Concerned your teenager is gambling? The data shows that 1 in 3 do

Data on rates of gambling among people under 18 are hard to come by. This is for the simple reason that, in Australia, it is illegal for people under 18 to gamble. But polling undertaken by the Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne (RCH), shows that more than a third of parents (39%) are concerned about their teenage children gambling. So, using the best evidence available, The Australia Institute analysed rates of gambling among Australian teenagers (people aged 12-19).

We found that more than 900,000 Australian teenagers gamble. That’s more than the 480,000 who play soccer, or the 440,000 who play basketball, which are the two most popular sports among 12-19 year old Australians. What that means is that teenagers are more likely to gamble than they are to play any of the most popular sports in their age group.

The research broke the analysis down into two categories: underaged gamblers (12-17-year-olds), and 18 & 19-year-olds. This shows that Australians start gambling in large numbers well before they are old enough to legally gamble. Around 600,000 of Australia’s teenage gamblers are aged just 12-17-years-old, which is enough to fill the MCG six times over. Almost one in three (30%) 12-17-year-olds gamble.

Participation in gambling increases to almost half (46%) of Australian teenagers once they are aged 18 or 19. This level does not decline at least until people are in their mid-20s, which means that gambling habits established in these teenage years persist into adulthood.

Such high rates of gambling mean that Australia’s teenagers are losing big. Annual expenditure on gambling among teenagers is an estimated $231 million, or an average of $86.72 per teenager per year. Of this, 12–17-year-olds spend around $18.4 million a year on gambling activities – this is about $30 a year for each underage teenager that admits to gambling.

This is relatively small compared to the $213 million a year spent by 18- and 19-year-olds. This is $321 per 18- and 19- year-old, or a staggering $698 a year if limited just to those who do gamble.

It’s hard to compare statistics about underaged gambling over time, but the parents of today are well aware of the societal shift that has taken place since they were teenagers. Not long ago, online gambling simply wasn’t an option, which means there was little incentive for gambling companies to saturate our screens with advertisements for sports bets.

Concern about this shift led the Australian Parliament to hold an inquiry into online gambling and gambling advertising. It’s final report – known as the Murphy Review, after the late Labor MP Peta Murphy who chaired the inquiry – was released in 2023.

The Murphy Review recommended 31 ways to better regulate gambling in Australia, including a ban on all forms of advertising for online gambling. Australia Institute polling research shows widespread support for this kind of initiative. Three in four Australians (76%) support a total ban on gambling ads phased in over three years, and four in five support banning gambling ads on social media and online (81%) and in stadiums and on players’ uniforms (79%).

But none of the recommendations of the Murphy Review have been taken up. Although Labor floated the idea of a ban on advertising in August 2024, it was never introduced.

In a matter of years gambling has become normalised among young Australians, and the only ones happy about it are the companies that are raking in millions from vulnerable people. As the Murphy Review makes clear, “Australians do not like being flooded by messages and inducements to gamble online and worry about the effect this is having on children and young people.”

The people who gamble as teenagers now are growing up in a country with a serious gambling addiction. When all age groups are combined, Australians gamble more than any country in the world. In 2022-23, Australians lost a collective $30 billion to lost bets.

Without greater regulation, there is no reason to expect the high levels of gambling among Australian teenagers to decline.