Gambling in France Reaches Record Highs, Regulator Calls for Change
Gambling is becoming increasingly popular in France. The regulatory authority is urging a shift in the sector’s economic model towards less intensive gambling that is less focused on at-risk players.
France’s gambling sector hit another record in 2024, with revenue increasing by nearly 5% to €14 billion, according to the Autorité Nationale des Jeux (ANJ). This surge was fueled by the Euro football championship and the Paris Olympic Games.
Last year, the gross gaming revenue (GGR) – the difference between player bets and operator payouts – from online sports betting soared by 19% to almost €1.8 billion.
Among the forty or so sports available for betting in France, football, tennis, basketball, and rugby stand out in terms of betting amounts, according to the ANJ. Online horse race betting saw a slight increase (+1.5% to €339 million), while poker declined (-2% to €493 million).
FDJ Continues to Grow
In 2024, the number of active player accounts increased (5.7 million accounts), as did the number of unique players, now at 3.9 million. The sports betting population has become younger (30% of sports bettors are between 18 and 24 years old) and more female (with 15% of bettors being women), the regulator notes.
While online gaming grew significantly last year, the majority of gambling activity comes from FDJ, rebranded as FDJ United, which achieved a GGR of over €7 billion (+6%), mainly driven by the lottery.
Next are the 202 French casinos with a GGR up 1.2% to €2.7 billion, with a stable number of entries (31 million). The GGR of the 7 Parisian gaming clubs stands at €123 million.
Finally, PMU saw its GGR decrease by 2% to €1.7 billion, but its net profit remained stable in 2024 (€837 million), which allows it to maintain its funding to the horse racing industry, and the number of players increased (3.5 million players).
A Model “Less Focused on At-Risk Players” Soon?
For the ANJ, this dynamic means that increased vigilance will be needed in 2025 regarding at-risk players and the commercial pressure from operators, even if the tax increase that will come into effect on July 1 could affect online market activity in 2025.
“The first months of 2025 confirm this growth dynamic,” emphasizes the president of the authority, Isabelle Falque-Pierrotin.
“In this context, the regulator highlights two major challenges: the necessary reorientation of the sector’s economic model towards less intensive gambling that is less focused on at-risk players.”
And “the mobilization of all stakeholders to change the representations associated with gambling, leading to their trivialization in French society,” she continues in the statement.
Another point of attention in 2025: the opening of the market for monetizable digital object games (JONUM), an experiment that should begin in September 2025 after the publication of decrees and to which the ANJ will be “particularly vigilant in strictly respecting the boundaries with gambling.”
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