Argentina to reach 4.6M online gamers, exceed $1.5B in revenues by end of 2025

Online gambling in Argentina will reach a user base of 4.6 million, with a turnover that would be close to $1.57 billion by the end of this year.

This is according to an analysis by El Economista, which says online gambling stopped being a "marginal phenomenon" and will become a "massive business" in the country, thanks to the fast adoption of cell phones, internet access, and advances in the technological infrastructure.

According to the report, the number of online gamblers will increase from 4.3 million in 2024 to 4.6 million in 2025, with a projection of 4.8 million by 2026. These gamblers are mostly young urban adults with good access to mobile devices, as 90.1% of the population already uses the Internet, and there are 64.7 million active mobile lines, more than 1.4 per inhabitant.

Added to this are advances in technological infrastructure, such as the average bandwidth, which exceeds 35 Mbps, and the use of virtual wallets that facilitate instant deposits.

According to the Report News blog, the growth of online gaming has been 'vertiginous'. Since 2021, its expansion rate has ranged between 20% and 35% per year, surpassing the revenues generated by tourism in several jurisdictions. In turn, gross online gaming revenues are forecast to grow by more than 9% year-on-year, with a big boost from the casino vertical, which includes slots, roulette, and blackjack.

According to the analysts of Statista's Digital Market Outlook, online turnover will exceed $6.5 billion in 2029.

The experts also warned that, as part of this phenomenon, the provinces of Córdoba, Mendoza, Río Negro or Salta, which historically have had tourism as an economic engine, are now observing how gambling is imposing itself on their tax rolls. They highlighted that online gambling has a high tax efficiency, since each movement or transaction is registered and taxed automatically.

According to the aforementioned publication, the Argentine market encourages large bookmakers to constantly generate new strategies to attract more young and mobile audiences, such as payments with cryptocurrencies, blockchain contracts, or virtual reality. It also encourages more provinces to advance in regulation, to avoid jurisdictions without fiscal control.

It is worth remembering that, in Argentina, there are currently 17 jurisdictions that allow iGaming under local concessions, while at least eight remain without a formal framework, which favors the movement of users to unlicensed sites.