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CanadaCanada’s Gaming Market
There is no single “Canadian gambling market.” Under the Criminal Code, gaming is administered province by province, and each province has chosen its own path. The result is a mosaic rather than a national system.
Two broad models
- Crown-monopoly provinces. Most provinces deliver online and retail gaming through a government agency — for example the British Columbia Lottery Corporation, Loto-Québec, or Atlantic Lottery. The province both regulates and operates.
- Ontario’s open model. Since April 2022, Ontario has licensed private operators competitively while a public body (iGaming Ontario) conducts and manages the market — the first Canadian jurisdiction to separate operation from a single Crown provider at scale.
Because provinces report differently and on different calendars, a clean national revenue total is not straightforward to assemble; Ontario is by far the most transparent and frequently reported market, which is why it anchors our Canadian coverage.
Other provinces have signalled interest in Ontario-style competitive models. We will track any move from monopoly toward open licensing as it is formally announced by the relevant regulator.
Sources & notes
- Provincial frameworks summarised from each regulator/operator (BCLC, Loto-Québec, ALC, AGCO/iGaming Ontario).
- National totals are not directly comparable across provinces; see Methodology.