The £5 slot stake limit is the UK rule that adults aged 25 and over can stake no more than £5 on a single online slot game cycle. It has applied at every casino licensed in Great Britain since 9 April 2025. Before then, online slots had no legal stake ceiling at all; adults aged 18 to 24 have a lower £2 limit.
Since 9 April 2025, online slot stakes are capped at £5 per game cycle for adults aged 25 and over.
The cap counts the whole stake in a game cycle, including ante bets and other extra stakes.
It applies only to online slots, not to roulette, blackjack or land-based machines.
It limits how fast money can be lost, not how much: deposit limits control total spend.
A slot offering stakes above £5 to a British player isn't operating under a British licence.
LatestAdults aged 25 and over can stake no more than £5 on a single online slot spin.
What the rule says
Adults aged 25 and over can stake no more than £5 on a single online slot spin.
Before and after
Compared
Before
Since April 2025
The position
Stakes of £50, £100 or more per spin were available
£5 maximum
Why it was brought in
Stake size is the simplest control on how quickly money can be lost on the fastest casino product.
What it does to top prizes
Slot
Max win
In pounds at £5
Big Bass Bonanza
2,100x
£10,500
Starburst
500x
£2,500
Sweet Bonanza
21,100x
£105,500
Gates of Olympus
5,000x
£25,000
Book of Dead
5,000x
£25,000
Fishin' Frenzy
5,000x
£25,000
Arithmetic from published maximums, not a record of wins.
And to an hour of play
At the 2.5 second minimum, an hour holds at most 1,440 spins. At £5 each that is a ceiling of £7,200 staked in an hour, where no ceiling existed before.
The limit is per spin, not per session or per day: it does not cap how much you can lose, only how fast. It applies to the total stake on a spin, across all lines. It does not apply in betting shops or land-based casinos, which have their own rules, and it does not apply to online roulette or blackjack.
How to check a site follows it
Open a slot and try to raise the stake past £5. On a licensed British site you cannot.
Coral and Ladbrokes are both run by LC International Limited (Entain). If you already hold an account with one Entain brand, you may not be able to open a new account with another; check the terms before signing up.
Significant terms: 18+. New players only. Offer runs 01/10/2026 to 01/02/2027. Deposit (certain types excluded) and bet £10+ on slot games to get 100 free spins (selected games, £0.10 each, 48 hrs to accept, valid 7 days). No wagering on free spin winnings. Deposits by Neteller, PayPal, Paysafe, Skrill, prepaid cards and certain debit cards do not qualify. Restrictions and T&Cs apply. GamCare.org.uk
Read the Coral reviewLicence: LC International Limited, UKGC account 54743. Offer checked 5 October 2026.
Significant terms: 18+. New UK customers (excluding Northern Ireland). First deposit only. Minimum deposit £10. 80 free spins on Big Bass Bonanza, £0.10 each. No wagering requirements; winnings paid in cash. Cannot be used with any other offer. Only available to players who arrive through the designated offer link. Full T&Cs apply. GamCare.org.uk
Read the PlayOJO reviewLicence: Skill On Net Limited, UKGC account 39326. Offer checked 5 October 2026.
Significant terms: 18+. New customers only, from 14/11/25 until further notice. Certain deposit methods excluded. Deposit and spend £10+ on slots for 50 free spins a day during the first 10 days after first deposit and registration (max 500, £0.10 each, selected games, claim before 23:59 each day, valid 7 days). No wagering. Prepaid cards, PayPal, Paysafe, Neteller, Skrill and Moneybookers deposits do not qualify. Restrictions and T&Cs apply. GamCare.org.uk
Read the Ladbrokes reviewLicence: LC International Limited, UKGC account 54743. Offer checked 5 October 2026.
How to check a site applies it
Open any slot and raise the stake as far as it will go. On a site licensed in Great Britain the control stops at £5. If it goes higher, the site is not operating under a British licence, whatever its address or branding suggests.
What it does to prizes
A slot's top prize is a multiple of the stake, so the limit caps it in pounds. A 5,000x slot can pay at most £25,000 at £5; a 21,100x slot £105,500. Published maximum wins in pounds from before April 2025 no longer apply.
What it leaves alone
Roulette, blackjack, baccarat and live game shows set their own table limits, and land-based gaming machines have separate categories.
The legal basis of the £5 online slot stake limit
Unlike most casino rules, which the Gambling Commission writes into its own codes, the £5 limit was made by the government through secondary legislation. Regulation 5 of the Gambling Act 2005 (Operating Licence Conditions) (Amendment) Regulations 2025 attaches the limit as a condition to every remote casino operating licence. The Commission then published online slots stake limit guidance (opens in a new tab) explaining how operators must apply it.
Two definitions in that guidance decide what the rule covers. An online slot is a reel-based casino game played online. A game cycle runs from the moment a game starts until all stakes are lost or all winnings are paid, and any further stakes made inside that cycle count towards the £5. The Gambling Act 2005 is the parent law, and the remote casino licence page explains which businesses hold the licence the condition is attached to.
Because the limit is a statutory licence condition, it can't be waived for VIP customers, high-value players or anyone else. A casino offering more than £5 a spin to a British customer would be in breach of its licence.
£5 stake limit timeline: 2023 to 2025
The figure of £5 was the outcome of a range: the 2023 white paper consulted on a limit anywhere between £2 and £15 per spin. Here is how the decision unfolded, alongside the related slot rules that were changing at the same time.
How the £5 online slot stake limit came in
Date
Step
31 October 2021
Slot design rules: no autoplay, 2.5-second minimum spin, no turbo or slam stop
27 April 2023
White paper proposes consulting on a per-spin limit between £2 and £15
23 February 2024
Government confirms £5 for adults and £2 for 18 to 24s, then expected from September 2024
17 January 2025
Game design rules extended to other online casino games, with a 5-second minimum
What counts towards the £5: total stake, ante bets and extra features
The £5 is measured per game cycle, so anything you pay into the same game counts, not only the main stake. That matters for slots with optional extras. The examples below are illustrative; individual games set their own ante percentages and menus.
Illustrative stake set-ups for a player aged 25 or over
Set-up
Base stake
Extra in the same cycle
Total per cycle
Allowed?
Standard spin
£5.00
None
£5.00
Yes, at the cap
Spin with a 25% ante
£4.00
£1.00
£5.00
Yes, at the cap
Spin with a 25% ante
£4.50
£1.13
£5.63
No: over £5
Double-chance mode at 2x
£2.50
£2.50
£5.00
Yes, at the cap
Welcome spin at a fixed value
10p
None
10p
Yes, well within
Free games won inside a bonus round don't add to the stake, because they are part of the cycle you already paid for. What the rule stops is paying more into the same game, which is also why a bonus buy option, if one were offered, could not exceed £5 for the cycle. In practice, slots supplied to UK-licensed casinos don't offer feature buys at all; see no bonus buy on UK slots. For how stake menus are built from coin values and bet levels, see coin size.
£5 online slot limit vs land-based gaming machines
Online slots had no legal stake limit until 2025, while land-based gaming machines have long had stake caps set by machine category. The best-known example is the B2 machine in betting shops, often called a fixed-odds betting terminal, where the government decided in May 2018 to cut the maximum stake from £100 to £2. Online slots now sit at £5, or £2 for 18 to 24s.
Maximum stakes compared: online slots and B2 machines
Product
Maximum stake
Where the rule comes from
Online slots, adults 25+
£5 per game cycle
2025 licence condition regulations
Online slots, adults 18 to 24
£2 per game cycle
2025 licence condition regulations
B2 machines in betting shops
£2 (cut from £100)
Government decision of May 2018
Online roulette, blackjack and other table games
No legal stake limit; each game sets table limits
Not covered by the slot limit
On 30 September 2026 the Gambling Commission announced new gaming machine standards for land-based venues; those apply to physical machines, not to online slots. For the wider differences between the two, see online vs land-based casinos and table limits explained.
How far £100 goes at different slot stakes
The £5 limit caps the speed of losses rather than their total, and stake size is the biggest single factor in how quickly a budget is used up. The table takes a £100 budget and a slot returning 96% to players, and shows how many spins it covers in the worst case and how much is lost on average per 100 spins.
A £100 slot budget at different stakes (averages on a 96% RTP slot)
Stake per spin
Spins if every spin lost
Total staked per 100 spins
Average loss per 100 spins
10p
1,000
£10
£0.40
50p
200
£50
£2
£1
100
£100
£4
£2
50
£200
£8
£5
20
£500
£20
Real sessions sit between those extremes, because wins are staked again, but the pattern holds: at £5 a spin, the average cost of play is fifty times what it is at 10p. On a high-volatility slot, losing streaks are longer as well. If you want a budget to last, a lower stake does more than any game choice. Our guides to casino bankroll basics and do bigger bets win more? go further.
Bonus maximum bets and the £5 stake limit
Many bonus terms include a maximum bet while bonus money is active. Since April 2025, that term and the legal limit overlap on slots, and whichever is lower applies. Off slots, only the bonus term applies, because the legal limit doesn't cover table games.
Casumo: 50% bonus up to £100 on a first deposit of at least £20, 10x wagering within 7 days and a maximum of £5 per bet while the bonus is active (18+, new customers, opt-in, terms apply). On slots the bonus maximum and the legal limit coincide; on other games the £5 bonus maximum is what stops you.
10bet: 100% bonus up to £25, wagered 10x on slots within 3 days, maximum bonus winnings £1,000 (18+, new UK customers, terms apply). At £5 a spin, £250 of wagering is 50 spins; at £1 it is 250.
Coral, Ladbrokes and PlayOJO: welcome spins are set at 10p each by the offer, so neither limit comes into play (18+, terms apply).
Breaking a bonus maximum bet can cost the bonus and anything won with it, even when the stake was within the legal limit. Our explainers on the max bet rule and what happens if you break bonus terms cover how casinos enforce it.
£5 slot stake limit myths vs facts
Common misunderstandings about the £5 limit
Myth
Fact
It caps how much you can lose in a day
It caps each game cycle only; a deposit limit caps your total spend
Progressive jackpots are now worth five times less
A progressive jackpot's size comes from its prize pool; the limit only caps what you stake to play
High rollers can still get higher stakes
No exception exists for VIP or high-value customers
It applies to live roulette and blackjack
It covers reel-based online slots only
The casino sets £5 as a house policy
It is a legal licence condition that every licensed casino must apply
How the £5 limit affects different kinds of slot play
The limit lands differently depending on how someone plays. For a player who already stakes 20p or 50p a spin, nothing changes in the stake menu, though the rule still sets an outer boundary. For someone who used to stake £20 or £50 a spin before April 2025, the change is large: the same session at the new maximum moves far less money per hour, and the largest possible single win shrinks in proportion.
Effect of the £5 limit by style of play (adults aged 25 and over)
Style of play
What changes
What stays the same
Low stakes (under £1)
Nothing in practice; the cap sits well above
RTP, volatility and game speed rules
Mid stakes (£1 to £5)
Stake menus stop at £5 per game cycle
Bonus maximum bets still apply on top
Previously high stakes (above £5)
Maximum stake and top prize in pounds both cut
Deposit limits and session tools
Bonus play on slots
No spin can exceed £5, whatever the bonus allows
The 10x wagering cap and the bonus deadline
Table games and live casino
Nothing: they are outside the slot limit
Each table's own limits and the 5-second minimum
The rule also changes how prizes are advertised. A slot's maximum win is usually expressed as a multiple of the stake, so the largest amount a game can pay on one spin in Great Britain is now that multiple times £5. When a page or advert quotes a single-spin prize in pounds that is larger than the game's multiplier times £5, it either predates April 2025 or describes play outside Great Britain, so it is worth checking the multiplier in the game's paytable and doing the sum yourself. Progressive jackpots are the exception, since their prize comes from a pool rather than a multiple of your stake.
None of this alters the basic arithmetic of slots. Every game returns less than it takes on average, and a lower maximum stake only slows the rate at which that happens. Anyone who notices they are missing the higher stakes they used to play, or chasing losses within the new limit, may find the National Gambling Helpline on 0808 8020 133 useful. It is free and open 24 hours.
If a slot lets you stake more than £5
For a British player aged 25 or over, a stake option above £5 on an online slot almost always means the site isn't operating under a British licence. Offshore sites often use the same game titles, so a familiar slot is no guarantee of the rules behind it. Work through these checks.
Note the website address and look for a Gambling Commission account number in the footer.
Search the address and account number on the Commission's public register. A missing or expired entry means no British licence.
Look for other giveaways: a bonus buy button, autoplay, turbo spin, or wagering above 10x on offers.
If the site isn't licensed, don't deposit; if you already have, withdraw what you can and stop playing.
If the site is licensed, report the stake setting to customer service and keep their reply; then use the complaints process if needed.
Everything here is dated. Offers and facts were last checked on 5 October 2026; this is not a live feed. Casino details come from each casino's published terms and help pages and the Gambling Commission's public register. How we check. 18+. Free help: 0808 8020 133 or safer gambling.
Frequently asked questions
What is the maximum slot stake in the UK?
The maximum is £5 per game cycle for adults aged 25 and over, and £2 for adults aged 18 to 24, at every online casino licensed in Great Britain. The £5 limit has applied since 9 April 2025. It covers the total stake in one game, so extras such as an ante bet count towards it, and it applies whether you're playing with cash or bonus money. It doesn't apply to roulette, blackjack or other table games, which keep their own table limits. See the Gambling Commission's stake limit guidance (opens in a new tab) for the official wording.
When did it start?
The £5 limit started on 9 April 2025 for adults aged 25 and over, and the £2 limit for 18 to 24-year-olds followed on 21 May 2025. The government announced both on 23 February 2024 and at first expected them from September 2024; the final dates were set in the Gambling Commission's guidance. Before April 2025 there was no legal stake limit on online slots at all, so the size of each spin was decided by the game and the casino. See the 2025 timeline for what else changed that year.
Does it apply to roulette?
No. The £5 limit applies only to online slots, which the guidance defines as reel-based casino games played online. Online roulette, including live dealer roulette, isn't covered, and each table sets its own minimum and maximum stakes. Roulette has its own UK rules, though: since 17 January 2025, non-slot online casino games must take at least 5 seconds per game cycle and can't offer autoplay. Your deposit limit applies to roulette like everything else. Our guide to online roulette explains the bets and the house edge.
What about under-25s?
Adults aged 18 to 24 have a lower limit of £2 per online slot game cycle, in force since 21 May 2025. Casinos apply it automatically from the date of birth verified when you register, so there is nothing to switch on and it can't be switched off. On your 25th birthday the limit rises to £5 without any action from you. The lower limit reflects the government's view that younger adults face a higher risk of gambling harm. Our page on the £2 slot stake limit for 18 to 24s covers how it works in detail.
Can I use a credit card at a UK casino?
No. Gambling with a credit card has been banned in Great Britain since 14 April 2020, at every licensed casino and betting site. The ban also covers paying through an e-wallet or other service that was topped up with a credit card, so casinos accepting e-wallets are expected to check where the funds came from. Debit cards, bank payments and e-wallets funded from a bank account are all allowed. The aim was to stop people gambling with borrowed money. See the gambling credit card ban for the details and dates.
Do all five casinos have a welcome offer?
Yes. All five partner casinos had a welcome offer when we last checked on 5 October 2026. Three give spins at 10p with no wagering: Coral (deposit and bet £10 on slots for 100 spins), Ladbrokes (spend £10 on slots for up to 500 spins, 50 a day for 10 days) and PlayOJO (80 spins on Big Bass Bonanza for a £10 first deposit). Two give bonus money with 10x wagering: Casumo (50% up to £100, minimum deposit £20) and 10bet (100% up to £25). All are 18+, new customers only, and terms apply. See the latest welcome offers.
Which offers have no wagering?
Coral's, Ladbrokes' and PlayOJO's welcome offers have no wagering, so winnings from their spins are paid as cash. Coral gives 100 spins at 10p after you deposit and bet £10 on slots, Ladbrokes up to 500 spins at 10p after £10 spent on slots, and PlayOJO 80 spins at 10p on Big Bass Bonanza for a £10 first deposit. No wagering doesn't mean no conditions: spins are on chosen games, must be claimed within set windows and expire. Each is 18+ and new customers only; terms apply. The latest no wagering offers page has the full terms.
What payment method should I use for a first deposit?
A debit card is the method most likely to qualify for a welcome offer, but check each casino's terms first. Coral excludes Neteller, PayPal, Paysafe, Skrill, prepaid cards and certain debit cards from its offer; Ladbrokes excludes prepaid cards, PayPal, Paysafe, Neteller, Skrill and Moneybookers. Casumo says payment method restrictions apply. An excluded method still lets you deposit, but the offer won't be added. Credit cards can't be used at all. Set a deposit limit before your first deposit. Our guide to how to deposit at an online casino walks through the steps.
Are there no deposit offers?
None of the five partner casinos runs a no-deposit offer at present, based on their terms checked on 5 October 2026. Each of their welcome offers needs a deposit, and in the cases of Coral and Ladbrokes a £10 stake on slots as well. No-deposit offers are uncommon at UK-licensed casinos, partly because age and identity checks must be finished before any bonus play, and some sites advertising them have no British licence. Be cautious with any offer that asks for nothing. Our page on why there are no no-deposit bonuses explains the reasons.
Is the £5 limit per spin or per session?
Per spin, or more precisely per game cycle. The limit caps how much you can commit to one game, from the start of the spin until all stakes are lost or winnings paid, including extras such as an ante bet. It doesn't cap how much you can stake over a session, a day or a month. At the 2.5-second minimum spin time, £5 spins could add up to £7,200 staked in an hour. To control total spending, use a deposit limit, which casinos must prompt you to set before your first deposit. See how to set deposit limits.
Does the £5 limit apply to free spins?
It applies to every online slot game cycle, but spins given in an offer usually have a fixed value far below £5. The current welcome spins at Coral, Ladbrokes and PlayOJO are 10p each, so the limit makes no difference to them (18+, terms apply). It matters more for bonus money you stake yourself: while you play through a matched bonus on slots, no spin can exceed £5, and the bonus may set its own lower maximum. Free games triggered inside a slot's bonus round are part of the cycle you already paid for. See bonus spins for definitions.
Did the £5 limit change slot RTP?
No. The limit changes how much you can stake, not the percentage a slot returns. A game's return to player (RTP) is set by its design and is the same at 10p as at £5, although casinos can run different RTP versions of the same title, so check the help screen. What did change is the top prize in pounds: because a slot's maximum win is a multiple of the stake, a 5,000x game can now pay at most £25,000 on a single £5 spin. See how to check RTP to find the figure that applies.
Does the £5 limit apply in Northern Ireland?
The limit is a condition of Gambling Commission licences, which cover gambling in Great Britain; Northern Ireland has its own gambling law, the Betting, Gaming, Lotteries and Amusements (Northern Ireland) Order 1985, and no full framework for online gambling. So the Commission's rules shouldn't be assumed to protect players in Northern Ireland in the same way. Some UK casino offers exclude Northern Ireland altogether, as PlayOJO's welcome offer does. Check each casino's terms on where it accepts customers. See can I play UK casinos in Northern Ireland?.
Gambling can be addictive. Free, confidential help is available 24 hours a day from the National Gambling Helpline on 0808 8020 133. Get free support from GamCare or NHS gambling support, or block yourself from all UK-licensed gambling sites with GAMSTOP.
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