Global Online Gambling Black Market Hit $5.9 Trillion, 2025 Report Finds

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The global online gambling black market reached an estimated $5.9 trillion in wagering value in 2025, according to a new report from Gaming Compliance International (GCI), highlighting the growing scale of unregulated betting activity worldwide.

GCI’s Online Gaming 2025: Global report found that unregulated operators accounted for roughly 78% of global online gaming gross revenue, compared with 22% for licensed and regulated operators. The analysis covered online sports betting, casino gambling, poker, lotteries, and crypto gambling.

The report describes unregulated gambling as one of the world’s largest underground digital economies, larger than the GDP of every country except the United States and China. GCI CEO Matt Holt said regulators are confronting “a dominant” challenge rather than a marginal one, with most activity now occurring outside licensed oversight frameworks. 

Researchers also argued that the online gambling ecosystem is evolving beyond the traditional regulated-versus-unregulated divide. GCI introduced a third category called “unacknowledged gambling,” covering products that replicate gambling mechanics without formally being classified as gambling in many jurisdictions. These include prediction markets, social casinos, skins trading, sweepstakes platforms, and certain digital contest formats.

According to the report, illegal sports streaming has become a major distribution channel for offshore gambling advertising, with more than 80% of illegal sports streams in the US and UK during 2024 and 2025 reportedly featuring promotions for unregulated betting operators. These findings will likely raise further debates around gambling regulation, taxation, and channelization strategies.