US Legal Online Gambling: A State-by-State Guide 2023
It’s an exciting time for online gambling in the US, as more and more states legalize online casino, online poker, and sports betting.
Traditionally a legal gray area, recent years have seen several US states pass legislation that allow its residents to legally gamble online – with many more states currently in the process of legalization too.
Use this guide to find out what states offer legal online gambling, and which states will launch legal online gambling in the future.
- Casinos
- Poker Sites
US Online Gambling Law
Much like issues such as welfare, real estate, and taxation, the legality and regulation of online gambling varies from state-to-state.
In part due to legislation such as the Interstate Wire Act of 1961, the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act of 1992 (PASPA), and the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 (UIGEA), it was long presumed that sports betting and online gambling was generally illegal in the US under federal law.
However, in 2018 the Supreme Court ruled that PASPA was unconstitutional – which became an almost instant catalyst for numerous states to begin legalizing sports betting.
Similarly, six years previous in 2011, the Department of Justice declared that the Wire Act, which was written decades before the internet as we know it came into existence, applied only to bets on sports events and races – paving the way for states to pass their own laws on US online casinos and US online poker.
Furthermore, as state law supersedes federal law, should it afford more rights to the individual, it’s now best understood that each state can legalize online gambling for its own residents if it so chooses.
While the general outlook across the US is a positive one, with more and more states looking to legalize online gambling for reasons of liberty, entertainment, job creation, and state revenue, the main opposition to legalized gambling comes from certain moral concerns, and the impact it might have on an individual’s social and economic well-being.
Indeed, a perfect illustration of how gambling law can, and does, vary from state-to-state are the cases of New Jersey and Utah. In New Jersey, all forms of land-based and online gambling are legal, whereas in Utah, all forms of gambling are illegal.