Australia sees a decline in gambling prevalence

• Industry News
• 01. 08. 2024.
• Dusan Savic

Australia’s overall gambling habits dropped by 8% from 2019 to 2024. Read what ANU’s Centre for Gambling Research has reported about it.

According to a recent study conducted in 2024 by ANU’s Centre for Gambling Research, the gambling participation rate in the Land Down Under dropped 8% from 2019. Before the pandemic, 65.6% of the overall population gambled, but the gambling participation rate fell to 60.3% in 2024.

A drop in retail sales is thought to be the result of COVID-19 forcing retailers to close their locations. However, the study also encompassed a bigger research sample compared to 2019, when there were 2,054 participants, and 2024 when it encompassed 4,027 people.

New tendencies in gambling

The participation rate during COVID-19 was significantly lower, standing at approximately 50% compared to the post-COVID rate, which peaked at about 60%, according to the latest data. Moreover, there has been a significant rise in online gambling, with 33.4% of participants choosing to play online as compared to 28.6% of people doing it in person.

Online gambling in Australia was most popular among 45-55-year-old participants, who made up 20.5% of the bettors, including the lottery. The second most frequent demographic group was 25-34-year-olds, with 18.7% of the population being online players. The report mentioned that younger online gamblers were more likely to have higher incomes and be employed.

Additionally, 28.5% of online gamblers had a university degree, while 47.2% had post-school diplomas or certificates. Those players were more likely to be in a relationship and have children.

Interestingly, almost two-thirds of the in-person gamblers were over 45 (66.1%), while the study shows that people aged 65-74 prefer land-based gambling, with 21.2% of them choosing in-person gambling. Gender analysis proved that females made up 53.8% of all non-online gambling, while 42.1% of online gamblers were women.

Lottery takes the cake

The lottery was the most popular gambling form, with 46.8% of participants choosing to participate. Raffles, with 23.4% of players, took second place, followed by scratchcards, with 15.7%. Interestingly, while sports betting is considered a big business in Australia, only 4.7% of the population partook in it, with 94.2% of the wagers placed online.

Casino table games comprised 2.7% of the sampled players’ gambling activity. However, the levels of so-called risky gambling (calculated using the PGSI scoring method*) have risen from 11.6% to 13.7% since last year. The most recent data shows that the rates of risky gamblers have exceeded the COVID-19 proportions. Furthermore, the rate of non-gamblers has also slightly increased since 12 months ago.

*The PGSI scoring method is used to define risk behaviours among gamblers and rate them according to severity. The Australian National University used it to determine what should be defined as problem gambling on a table of 1 to 8 and upwards, where the latter is defined as high-risk gambling.