Legal casino gambling age in Belize
Belize permits gambling under a licensing system run by the state. Casinos, gaming machine halls and, in principle, online gaming are licensed by the Gaming Control Board under the Gaming Control Act, Chapter 152 of the Laws of Belize. Lotteries fall under a separate statute, the Lotteries Control Act, Chapter 151, and since 2023 the main numbers game, Boledo, has been run by a government-owned company rather than a private concessionaire. Online gaming is a special case: the government has stated publicly since 2024 that a moratorium is in place and that no online gaming company is licensed to operate from Belize. This guide sets out the statutes, the licensing model, the position of online gambling and of players, taxation, protections and recent developments.
Key points
- The Gaming Control Act (Chapter 152, Revised Edition 2020; originally Act No. 24 of 1999) establishes the Gaming Control Board, requires a licence for any gaming premises and sets a minimum age of 18.
- Licences are processed by the Investment Policy and Compliance Unit (IPCU) of the Ministry of Investment on the Board’s behalf. Casino licences are tied to four- or five-star hotels with at least 50 rooms.
- The government has maintained a moratorium on online gaming licences since at least May 2024 and stated in June 2025 that no online gaming company is licensed from Belize.
- Lotteries are governed by the Lotteries Control Act (Chapter 151). After the private Boledo licence was revoked in May 2023, Belize Government Lotteries Ltd took over the national lottery.
- Official licensing guidance lists an 8% gaming (business) tax on casinos’ gross earnings and a 15% withholding tax on winnings above $1,000.
- We found no national self-exclusion scheme or dedicated gambling helpline in official sources.
Last reviewed: 7 October 2026.
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Historical development
Lottery regulation is the oldest strand of Belizean gambling law. The Lotteries Control Act predates independence: its revised text traces it to Chapter 169 of the Revised Laws of 1958 and Act No. 10 of 1962, gives a commencement date of 15 April 1954, and lists amendments up to Act No. 17 of 2010.
Casino gaming was put on a modern footing by the Gaming Control Act of 1999 (Act No. 24 of 1999). It created a system under which gaming premises could be licensed and taxed, while using premises as an unlicensed “common gaming house” remained an offence (section 15). The 1999 Act was amended by Acts No. 22 of 2013 and No. 17 of 2014, which added much of its current supervisory machinery: fit-and-proper tests, compliance officers, inspections, administrative penalties and anti-money-laundering obligations. The consolidated text is published in the Revised Edition of 2020.
Belize also had an early online gaming regime. According to Amandala (February 2022), online gambling was “first officially legalized and codified in 1995, through the Computer Wagering Licensing Act, which was last modified in 2000”. The Ministry of Investment’s resources page also lists Online Gaming Regulations dated 2004, which sit under the Gaming Control Act. We could not read the text of either instrument, so their detailed content is not described here.
For lotteries, the decisive change came in 2023. Brads Gaming Group Ltd had held the exclusive licence to run the government lotteries (Boledo, Jackpot and the Ordinary lottery) since 2010. According to Amandala (May 2023), Prime Minister John Briceño said the contract was cancelled “because they refused to comply with the requirements of the contract that they signed”. The government’s notice to lottery agents stated that the revocation took effect on 2 May 2023, and Amandala reported that a Lotteries Control (Amendment) Bill 2023 would place operations in a government-owned company, Belize Government Lotteries Ltd (BGLL).
Legal framework
The principal statutes are:
- Gaming Control Act, Chapter 152 (Revised Edition 2020; Act No. 24 of 1999, amended by Acts No. 22 of 2013 and No. 17 of 2014). It defines gaming as the playing of any game of chance “for winnings in money’s worth”, establishes the Gaming Control Board and an Appeals Tribunal, provides for gaming licences, the gaming tax and offences, and authorises regulations.
- Lotteries Control Act, Chapter 151 (Revised Edition 2020; derived from Chapter 169 of the Revised Laws of 1958 and Act No. 10 of 1962, last amended by Act No. 17 of 2010 in the revised text). It covers lotteries, lottery agents, lottery tax and offences. It excludes from the definition of “lottery” raffles where the article raffled is worth no more than ten dollars.
- Gambling Prevention Act. This older statute is referred to in the Gaming Control Act and in the government’s December 2025 warning on unlicensed gaming. We could not obtain its current text or verify its chapter number, so its provisions are not summarised here.
The Gaming Control Act is supplemented by regulations consolidated in the Revised Edition 2003 and by later instruments. The official casino application requirements list the Gaming Control (General Regulation of Licensed Gaming Premises) Regulations, the Gaming Control (Gaming Tokens and Equipment) Regulations, the Gaming Control (Licensed Gaming Premises) (Accounting and Internal Control) Regulations and the Gaming Control (Casino Games) Regulations, all in the Revised Edition 2003. The gaming machine requirements cite the Gaming Control (Gaming Machines) Regulations (Revised Edition 2003) and Statutory Instrument No. 98 of 2014. Belize’s Money Laundering and Terrorism (Prevention) Act also applies: licensees must comply with their anti-money-laundering and counter-terrorist-financing (AML/CFT) obligations as a condition of every gaming licence (section 5A).
Section 25 of the Act provides that contracts and payments relating to licensed gaming cannot be challenged as illegal or against public policy, so winnings from licensed premises are legally recoverable. Our reading of the 2020 revised text found no express provision on online, internet or remote gaming; the online regime rests on separate regulations and on government policy.
Regulator and licensing model
The Gaming Control Board
Section 4 of the Gaming Control Act establishes a Gaming Control Board of nine members appointed by the Minister responsible for gaming. They include representatives of the ministries responsible for economic development, natural resources, tourism, national security and commerce, the Financial Secretary, a member of the Lotteries Committee and two members chosen at the Minister’s discretion. Under section 5 the Board controls and regulates gaming, grants and revokes licences, supervises licensees and their compliance, works to keep criminal influence out of the industry and may cooperate with foreign regulators.
Day-to-day administration sits with the Investment Policy and Compliance Unit (IPCU) of the Ministry of Investment. According to the Ministry website, IPCU “issues licenses on behalf of the Gaming Control Board for diverse gaming activities” and oversees the Lotteries Committee and lottery operations. Its resources page lists three licence categories: gaming premises (casino) licences, gaming machine (establishment) licences and online gaming licences. In 2022 the same functions were described as sitting in the Ministry of Finance, Economic Development and Investment (Breaking Belize News).
Licensing conditions
The Act sets the common rules for all gaming licences:
- applicants must be at least 18 and must be judged “fit and proper”, taking into account integrity, financial standing, ownership, experience and associates, with convictions for gaming, money-laundering and serious criminal offences counting against them (sections 6 and 6A);
- a licence lasts 12 months and is renewable on payment of the annual fee (section 6A(3));
- the Board may require a cash deposit, bond or guarantor to secure unpaid winnings and taxes (section 7);
- licensees must appoint an approved compliance officer and keep a compliance policy (section 8A), and are subject to inspections, information notices, directions and enforcement action, including revocation (sections 8B to 8G);
- the Board may impose administrative penalties for “disciplinary violations”; regulations may set these at up to $250,000 (sections 8H to 8L and 24(2));
- decisions can be appealed to the Appeals Tribunal within 14 days (section 14B).
Casinos
The gaming premises application requirements published by IPCU restrict casino licences to applicants making “a significant investment in a 4 or 5 Star Hotel or Resort and not only offering gaming as its main attraction”, with at least 50 rooms and other tourist amenities. Applicants also need letters of no objection from their Area Representative (the constituency member of the House of Representatives), the municipal authority or village council, and the police. The published fees are:
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Application fee (non-refundable) | $5,000 (currency not specified) |
| Annual licence, 50 to 60 rooms | US$60,000 |
| Annual licence, 61 to 199 rooms | US$125,000 |
| Annual licence, 200 rooms or more | US$300,000 |
| Cash deposit or bond | US$125,000 |
Official sources we consulted do not publish a register of licensed casinos, so the number of licensees could not be verified. Press reports confirm that casinos operate in Belize City, where the Princess Casino continued trading when the Belize Tourism Board temporarily closed the neighbouring hotel in October 2025 (Breaking Belize News), and close to the northern border with Mexico, where Princess Casinos International operates the Princess Vegas Casino (Breaking Belize News, December 2023). The northern border area around Corozal, including the Commercial Free Zone, is often described as a casino location, but we did not find an official source listing the casinos licensed there.
Gaming machine establishments
Slot-machine halls outside casinos need a gaming machine licence. Under the gaming machine requirements, applicants pay a non-refundable application fee of BZ$1,500 and BZ$3,750 per machine per year; for new licences the per-machine fee falls by quarter of approval, to BZ$2,812.50, BZ$1,875 and BZ$937.50. Late renewals cost BZ$100 a day. Premises must be more than 300 feet from a school or church, measured entrance to entrance. The licensing year runs from 1 April to 31 March, and renewal applications are due two months before 31 March; for 2024-2025 the deadline was 13 February 2024 (Breaking Belize News, December 2023).
Lotteries
Under the Lotteries Control Act, a Lotteries Committee (including the Auditor General, the chief executive of the responsible ministry, the secretary and three members of the Gaming Control Board) may license “fit and proper” persons aged 18 or over to run lotteries (sections 4 and 6). Operators may sell only through formally appointed agents (section 13). The government lotteries, Boledo, Jackpot and the Ordinary lottery, are now run by Belize Government Lotteries Ltd, distributed through regional master agents, for whom a public tender was issued in June 2023 (tender documents on the IPCU resources page). The Committee also licenses raffles: a written application is needed for raffles with prizes totalling $500 or more, and the government published a list of about 50 approved raffles for 2024-2025 (Government Press Office).
Online gambling: what is permitted and how it is enforced
On paper, Belize provides for online gaming licences: IPCU lists an online gaming application and the Online Gaming Regulations 2004 among its licensing documents (IPCU). In practice, no licences are being issued. In February 2022 the Gaming Control Board said that only one company held a Belize online gaming licence and that “all other entities that claim to have an online gaming license from Belize must immediately cease and desist since their operations are clandestine and illegal” (Breaking Belize News). Amandala reported at the same time that licensed online operators “may not offer their services to residents of Belize” (Amandala).
In May 2024 the Board went further. Its notice on illegal online gaming stated that “Belize currently has a moratorium on online gaming licenses”, that “there are no online gaming companies licensed to operate from Belize” and that “no licenses will be issued, until further notice”. A moratorium is a temporary suspension of licensing. The government repeated the position on 9 June 2025, warning that several websites were “falsely claiming to hold an online gaming license from Belize” (Breaking Belize News).
We could not verify whether the International Financial Services Commission (IFSC), Belize’s offshore financial services regulator, ever had a formal role in online gaming licensing, or whether the 1995 Act remains in force alongside the 2004 regulations.
We found no evidence of website blocking, payment blocking or advertising rules aimed at offshore online casinos. In December 2025 the Ministry responsible for gaming warned that operating a gaming business, slot machines, casino table games or poker without a licence breaches the Gambling Prevention Act and the Gaming Control Act, and urged operators to “immediately cease and desist” (Breaking Belize News). Under section 15 of the Gaming Control Act, using premises as a common gaming house without a licence is punishable by a fine of up to $100,000, up to two years’ imprisonment, or both.
Lottery products face similar warnings. In December 2023 the government cautioned against unlicensed Boledo, Jackpot and Ordinary lottery sales and against altered tickets, citing the Lotteries Control Act penalties: on a first conviction a fine of $10,000 to $20,000, one to two years’ imprisonment, or both; on a later conviction $20,000 to $50,000, two to five years, or both (Government Press Office).
Position of players
The Gaming Control Act is aimed at operators, owners and occupiers of premises, licensees and their staff. Its offences concern running unlicensed premises, breaching licence conditions, failing to pay tax and admitting minors. We found no provision in the revised text that makes it an offence for an adult to play at a licensed casino, and section 25 positively protects a player’s right to recover winnings from licensed gaming.
The position of a player who uses an unlicensed operator is less clear. The Gambling Prevention Act may contain offences relating to being found in a common gaming house, but we could not read its current text and therefore do not state its content. Official warnings on online gambling are addressed to operators and to “internet users”, whom the Ministry has asked to “refrain from doing business with these companies”; they do not threaten players with prosecution. We found no reports of players being prosecuted for gambling online. With no online operator licensed, players have no local regulator to turn to if winnings are not paid.
Taxation
Operators
Section 9 of the Gaming Control Act imposes a “gaming tax” on gaming at every licensed premises, at a rate set by ministerial regulations and paid to the Commissioner (the officer performing the duties of Commissioner of Income Tax). Section 9(5) requires that its proceeds “be used exclusively for the purposes of promoting education, sports and culture”. Unpaid tax attracts a 10% surcharge after 15 days and can be recovered by distress (seizure and sale of goods). The Act does not itself state the rate. IPCU’s casino requirements describe it as an “8% business tax (payable monthly) on gross earnings (Gaming Tax)”. Casinos also pay the annual licence fees set out above.
Lottery operators pay a lottery tax at a rate set by regulations, separate from income and business tax (Lotteries Control Act, section 8). Since BGLL is government-owned, the lottery’s surplus now flows to public purposes. The government reported net profits of nearly $17 million from gross sales of $111.2 million between November 2023 and November 2024 (Breaking Belize News, May 2025), and the Prime Minister told the House of Representatives that sales between April 2024 and March 2025 were $123.2 million, with net earnings of $16.7 million (Breaking Belize News, November 2025). Currencies in these reports are not stated and are presumably Belize dollars.
Players
IPCU’s casino guidance lists a “15% withholding tax on winnings in excess of $1,000” (IPCU); Amandala’s 2022 report describes the same 15% withholding tax in connection with online licensees. We could not locate the provision of the Income and Business Tax Act that imposes it, so readers should confirm its current application with the Belize Tax Service.
Consumer protection and responsible gambling
Belize’s protections are mainly structural rather than player-facing. Licensed gaming premises may not admit or employ anyone under 18, on pain of a fine of up to $5,000 or up to two years’ imprisonment (Gaming Control Act, section 22), and lottery tickets may not be sold to anyone under 16 (Lotteries Control Act, section 14). Casinos must form part of large hotels or resorts, gaming machine halls must be more than 300 feet from schools and churches, and all licensees are subject to fit-and-proper tests and AML/CFT supervision.
We found no national self-exclusion register, no statutory deposit or loss limits and no dedicated gambling helpline in the official sources reviewed. People affected by gambling problems in Belize may need to rely on general health and counselling services. General guidance is available in our responsible gambling guide.
Recent and upcoming developments
- Government lottery takeover (2023 onwards). The private Boledo licence was revoked from 2 May 2023 and Belize Government Lotteries Ltd took over, with sales to be organised through four regional master agents selected by tender (tender issued June 2023) (notice; Amandala).
- Online moratorium (May 2024, reaffirmed June 2025). The Gaming Control Board declared that no online gaming licences will be issued “until further notice” (notice; June 2025 warning). As of October 2026 we found no announcement lifting it.
- Enforcement against unlicensed premises (December 2025). The Ministry warned that unlicensed slot machines, table games and poker are offences and invited the public to report them (Breaking Belize News).
- Use of lottery proceeds (September 2026). At the first National Sports Summit, the chair of the lottery board, Narda Garcia, said the lottery was projected to generate over $144 million in 2026 and argued for a larger share for sport; the government has said that lottery profits fund National Health Insurance, sport and charities (Breaking Belize News, September 2026; Breaking Belize News, May 2025).
Casino listings for players in Belize
The listings below are generated automatically from our casino database. They do not show that an operator is licensed in Belize: according to the Government of Belize, no online gaming company is currently licensed from Belize and a moratorium on new online licences remains in place (June 2025 notice). The listings must not be read as an indication that an operator is authorised in Belize. Questions about licensing can be directed to the Ministry of Investment’s Investment Policy and Compliance Unit.
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Sources and further reading
- Laws of Belize (Revised Edition 2020), published by the Ministry of Investment, Gaming Control Act, Chapter 152 (2020).
- Laws of Belize (Revised Edition 2020), published by the Ministry of Investment, Lotteries Control Act, Chapter 151 (2020).
- Ministry of Investment, Investment Policy and Compliance Unit, Resources: Gaming and Lotteries (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Ministry of Investment, Belize Investment: IPCU functions (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Ministry of Investment, Investment Policy and Compliance Unit, Gaming Premise (Casino) Application Requirements (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Ministry of Investment, Investment Policy and Compliance Unit, Revised Gaming Machine Licence Application Requirements (accessed 7 October 2026).
- Government of Belize Press Office, Notice to all Agents of Government Lotteries (2023).
- Government of Belize Press Office, GOB Cautions Against Illegal Boledo Lottery and Jackpot Sales (2023).
- Government of Belize Press Office, List of Applicants Approved for Raffles in 2024-2025 (2024).
- Flowers, B. (Breaking Belize News), Gaming Control Board warns of illegal online gambling (2022).
- Amandala, Online gambling sites operating without a license (2022).
- Flowers, J. (Amandala), Government to control Boledo (2023).
- Breaking Belize News, Important updates for gaming machine license holders (2023).
- Breaking Belize News, Young worker killed, colleague injured falling from crane at border casino worksite (2023).
- Breaking Belize News, Gaming Control Board NOTICE: Illegal Online Gaming (2024).
- Breaking Belize News, The People’s Boledo: Lottery reform yields $17 Million in public profits (2025).
- Breaking Belize News, Government of Belize warns: No online gaming licenses currently issued (2025).
- Breaking Belize News, Temporary closure of Ramada Princess Hotel ordered amid regulatory issues; casino stays open (2025).
- Breaking Belize News, Fi We Boledo records $16.7 million in first-year net earnings (2025).
- Breaking Belize News, Government warns operating a gaming business without license is an offense (2025).
- Breaking Belize News, Boledo generates millions, but Garcia says sports need bigger slice (2026).
