For parents it’s second nature to worry about the effects that social media and being chronically online are having on our children. What we may not have noticed, though, is that young boys are getting hooked on a potentially devastating pastime — one that is quietly becoming an increasing problem.
That problem is gambling. Perhaps most alarmingly, it’s seemingly harmless online games and sport that are often a gateway into it.
The Gambling Commission’s Young People and Gambling Report 2025, released this week, shows that 30 per cent of children aged 11 to 17 spent their money on gambling in the previous 12 months — up from 27 per cent in 2024 — despite the fact that the legal age for gambling in the UK is 18. Boys were more likely to gamble than girls. The increase appears to be largely driven by a rise in “unregulated gambling” (engaged in by 18 per cent in 2025, compared with 15 per cent in 2024).
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This consists of mainly kids betting among themselves, according to Daniel Bliss of Ygam, a charity dedicated to preventing gaming and gambling harms among young people. “The majority of the gambling done by young people is actually done through private betting,” he says. “It doesn’t feel like gambling but it’s the normalisation of gambling. We’ve heard from parents that their child is playing Fifa on their headset, and before they start the game they say ‘the winner of this gets a tenner’ — they’re gambling on the outcome of the game.”
The report also cited the influence of social media, finding that 31 per cent of young people who saw gambling-related content on social media (16 per cent of all respondents) reported that influencers had advertised gambling-related content to them.
The harm gambling can cause to young people is, of course, huge. The Gambling Commission reported in 2019 that there were 55,000 problem gamblers aged 11 to 16 in the UK. Gambling can interfere with childhood development, disrupting play, sleep and socialising, Bliss says. Compared with adults, teens have a high rate of problem gambling, yet few seek help, a report published in the journal Psychiatry MMC found. They are particularly vulnerable to the negative effects of gambling, including addiction and mental health issues. The teens who are most vulnerable — those who have experienced bullying and family disruption — are more likely to develop gambling problems, according to a 2023 study in the European Journal of Investigation in Health, Psychology and Education.
James Grimes, director of Chapter One, the education arm of the charity Gambling with Lives, believes the catalyst for his own 12-year gambling addiction was the “gamblification of sport”. He began at the age of 16, with betting on football, before going on to play online casino games — “online roulette especially, and online slots”. By the time he left home to go to university he was £2,000 in debt to family and friends; by the time he was 28 he had 20 payday loans and owed about £30,000.
A recent study by researchers at the University of Bath shows that many boys and young men “view the casual wagering of money as vital to their enjoyment of sport”. It’s worth noting that 11 teams in the Premier League had a gambling logo on the front of their shirts last season, the highest proportion among Europe’s top five leagues.
Liz Ritchie, who set up the charity Gambling with Lives with her husband Charles after their son Jack died in a gambling-related suicide in 2017, describes the process that occurs for boys betting on sports: “ They go on to a sports gambling site and put a bet on a football club or something like that, and they are cross-sold immediately to casinos and slots” — the most lucrative games for betting companies. Within 24 hours, they’ll begin to get offers, boosts and other incentives.
Alongside sports, another big factor in the rise of gambling is video gaming. Studies show that while girls prefer online puzzles and quizzes, boys play console or handheld games, along with first-person shooter titles such as Call of Duty, strategy games like Clash Royale and, of course, Fifa for football-mad fans (now officially called EA Sports FC).
Within these games, players buy “loot boxes” — digital products purchased with real money that might have special benefits for play, such as a “skin” for your avatar, a special weapon or cards featuring real players with different ratings that they can collect or trade (in Fifa they’re called packs).
What parents may not know is that buying these loot boxes — where players sometimes get something valuable for the game — is psychologically similar to gambling, according to research by the universities of Plymouth and Wolverhampton. The study, published in the journal Addictive Behaviours, showed that 40 per cent of children in the UK have bought them.
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“ There are increasingly blurred lines between gaming and gambling,” Bliss says. Often, the money at stake doesn’t seem real to the children, who may have only a vague grasp of finances anyway.
“Children haven’t necessarily developed the concept of money and the value of money,” Bliss says. “Them losing their parents’ money doesn’t have the same impact as it would if you were 18 and gambling your own money.”
Owing to these loot boxes, close to half of children in the UK have used a product that researchers equate to gambling. Yet because what is in them doesn’t have monetary value outside the game, the Gambling Commission has stated that it can’t regulate them.
“ The reality that parents have to face,” Ritchie says, “is that we’re in a situation where the sale of these very addictive products has been completely normalised. It’s a risk for all young people.”
Victor, a 21-year-old student, connects his early gaming habits to his growing gambling habit during his university years. “When you are playing Fifa at the age of 12, 13, that risk-reward system in your head is already being activated from such a young age,” he says. It means that the transition from buying packs on Fifa to betting on football matches is “quite seamless”.
Victor began placing bets when he was 17 using his older brother’s account, and later his own account when he turned 18. Things finally came to a head in his second year at university. “I should have been revising, but I was playing online poker, and I lost £250 in just half an hour. Overall, I lost hundreds of pounds and my mood was severely affected.”
So what can parents do? Organisations such as the Coalition to End Gambling Ads and Gambling with Lives are campaigning for the restriction of gambling ads, the tracking of gambling-related suicides and a government public health strategy around the effects of gambling. But until this happens, parents need to be aware and proactive.
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Gambling under the age of 18 is illegal, and online gambling sites are legally required to verify age. But parents need to be aware that under-18s can get around this by using a friend or family member’s account. What’s more, offshore and unregulated sites may not perform these checks. So keep an eye out for gambling sites popping up on kids’ devices — common ones include Betfred, Bet365, Paddy Power, Betfair, talkSport, Coral and Sky Bet. Parents can block gambling apps on their child’s phone with apps such as BetBlocker and Gamban, via parental controls such as Google Family Link, Apple Screen Time and Net Nanny, and by configuring their router to filter or block certain websites — although this won’t affect what someone can browse outside the home.
On TikTok and Instagram a whole raft of influencers are talking about their gambling addictions and how they got over them. Watching or sharing these with your teen can be a great way to open the conversation and show them what the dangers are, according to experts.
The TikTokker @alinobets talks about his own experience with gambling addiction and also explodes the get-rich-quick myths. Example post: “The richest men in the world are: 75 per cent entrepreneurs; 15 per cent investors; 7 per cent athletes; 3 per cent artists; 0 per cent gamblers. Nobody got rich from gambling. It’s a scam.
It’s also about the way you talk to your kids, Grimes says. Try not to lecture them. “The message we want to get through is this idea of, ‘Don’t get tricked. Don’t get mugged. Don’t get conned.’ As a 16-year-old, you want to feel, ‘I’m really in control of my life. I’m not going to get tricked by the gambling industry.’”
Grimes urges parents not to be afraid to ask questions: “What is gambling actually costing you? Is it more than just money?”
Jennifer Howze’s Substack, Spotlight on Affected Others, provides insight for families and friends of compulsive gamblers, spotlightonaffectedothers.substack.com
Does your child have a gambling problem? The signs
• They spend less time doing things they previously enjoyed, such as spending time with friends or playing sports.
• They withdraw from family activities.
• Their attendance or performance at school begins to decline.
• They’re secretive about how they’re spending their time, where they are and what they’re doing.
• They seem distracted, distant or preoccupied.
• They become obsessed, for example, with a particular video game, acquiring loot boxes/packs or sports results.
• They take longer to complete simple tasks (possibly because they are taking breaks to game or gamble).
• They’re frequently tired or falling asleep due to late-night gaming or gambling.
• They neglect their physical hygiene or appearance, not showering or changing clothes for example.
Information supplied by Ygam