One year after the launch of the regulated online gambling market in Ontario, Canada, the regulator in the province, the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario (AGCO), released a new report, revealing that an overwhelming majority of gamblers enjoy services via regulated operators.

It was back on April 4, 2022, when Ontario launched its regulated iGaming, or internet gaming market. The initial launch of the market saw a dozen operators enter the newly regulated gambling vertical. Only a year later, the number of licensed operators increased to a total of 45, offering more than 5,000 certified games for customers in Ontario.

Channelization of Users to the Regulated Market

Tom Mungham, AGCO’s CEO and Registrar, explained that one of the key objectives of the regulator was to help channel the players from the unregulated to the regulated iGaming market. According to him, this helped protect the users by providing them with a market that maintains a high standard, ensures responsible gambling and player protection.

“A key objective in this first year has been to move Ontario players from playing on unregulated sites to the regulated market, so that they would benefit from high standards of operator and game integrity, fairness and player protections including responsible gambling safeguards.“

Tom Mungham, CEO and Registrar of the AGCO

The AGCO posted the results of a new study, conducted by Ipsos in March this year. Overall, nearly 1,200 gamblers participated in the study. The new market research revealed that an overwhelming majority of the gamblers in Ontario, or 85.3%, admitted they used the services of a licensed gambling operator in the last three months.

In contrast, before the introduction of the regulated gambling market, an overwhelming majority of players, or 70%, used unregulated gambling operators. Now, the results of the new study reaffirm the success of the market in Ontario. The province was able to establish robust regulations and at the same time, offer plenty of available gambling options for the operators.

Ontario Is Recognized as iGaming Leader

Doug Downey, Ontario’s Attorney General, said that the launch of the regulated iGaming market in the province helped push back unregulated offerings, replacing them with licensed operators. This, according to him, helped Ontario become “an internationally recognized leader in this industry.”

Mungham added that there’s still work to be done, but pointed out that the AGCO is “pleased to see such a substantial shift towards gaming on regulated sites so far, and everything that it represents for players and for the province.”