The second full fiscal year for legal, regulated Ontario sportsbooks and online casinos ended with a bang.
The province set records again for January through March, the fourth quarter of the fiscal year for Ontario gaming concerns. The sports betting, iGaming and peer-to-peer poker operators in Ontario gathered $17.8 billion CAD in wagers, breaking the mark of $17.2 billion set in the previous quarter (October to December 2023).
Ontario’s financial figures, reported by iGaming Ontario, are released once every three months. In the United States, each state has its own sports betting or iGaming structure, and they report monthly (some states do so more quickly than others).
Ontario Casino & Sports Betting, FY 2023-24 Q4 vs. Q3
Ontario Gambling Breakdown
The Ontario online casinos have always accounted for the majority of handle (or amount wagered) and that was the case again from January to March. Of the $17.8 billion in handle, $14.6 billion came via iGaming operators. Sportsbooks combined to take $2.7 billion in wagers (a drop from $3.1 billion in the previous quarter) and poker sites accepted a record $446 million in bets.
For the 2023-24 fiscal year, from April 2023 to March 2024, Canadian gambling operators combined for $63.12 billion in handle, nearly double the $35.546 billion from the first full year of operations, which ran from April 2022 to March 2023.
Legal, regulated casino apps in Ontario and sports betting launched in April 2022. Since then, dozens of operators have launched – the latest is Casino Time, which began offering its online casino and bingo products this week.
Revenue from Canadian online gaming was more than $2.4 billion in the 2023-24 fiscal year, including $690 million in Q4, which was another record. The previous high was $658 million in Q3. That annual revenue figure, just like handle, was nearly double the previous year, when the province reported $1.4 billion.
Of the Q4 revenue, $510 million came from casino, $161 million from sportsbooks and $19 million from Ontario online poker.
“With $63 billion in wagering and $2.4 billion in gaming revenue, the second year of Ontario’s iGaming market is more than 70% bigger than the first,” iGaming Ontario Executive Director Martha Otton said in a statement on the organization’s website. “As the market matures into its third year, I look forward to building on this foundation of success with operators and other partners as they invest in Ontario so that Ontarians can continue to play with confidence.”
The quarterly report from iGaming Ontario (iGO) noted that there were more than 1.3 million player accounts active during Q4. The Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO) regulates gaming in the province, while iGO is responsible for conducting and managing the operation.
Stay with OntarioBets.com for Ontario sportsbook apps reviews and more industry coverage.
USA Today photo by Nick Turchiaro
