Legal casino gambling age in Botswana
Botswana regulates gambling through a single licensing system. The Gambling Act, 2012 (Act No. 7 of 2012), now cited as Chapter 19:03 of the Laws of Botswana, created the Gambling Authority. It replaced the older casino, lottery and betting legislation. The Authority licenses casinos, bookmakers, totalisators, bingo, lotteries and machine venues, collects levies and promotes responsible gambling. It also has the statutory task of licensing a National Lottery. The 2012 Act was written for premises-based gambling. It contains no dedicated licence for online casinos, and the Authority does not publish any licence that authorises internet casino games. Since May 2024 the Authority has registered paid digital, SMS and interactive competitions and quizzes, but that is a narrow scheme and not an online casino licence. This guide sets out the statutes, the licensing model, the rules on levies and fees, the position of online play and the main player-protection tools.
Key points
- The Gambling Act, 2012 (No. 7 of 2012, assented to on 17 September 2012) is the principal statute. The Gambling (Amendment) Regulations, 2024 cite it as the “Gambling Act (Cap. 19:03)”.
- The Gambling Authority began regulating on 1 April 2016, when the Act took full effect and replaced the Casino Act and the Lotteries and Betting Act (Gambling Authority).
- The Authority’s public registers list six casinos and six bookmaking and betting licensees (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Since June 2024 licensees pay a 3% levy and a 7% supervisory and monitoring fee on gross gambling revenue, plus a 3.5% contribution to responsible gambling programmes.
- No licence category for online casino games was found in the Act or the Authority’s published materials. A registration scheme for paid digital and SMS competitions opened on 6 May 2024.
- The Authority runs a register of excluded persons with self-exclusion and third-party exclusion, and funds counselling (Gambling Authority).
Last reviewed: 7 October 2026.
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Historical development
Before 2016 gambling in Botswana was governed by separate laws for different products. According to the Gambling Authority, casinos were regulated under the Casino Act and betting and lotteries under the Lotteries and Betting Act. Policy was set by the Gaming and Gambling Policy of 2002, which the Authority still cites as its policy basis (RIA notice, 2025).
Parliament passed the Gambling Act in 2012. The Act was assented to on 17 September 2012 and published in a supplement to the Government Gazette of 21 September 2012. Its commencement was left “on notice”, meaning that the Minister would bring it into force by order in the Gazette (text of the Act). In its arrangement of sections, section 136 is headed “Repeal of Cap. 19:01 and Cap. 19:02”. These chapter numbers refer to the earlier statutes. The Authority states that it “commenced its regulatory function on April 1, 2016”, when the Act came fully into effect, and the Gambling Regulations made under the Act also took effect from that date.
In February 2017 the Authority announced that its Board had approved the issue of new casino, lottery, sports betting and bingo licences. It said that the selection would follow a Request for Applications (RFA) process. The RFA is a public tender-like document that sets out the criteria for each licence. The criteria it named included operating capability, clean records, citizen participation in ownership and management, local employment, and commitment to responsible gambling (Gambling Authority, 8 February 2017). Further RFA rounds followed for gambling establishments with limited payout machines (see below).
Legal framework
The Gambling Act, 2012 (Cap. 19:03)
The Act’s long title describes it as an Act “to regulate gambling in Botswana; to establish the Gambling Authority; and to provide for all matters incidental thereto” (Gambling Act, 2012). It defines “gambling” as “(a) betting (including pool betting) and bookmaking; (b) gaming; and (c) promoting or entering a lottery”. It has 21 Parts and 138 sections. The main provisions relevant to this guide are:
- Part II (sections 3 to 18): establishes the Gambling Authority as a body corporate and sets its functions and its Board.
- Section 32: prohibits operating a gambling establishment without a valid licence. The Act sets a fine of up to P180,000, imprisonment of up to 15 years, or both, for a first offence, and up to P240,000 or 20 years, or both, for a repeat offence. (P stands for pula, the national currency.)
- Section 33: lists the types of licence, including betting, bingo, bookmaker, casino, gambling establishment, gambling machine, lottery, racing, testing agent and totalisator licences.
- Section 50: requires each licensee to pay a monthly licence levy, set as a prescribed percentage of its gambling revenue.
- Sections 62 and 63: provide for a single National Lottery licence and a National Lottery Distribution Fund for good causes.
- Part XVII (sections 104 to 112): contains the general rules on gambling, with headings covering advertising and its restrictions, a ban on extending credit to gamblers, protection of minors, and excluded persons. Section 104 defines a minor, for the purposes of that Part, as a person under 21, and section 108 makes it an offence for a licensee or employee to permit a minor to play in the gambling area of a casino.
- Part XVIII (sections 113 to 115): covers monitoring the social effects of gambling, a code of practice, and education and counselling.
- Part XXI (sections 122 to 138): includes sections headed “Unlicensed gambling unlawful” (section 125), “Offences” (section 127), “Penalties” (section 128) and “Levy fund” (section 134).
The copy of the Act published by the Authority was only partly machine-readable for this review. The headings of sections 109 to 138 above are taken from the Act’s arrangement of sections. We were not able to check the full wording of those later sections, so this guide does not describe their content in detail.
Regulations
Detailed rules are in the Gambling Regulations, in force since 1 April 2016 (Gambling Authority). They were amended by the Gambling (Amendment) Regulations, 2024 (S.I. No. 75 of 2024), published on 28 June 2024. The amendment replaced regulation 108 on levies and fees, added a responsible gambling contribution to regulation 109, and updated the fee schedule and several application forms.
Other legislation
Casinos are also subject to anti-money-laundering law. The Authority is “a Supervisory Authority of casinos in Botswana as provided for under the Financial Intelligence Act, 2022” (Gambling Authority, compliance and monitoring). The Authority also lists the Citizen Inclusion Act, 2021 and the Data Protection Act, 2024 among the laws that govern its work (About the Authority; complaints procedure).
Regulator and licensing model
Botswana follows a licensing model. Gambling is lawful when it is offered under a licence from a single national regulator. It is not a state monopoly, and it is not an open market. Licences are issued in limited numbers through competitive RFA rounds. According to its mandate, the Authority is to “regulate and control all gambling establishments and activities in Botswana”. It issues and revokes licences, collects levies and fees, oversees the National Lottery, disburses lottery funds, and seeks to ensure that gambling is carried out responsibly.
Its Licensing Services Unit drafts RFAs, reviews applications, assesses the suitability of applicants and employees, renews licences and registers service providers. It also deals with private lotteries and promotional competitions (Gambling Authority, licensing). The Authority’s own licence list describes eight categories: bingo, bingo machine, bookmaker, casino, gambling establishment, lottery, racing and totalisator licences. It also issues employee licences.
Licensees
The Authority publishes registers of licensees. On 7 October 2026 its casino register listed six casinos: three in Gaborone and one each in Letlhakane, Selebi-Phikwe and Francistown. Its bookmaker and betting register listed six companies, with outlets in Gaborone, Mogoditshane, Palapye, Francistown and Maun. The registers do not show licence dates. They also do not show whether a licence covers online betting.
Gambling establishments with limited payout machines (LPMs) were licensed through a separate RFA round. LPMs are gaming machines whose bets and payouts are capped by regulation. The Authority’s Licensing Update No. 2 of 2024 (29 February 2024) set out the timetable. Applications were submitted in January 2024, evaluation ran from February to May 2024, and awards were scheduled for June 2024. We did not find a published list of the LPM licences awarded.
Fees
Schedule 14 of the 2024 amendment regulations sets licence fees. For a casino it lists P250,000 on application and P100,000 each for the annual, renewal and transfer fees.
Online gambling
The Gambling Act does not contain a separate licence category for internet or remote gambling. None of the licence types in section 33 refers to online casino games (Gambling Act, 2012). The Authority’s licence pages and registers likewise contain no online casino licence, and no Botswana-licensed online casino could be identified (licence types; casino register). Casino licences under the Act authorise play “on the licensed premises” set out in the licence.
Digital, virtual, interactive and SMS competitions
The one digital framework the Authority has introduced is narrower. On 6 May 2024 it gave notice, “in terms of the provisions of Section 5 (h) of the Gambling Act (Cap 19:03)”, that it would receive applications and registrations for “Digital, Virtual, Interactive and Short Message Service (SMS) Competitions, Games and Quizzes” (Gambling Authority notice). The guidelines cover competitions in which participants pay to enter for a chance to win a prize. Their main features are:
- operators apply for registration rather than a full gambling licence, citing sections 27(c) and 33 of the Act;
- each competition needs approved rules, prize details and a method for determining winners, and an accountant or auditor must verify that it was fair;
- a competition may last up to three months, extendable to twelve;
- the application fee is P1,000, and a service fee of 10% of gross gaming revenue (net of VAT) is payable monthly;
- people under 18 may not take part, except in competitions aimed at minors for educational purposes, and advertisements must carry an under-18 warning.
The guidelines do not mention online casino games, slots or sports betting, and they cannot be read as a licensing route for online casinos. We found no published framework from 2024 to 2026 for licensing remote casino operators, and no record of any such licence being issued. Readers should treat this as unconfirmed and check with the Authority, because policy may change after the review of the 2002 policy (see below).
Offshore operators and enforcement
The Act prohibits operating gambling without a licence (section 32), and the arrangement of sections includes a provision headed “Unlicensed gambling unlawful” (section 125). The Authority states that it “continuously monitors the environment for illegal gambling activities” and works with other authorities to take remedial action (Gambling Authority, compliance and monitoring). Part XVII of the Act also restricts gambling advertising. We found no published blocklist of offshore websites, no published instruction to internet service providers or banks to block payments, and no reported enforcement action against an offshore online casino.
Position of players
No source reviewed for this guide states clearly whether a resident commits an offence by playing at an online casino licensed abroad. The penalty provisions we could read (section 32) are directed at people who operate gambling without a licence. Section 125 declares unlicensed gambling unlawful, but we could not verify its full wording, nor whether section 127 penalises participants. We also found no reported prosecution or fine of an individual player for using an offshore site.
It would therefore be inaccurate to say either that online casino play is expressly authorised or that players are being prosecuted. What can be said is that online casino games are not offered under any Botswana licence. Players using foreign sites are outside the Authority’s protection, including its complaints procedure, which applies to licensed operators. Gambling debts arising from licensed gambling are dealt with in section 110 (“Gambling debt enforceable”), and that provision will not help a player in a dispute with an unlicensed foreign operator.
In land-based venues the Act defines a minor as a person under 21 (section 104), and section 108 makes it an offence for a licensee to let a minor play in a casino’s gambling area. The digital competition guidelines use an 18-year limit for the narrower activities they cover.
Taxation
Gambling operators pay sector-specific charges on gross gambling revenue (GGR), which is the amount operators keep after paying out winnings. Under regulation 108, as replaced by the Gambling (Amendment) Regulations, 2024, licensees must pay a licence levy and a service fee within 10 days after the end of each month:
| Charge | Rate | Applies to |
|---|---|---|
| Licence levy (Schedule 15) | 3% of monthly GGR | Casinos, bingo, gambling establishments, totalisators, bookmakers |
| Supervisory and monitoring fee (Schedule 15A) | 7% of monthly GGR | Casinos, bingo, gambling establishments, totalisators, bookmakers |
| Responsible gambling contribution (regulation 109) | 3.5% of GGR | All licensees |
| Service fee for registered digital and SMS competitions | 10% of GGR, net of VAT | Registered competitions (guidelines) |
Late payment of the levy or fee attracts a penalty of 2% a week, capped at twice the amount outstanding. The Authority may remit the penalty if it is satisfied that the delay was not intentional. The 3.5% contribution must go to “a programme aimed at supporting responsible gambling”. These charges are in addition to general taxes such as corporate income tax and VAT, which this guide does not cover.
We could not verify from an official source whether gambling winnings are subject to income tax or withholding tax in Botswana. Players should consult the Botswana Unified Revenue Service.
National Lottery
Section 62 of the Act allows the Authority to issue a single National Lottery licence, valid for ten years unless revoked, and section 63 sets up a National Lottery Distribution Fund for charitable purposes, sport and recreation, and arts, culture and youth (Gambling Act, 2012). The Authority’s 2017 announcement included a lottery licence (Gambling Authority, 2017), and its website contains several notices about a National Lottery RFA. We could not read those notices for this review, so we cannot confirm the dates of the tender rounds or whether a National Lottery operator is currently licensed. On 7 October 2026 the Authority’s Gambling Fund disbursement page still read “Coming soon”.
Consumer protection and responsible gambling
Part XVIII of the Act requires the Authority to monitor the social effects of gambling, to set a code of practice and to promote education and counselling. In practice the Authority runs public education campaigns and pays for voluntary counselling and rehabilitation for gamblers and their families (Gambling Authority, prevention and rehabilitation). It has commissioned research, including a 2020 study of the prevalence of excessive and problem gambling and 2023 projects on socio-economic impacts and risk factors. Its website also offers the Problem Gambling Severity Index (PGSI), a standard nine-question screening tool.
The main protection tools are:
- Self-exclusion. A person can ask to be entered in the register of excluded persons by giving notice to the Authority. Applications can be made through the Authority’s self-help portal. We could not read the full text of section 109 (“Excluded persons”), so we could not confirm the duties it places on licensees or the available exclusion periods.
- Third-party exclusion. A person may apply to exclude a family member or someone for whom the applicant is financially responsible.
- Help and reporting lines. The Authority’s home page refers people with gambling problems to its counselling services and self-help portal, but it does not publish a dedicated problem-gambling helpline number. The numbers it does list (Orange 1144, Mascom 71119604 and BTC 0800 600 644) are for reporting fraud or unethical behaviour, not for problem-gambling support (Gambling Authority).
- Complaints. Customers must first use the operator’s own complaints process and can then escalate the matter to the Authority by email, online form or letter (complaints procedure).
The register of excluded persons applies only to licensed operators in Botswana. An offshore website is not connected to it. See also our responsible gambling guide.
Recent and upcoming developments
- February 2024: LPM licences. The Authority set out its timetable for licensing gambling establishments with limited payout machines, with awards planned for June 2024 (Licensing Update No. 2 of 2024).
- May 2024: digital competitions. Registration of paid digital, virtual, interactive and SMS competitions opened on 6 May 2024 (notice).
- June 2024: new levy and fee structure. S.I. No. 75 of 2024 introduced the 3% levy, the 7% supervisory fee and the 3.5% responsible gambling contribution (regulations).
- February to March 2025: policy review. The Authority published a Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) of the Gaming and Gambling Policy of 2002, with public comments invited from 26 February to 28 March 2025 (Gambling Authority, 2 March 2025). We found no published revised policy or amending bill. Whether the review will lead to a licensing route for online gambling remains unconfirmed.
- September 2026: new casinos and bingo halls. On 1 September 2026 the Authority invited expressions of interest from investors in developing and operating casinos in the Central District, Maun and Kasane/Pandamatenga, and bingo halls in several districts. It described this as a step “to assess market interest and obtain preliminary information”, not a licence award (Gambling Authority, EOI).
Casino listings for players in Botswana
The listings below are generated automatically from our casino database. They do not show that an operator is licensed in Botswana. No Botswana licence for online casino games could be identified, so the listings must not be read as an indication that a site is authorised there or that playing on it is lawful. Check any operator against the Gambling Authority’s casino and betting licensee registers before relying on its claims.
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Sources and further reading
- Republic of Botswana, Gambling Act, 2012 (Act No. 7 of 2012; Cap. 19:03) (2012).
- Republic of Botswana, Gambling (Amendment) Regulations, 2024 (S.I. No. 75 of 2024) (2024).
- Gambling Authority, Gambling Regulations 2016 (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, About the Authority (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Home page and helplines (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Licensing (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Licences (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Casino Licensees (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Bookmaker & Betting Licensees (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Compliance & Monitoring (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Prevention & Rehabilitation (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Complaints Procedure (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Notice: Application of Digital Gaming (2024).
- Gambling Authority, Guidelines: Application for Digital, Virtual, Interactive and SMS Competitions, Games and Quizzes (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Gambling Authority, Licensing Update Number 2 of 2024 (2024).
- Gambling Authority, Gambling Authority to Issue New Gambling Licenses (2017).
- Gambling Authority, Gaming and Gambling Policy of 2002: RIA Report (2025).
- Gambling Authority, Expression of Interest: Development and Operation of Bingo and Casino (2026).
- Gambling Authority, Gambling Fund Disbursement (accessed 7 October 2026).
