors operator reporting

The Great Britain Gambling Commission has reported a 7% year-on-year increase in online gross gambling yield (GGY) for the first quarter, helped by double-digital growth for online slots .

Data from the commission, released Wednesday, placed GGY at £1.45 billion ($1.93 billion) for the three months to 31 March. This beat £1.34 billion in the same period last year but fell 5.8% short of £1.54 billion in Q4.

The rise in GGY was accompanied by a 5% increase in the total number of bets and spins to 25.2 billion. In addition, the number of average monthly active accounts was 2% higher at 13.5 million.

The commission publishes data on Britain’s regulated market each quarter. This primarily covers online gambling but also includes insight into the land-based betting sector.

Slots GGY hits £689 million

Breaking down the online performance, slots accounted for 47% of total online GGY in Q1. The £689 million in slots revenue is 11% more than in the same period in the previous year.

Consumers played a total of 23.4 billion spins during the quarter, a 6% increase on last year, while average accounts also climbed 6% to 4.5 million. The latter was a new quarterly high for the slots segment.

Users also spent more time playing slots in Q1. The number of online slots sessions lasting longer than an hour increased by 5% to 10.1 million. Average session length was consistent at 17 minutes, while approximately 6% of all sessions lasted more than one hour, the same as last year.

Real event betting GGY up 5%

Elsewhere in the market, online real event betting GGY was 5% higher year-on-year at £596 million. This was despite the total number of bets falling 1% and average monthly active accounts dropping 2%. The vertical made up 41% of the overall online GGY.

As for other areas of the market, other gaming, including online casino games, generated £138.3 million in GGY. This fell just short of the £138.7 million reported in the previous year, with total bets down 9%.

Online poker GGR was down by 19.9%, while virtual betting GGY also declined 12% to £9.2 million. In addition, esports betting GGY slipped 26% to £3.2 million.

Declines in land-based betting

A small section of the quarterly report also offered insight in the performance of licensed betting offices (LBOs) in Q1. GGY for this market fell 3% to £554 million, with total bets and spins down 5% to 3.1 billion.

Retail gaming machines drew the most GGY at £275.7 million, but this was 5% short of the previous year. Over-the-counter GGY was marginally higher at £152.5 million, although self-service betting terminals GGY edged down 1% to £125.4 million.

Total machine sessions in Q1 were 5% lower at 22.6 million, although the number of sessions that lasted more than one hour climbed 4% to 613,062.

Retail decline mirrors operator performances in Q1

This continued decline in UK retail betting and gaming mirrors tier one omnichannel operator Q1 earnings. In April Entain reported NGR for its UK&I retail business dipped 1% year-on-year due to “lighter volume”.

Entain CFO Rob Wood said he expected the “softer results” in retail were due to changes to consumer behaviours.  

He said in terms of gaming, double-digit online gaming growth across the UK suggested players were largely shifting to online. 

Evoke also reported a decline within its UK&I retail segment in Q1, with revenue down 6% to £123.1 million.

Mapping out retail performance, Evoke said that the decline was mainly tied to a 9% drop in sports betting revenue due to lower stakes.