The mandatory monthly deposit limits introduced in the Netherlands in 2024 have led to a contraction in the online gambling market, regulator Kansspelautoriteit (KSA) has reported.
The gambling authority has released two sets of reports covering the entirety of 2025 and the first half of 2026, focusing on the entire licensed Dutch gambling market and exclusively on the online sector, respectively.
Data points to a shrinking online gambling economy, evidenced by both tax collections and player behaviour.
In October 2024, the Dutch government introduced monthly deposit limits capped at €300 (approximately $335) for young adults and €700 (approximately $780) for everyone aged 24 and above.
For the year following the changes, the KSA reported that online GGR in 2025 dropped noticeably by 18.2% for online casinos and 30.2% for sports betting, although the contraction in the latter segment was also partially driven by the higher baseline during UEFA Euro 2024.
Meanwhile, the impact of the deposit limits continued to drive market shifts during January-June 2026, leading to further changes in player behaviour.
The total number of active player accounts increased from 1.38 million in H2 2025 to 1.48 million in H1 2026, representing a rise of 7.2%.
However, over the same comparative period, the number of individual players fell from 830,000 to 820,000 (down 1.2%). The number of monthly active individual players also declined from 510,000 to 490,000 (down 3.9%), while the share of adults gambling online remained unchanged at 5%-6%.
The divergence between the increase in total active player accounts and the decline in individual players suggests that Dutch online gamblers are continuing to open multiple accounts with licensed operators in an attempt to circumvent the deposit limits introduced in October 2024.
A significant discrepancy has also emerged between the player channelisation rate and the actual revenue share generated by licensed operators.
According to the KSA, between 94% and 97% of players gamble exclusively or partly on licensed legal platforms. However, the regulator estimated that licensed operators accounted for just 59% of total gambling revenue in H1 2026.
One possible explanation is that the 3%-6% of players not included in the channelisation statistics incur significantly higher average financial losses than those who gamble on licensed platforms.
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