South Africa Online Casinos & Legal Gambling

Although you would expect a yes/no answer to this question, things are not that simple when it comes to gambling in SA. We’ll take everything in turn, starting with the laws introduced over the years.

Firstly, gambling at physical venues is legal in the country since 1965.

Most forms of gambling received the green light in 1996 via the National Gambling Act. This permitted pretty much all forms of online gambling including bingo, sports betting, and keno.

The first advancement to the initial law came in 2004 with the National Gambling Amendment Act. This bill came to regulate online casinos and poker in SA, to bring in profits through taxes, and also protect South African gamblers by handing out licenses to vetted online casinos.

However, a 2010 High Court decision overruled most of the forms of online gambling permitted through the NGA, until some were again legalized in 2011.

As you can see, the online gambling landscape in SA is a rocky one. Ultimately, you should remember the following:

• All forms of physical gambling and betting are legal in South Africa.
• Online sports betting, lottery, keno, scratchies, bingo, etc. are also legal in SA.
• Online casinos and poker sites fall within a grey area. If services are provided from offshore online casinos with a legit license (i.e., MGA, UKGC), then you shouldn’t worry about playing there from SA. Still, online licenses are still not provided to SA online casinos, so technically they are illegal.
• The Government hasn’t prosecuted any gamblers nor offshore gambling sites accepting SA players or offering Rand payments. However, the current bill states that fines up to R10 million and jail time up to 10 years can be applied as a punishment to either party. The purpose of this act is to provide the South African authorities the right to prosecute online casino operations from within the country.
• The Remote Gambling Bill is likely to pass in the future and simplify the situation; it did face a lot of opposition when first introduced in 2022.

For now, you must pick SA online casinos carefully. Our team works around the clock to review operators and we have listed legit and safe operators that accept payments in South African Rand and players from SA.