The French gambling market grew 0.5% to €5.66bn in gross gaming revenue (GGR) in the first half of 2026, excluding casinos and gaming clubs, according to the Autorité nationale des jeux (ANJ). Online GGR rose 11% to €1.45bn and was the only source of growth, as FDJ United’s lottery and PMU’s retail horse betting declined.
A year earlier the same perimeter grew 4.1%. The ANJ’s first-half 2026 market review, published on 15 October, puts online’s contribution at 2.5 percentage points, against negative contributions of 1.2 points from FDJ United’s exclusive-rights activities and 0.8 points from PMU. That compares with full-year 2025, when the French market grew 3% to €14.1bn GGR including casinos.
| Segment | GGR H1 2026 (€m) | Change y/y | Market share |
|---|---|---|---|
| FDJ United (exclusive rights) | 3,429 | -2.0% | 60.6% |
| Online sports betting | 995 | +11.6% | 17.6% |
| PMU (exclusive rights) | 782 | -5.8% | 13.8% |
| Online poker | 290 | +13.4% | 5.1% |
| Online horse betting | 164 | +2.8% | 2.9% |
| Total | 5,660 | +0.5% | 100% |
Source: ANJ, H1 2026, excluding casinos and gaming clubs. Market shares calculated by TGE.
Online now accounts for 25.6% of that market. Sports betting added 7.9 points to online growth, poker 2.6 points and horse betting 0.3 points, the ANJ said.
| Online segment (€m GGR) | H1 2024 | H1 2025 | H1 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sports betting | 792 | 892 | 995 |
| Poker | 257 | 256 | 290 |
| Horse betting | 160 | 160 | 164 |
| Total online | 1,208 | 1,307 | 1,449 |
Source: ANJ semi-annual analysis, first halves of 2024 to 2026.
Sports betting: a one-month story
Online sports betting stakes rose 10.6% to €6.6bn and GGR rose 11.6% to €995m, according to the ANJ. Almost all of that came in June, when the FIFA World Cup began: stakes were up 47% year on year in June and only 4% from January to May.
Football carried 8.6 of the 10.6 points of stake growth. Football stakes rose 116% in June and 2.5% over January to May, lifting the sport’s share of stakes to 55.8% from 53.1% in H1 2025. Tennis, the second growth driver in 2025, grew 2% from January to May and fell 13.5% in June; its share dropped to 23.2% from 26.0%. Other sports grew 21%.
The June volume did not translate into June revenue. Monthly data in the report’s annex show the highest stakes of the half in June but one of the lowest GGR margins.
| Month 2026 | Stakes (€m) | GGR (€m) | GGR margin |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 1,095.5 | 221.9 | 20.3% |
| February | 1,062.1 | 120.6 | 11.4% |
| March | 1,034.2 | 131.6 | 12.7% |
| April | 1,030.4 | 142.6 | 13.8% |
| May | 1,067.1 | 216.9 | 20.3% |
| June | 1,327.2 | 161.6 | 12.2% |
Source: ANJ, online sports betting monthly figures, January to June 2026. GGR margin (GGR divided by stakes) calculated by TGE.
Football is where the gap shows. Operators kept 24.7% of football stakes as GGR in January and 25.5% in May, but only 8.3% in June (€68.3m on €826m staked), based on TGE calculations from the ANJ annex.
The betting style also changed. Live betting’s share of stakes fell to 44% in June from 54% a year earlier, while it held at 50% from January to May, the ANJ said. The average bet slipped to €14.0 from €14.6 over the half, and to €14.7 from €17.4 in June.
Bonuses buy the World Cup cohort
Active player accounts in sports betting rose 28% to 5.2m and unique players 21% to 3.6m. Monthly active accounts were up between 2% and 11% year on year from January to May, then 69% in June, reaching 3.1m. Stakes per active account fell 14%.
That recruitment was paid for. Bonuses granted to sports bettors rose 35% to €129m, or 12.9% of GGR against 10.7% a year earlier. June alone accounted for €35.5m, against €14.5m in June 2025. Acquisition bonuses fell 6% from January to May, then reached €9.0m in June against €2.4m a year earlier, close to four times as much.
Across all online segments, bonuses rose 28% to €199m, 2.5 times faster than online GGR, and reached 13.8% of online GGR against 11.9%. The rise comes as France tightens player protection: the government approved a loss cap for under-25 betting customers in July.
Poker and horse racing grow without the World Cup
Online poker GGR rose 13.4% to €290m after a flat H1 2025 (-0.4%). Short formats (Sit&Go and tournaments) grew 15.9% and made up 83% of poker GGR. Sit&Go alone, mostly variable-prize formats, brought in €202m, or 70% of the segment, with growth rising from 5% to 10% in the first quarter to about 30% in June. Cash games grew 2.8%.
Poker accounts rose 38.5% to 2.3m and unique players 34.4% to 1.8m, three times the growth rates of H1 2025. GGR per active account fell 18% to €126. Poker players now make up 44% of all unique online players in France, up from 38%.
Online horse betting stakes rose 15.8% to €920m, the fastest growth since 2021, while GGR rose 2.8% to €164m. Monthly stakes were up 13% to 20% in every month, with no June spike. Gallop races grew 18.2% and trotting 13.5%, leaving the two nearly level at €456m and €464m. Active accounts rose 6.8% to 547,000, so the growth came from more betting per player.
Across the online market, active accounts rose 24% to 5.85m and unique players 17% to 4.06m. Each player held 1.44 accounts on average, up from 1.37, and was active in 1.45 segments, up from 1.38.
Monopolies lose share of the French gambling market
FDJ United’s GGR from its exclusive rights in France fell 2% to €3.43bn. The lottery lost €64m (-2.1%) to €2.98bn, with draw games down 7.6%. The operator attributed the fall to fewer and smaller large EuroMillions jackpots than in 2025 and to lower footfall in points of sale during second-quarter heatwaves; excluding long EuroMillions cycles (jackpots above €75m), lottery GGR rose 1%. Retail sports betting GGR fell 1.1% to €450m.
| FDJ United group (€m) | H1 2025 | H1 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| GGR | 4,369 | 4,314 | -1.3% |
| Revenue | 1,867 | 1,782 | -4.5% |
| Recurring EBITDA | 441 | 404 | -8.4% |
| Recurring operating income | 270 | 229 | -15.1% |
| Net result | 136 | -16 | n.s. |
Source: FDJ United half-year financial report to 30 June 2026, as cited by the ANJ.
At group level, tax increases in France, the UK, the Netherlands and Romania cost €52m, or 3 points of revenue growth, according to FDJ United. Its first-half net loss reflected €135m of impairments on online betting and gaming assets, linked to regulatory changes in those three foreign markets, and a €20m exceptional contribution on large companies’ profits.
PMU’s exclusive-rights stakes fell 3.8% to €3.1bn, the third consecutive annual decline, and its GGR fell 5.8% to €782m. Over two years PMU has lost €264m of stakes (-7.9%) and €70m of GGR (-8.2%), the ANJ said. The regulator links part of the gap between stakes and GGR to the higher payout rate on simple bets in points of sale, raised to 84.6% from 83.6% in October 2025.
PMU’s share of the market fell to 13.8% from 15.8% in H1 2024. Online sports betting overtook it in H1 2025 and now leads by 3.8 points. PMU’s retail network still takes 77% of horse betting stakes, down from 80% a year earlier.
Next steps
FDJ United, which generates 61% of GGR outside casinos, has guided for stable GGR from its French network activities in 2026, according to the ANJ. For online, the regulator said second-half activity will show whether the World Cup, which ran until the final on 19 July, has durably widened the pool of bettors.
PMU is in a transition year under Cyrille Giraudat, Chief Executive since January 2026, and Éric Woerth, Chairman of the Board since 30 March 2026, while it prepares a “Pacte PMU 2030”. Its 2026 budget, adopted by the board on 30 June, sets payments to the horse racing industry at €725m, down 9.6% from €802m in 2025.
Source: Autorité nationale des jeux (ANJ)
