Five for 2025

Five big predictions for the year ahead as we enter a very strange period for the online gambling industry

The year ahead is very hard to predict. It feels like nothing will change, but everything could. It is both unimaginably boring and incredibly exciting, like betting on Serie B soccer or baseball.

The world outside of the gambling bubble is certain to be uncertain. A change in US president, the rise of AI, various international conflicts, the continued decline of Europe and a hundred correlated factors will lead to a dizzying array of outcomes.

In gambling, the known unknowns feel a bit easier to manage. Regulation has beaten the the fun out of online gambling that consolidation hadn’t managed to. And it is now the main driver of growth and decline throughout Europe and North America.

As a result, everything feels tediously predictable. And yet we could see some big twists and turns in 2025. So let’s try and make some educated guesses.

This isn’t really a list of predictions, more a list of things that are already happening and could become significant for online gambling in the year or years ahead. Take all of them as they are meant, a bit of a speculative guess-up, and rest easy that there are only five of them.

1. The Death Of Google

Ok, let’s get one thing out of the way early on. Google is absolutely not going anywhere as the default search engine. You can’t even get most of the over 30s to move off Facebook so you’re certainly not suddenly going to see them rushing to use ChatGPT search integrated into TikTok or whatever mad fantasy someone from a web agency is trying to sell you.

But Google’s stranglehold on search, and as a result most of the online gambling acquisition budget, is lessening off. People are using other avenues for search and discovery, particularly the under 30s and the way people search for information is changing. There is more natural and unnatural (think influencer) discovery out there than ever before.

Alongside this we have google changing its all powerful algorithm and blowing up a bunch of tried and tested SEO plunging affiliates into an existential crisis. And none of these things are good for online gambling as it stands. The industry is completely aligned with search based affiliates, PPC and organic SEO for huge chunks of its digital marketing budget.

There is a lot to talk about here, so I won’t try and cover it all. But the net impact on online gambling marketing could be very significant indeed. Not least as black market operators are already operating effectively outside of the google ecosystem using influencers, streaming sites, discord, telegram and a bunch of other things many online gambling 2.0 execs will nod blankly at when mentioned in meetings.

Is this a crisis or an opportunity? A cristunity? Possibly both, good news for operators providing a great player experience and bad for those relying on churn and burn. And it’s probably neither in the short-term. But the short-term runs out quicker than you think.

2. Brazil will disappoint

Everyone is very excited about Brazil. Flutter has made a big acquisition here, Entain is hoping it will help kick start its revival and there is much talk of it being the big growth market for 2025. But the way regulation has been introduced does not give me high hopes it will bring a massive share of the existing grey market inside that regulated tent.

Brazil is a very crypto-savvy market, and while a lot of licenses have been awarded there will be a number of very effective black market operators happily sat outside taking advantage of all the things regulated operators are not allowed to do. Equally operators who have been making hay in the grey market now saddled with tax and operating restrictions won’t be jumping for joy.

We’ve seen a few run outs of this model in recent times, with The Netherlands probably the best example of how not to do it and the Swedish market also seeing a few teething pains in its early stages. High tax is no barrier to a strong regulated market, it just means the operator pool thins out quickly, but restrictive regulations are. And in this case it could be crypto availability that is the difference.

Let’s hope Brazil learns the lessons from elsewhere and adjusts quickly to how the new operating environment plays out. There is zero chance of this I know but a man can dream.

3. The Peak and the decline

This year will be the peak of online gambling 2.0, and the beginning of its decline. Flutter’s 800lb gorilla stomp over the regulated industry, its leadership flying around the world buying up growth business while shouting FLYWHEEL, might lead you to think this is where the power lies but I am not sure how long that will remain the case.

The black market is now very big indeed and operates in a space that the regulated industry can’t really compete in. By that I don’t just mean black and grey markets, I mean the payment methods it uses, the marketing channels it operates in, the retention mechanisms it uses and to an extent the products it offers.

This online gambling 3.0 model is changing consumer expectations of what an online gambling product is and can be and we can see a lot of money and talent moving over to that world. The threat to the big players in online gambling’s current guise are not its peers but these businesses that exist outside of its orbit.

A lot of customers of gambling 2.0 businesses are also using gambling 3.0 sites and apps in regulated markets. And this usage is only likely to increase as crypto becomes more ubiquitous and regulatory requirements on customers at higher spend levels become more onerous.

Growth for the online gambling world is going to increasingly be overweighted to the black market, to crypto enabled gambling sites and to those who can operate comfortably outside of the regulatory net. And while the existing industry can and will try and push back at this via legal channels there is a sense they may be trying to hold back the tide.

4. Sports and gaming merge

This is a big trend that the US will drive more than any other market. In the absence of available regulated online casino gaming, sports products that resemble or in some way replicate the experience of gaming will become more and more valuable and popular.

The shift to SGPs and bet builders has already created this demand without people realising it. There is often talk of SGPs being lottery style bets due to the low stake, high-margin big prize model, but the user experience is much more similar to a gaming product.

It will be in-play where this will be most obviously explored, and not just via instant or flash bets. There is so much potential here to blur the lines and create gamified experiences from sports bets during a game from the hyper casual to the deeply strategic.

Alongside this we are already seeing more sports assets being used in slots and table games, and more crash-style games featuring sports themes. The rise of free-to-play games within sports betting is also pushing the two verticals closer together as is the pick’em style games in the US.

This is another massive area we can’t possibly explore in 200 words so I am not going to try, but the growth of sports gaming style products is sure to be a feature of the next few years and will raise a bunch of regulatory issues along the way. Going to be a fun one to watch.

5. AI makes a big impact

We’re all completely sick of hearing about AI by this point so what better way to end the list than talking about it. Because there aren’t many industries that feel more prone to insane levels of disruption than this one. From trading to marketing to customer service there isn’t much of the online gambling world that doesn’t feel at significant risk from the rise of the machines.

An operating model where digital ad-spend is controlled by AI, game or bet curation is AI driven, trading is run by AI, retention bonusing is decided by an AI and CS teams are mostly AI bots is not really a wild fantasy. Will that happen by the end of 2025? Lol, no. But is some of that going to start being put into place by then? Absolutely yes.

AI is a really big threat to jobs in online gambling and there is no point dancing around this fact. And we need to quickly start thinking about what value the human touch can provide in a new AI-driven world, because it will remain significant and probably the differentiator. This is another huge disruptor but another huge opportunity if we’re smart.

We are smart aren’t we?

Oh. Never mind. I’m just off to train as a barista. Please enjoy the AI image in the article while I am gone.