Why Britain is losing betting shops

Sami Kurvinen

Last updated: 12 August 2026

4 minutes

If you’ve noticed fewer betting shops and adult gaming centres (AGCs) on UK high streets, you’re not imagining it.

The number of betting shops has fallen sharply over the past decade, from almost 9,000 in 2015 to around 5,800 today. AGCs have also declined, although by a much smaller amount.

So what’s going on?

The biggest reason is pretty simple: people have moved online and gamble at UK online casinos and sportsbooks.

Years ago, if you wanted to place a bet, you generally had to walk into a betting shop. Now you can do it from your phone in seconds. Online gambling on slots and sports is available 24/7, offers far more choice and is generally cheaper for operators to run than a network of physical shops.

That shift has been happening for years, but Covid accelerated it. Once people got used to betting from home, many simply didn’t have much reason to return to the high street.

Regulation has played a part too

The betting-shop industry was also hit hard by the decision to reduce the maximum stake on fixed-odds betting terminals (FOBTs) from £100 to £2 in 2019.

Those machines had been a major source of revenue for many betting shops. Once the stake was cut, operators had to rethink the economics of their shops, and many locations were no longer worth keeping open.

At the same time, operators face higher compliance costs, tighter safer-gambling rules and increasing tax pressure.

Put all that together and it becomes fairly simple: if a shop isn’t making enough money to cover its costs, it gets closed.

AGCs are a little different

Adult gaming centres have had a slightly different story.

While their numbers have also fallen, AGCs can still be attractive to operators because their business model is focused heavily on gaming machines.

This is why some betting companies have looked at converting betting shops into AGCs.

The idea is basically: if traditional betting is becoming less profitable on the high street, perhaps a different type of gaming venue can make the location work.

The industry isn’t simply disappearing

The decline in betting shops doesn’t necessarily mean people have stopped gambling.

In fact, gambling has increasingly moved from the high street to the smartphone.

The Gambling Commission recorded £16.8 billion in gambling gross gambling yield in Great Britain in the year to March 2025, with online gambling driving much of the growth.

So the industry is adapting.

Instead of trying to keep thousands of traditional betting shops open, operators are increasingly concentrating on their better-performing locations while putting more investment into online gambling.

In simple terms, they’re following the customer.

And now the government is adding another challenge

The latest government proposals could make opening new betting shops and AGCs even harder.

The plan is to remove the “aim to permit” principle, giving councils more freedom to reject new gambling venues. The government is also considering requiring AGCs to obtain specific planning permission for each location.

The government says this will give communities more control over their high streets and help tackle the concentration of betting shops and gaming venues in some areas.

The industry sees things differently.

Operators argue that the number of retail gambling venues has already been falling for years and warn that more taxes and restrictions could simply accelerate the decline.

So where does this leave the industry?

The future probably isn’t a UK without betting shops or AGCs.

It’s more likely to be a smaller and more concentrated retail sector, alongside a much bigger online gambling market.

The strongest high-street locations will probably survive, while weaker ones continue to disappear. Some operators will look at converting premises into different types of gaming venues, while online gambling will continue to take a bigger share of customers.

The recent Remote Gaming Duty (RGD) increase from 21% to 40% for licensed online casinos in the UK has made it more challenging for UKGC-licensed companies to operate in the legal market as well, as margins are a lot thinner, but some new casinos, such as Betty, are still entering the market and see potential for growth.

So the real story isn’t that Britain has suddenly stopped gambling.

It’s that Britain has changed how it gambles.

The betting shop that once stood on the high street is increasingly being replaced by an app on someone’s phone — and the gambling industry is having to change with it.