France's Gambling Market Grows 0.5% to €5.66bn in H1 2026 as Only Online Expands

France's regulated gambling market barely grew in the first half, and only because online sports betting had a World Cup June. The regulator now says the full-year figure depends on whether a record 5.85 million active online accounts keep playing after the tournament, and on a lottery operator whose French revenue is shrinking.

• France's Autorité nationale des jeux (ANJ) puts gross gaming revenue (GGR) for the first half of 2026 at €5.66bn, up 0.5% on a year earlier against 4.1% growth in the first half of 2025, a total that excludes land-based casinos and gaming clubs, which report annually
• Online was the only segment to grow, with GGR up 11% to €1.45bn and its share of the market up 2.4 points to 25.6%, while active player accounts rose 24% to a record 5.85 million
• Online sports betting stakes rose 10.6% to €6.6bn, but by only 4% from January to May against 47% in June, when the World Cup began and acquisition bonuses were nearly four times their June 2025 level
• FDJ United's exclusive-rights GGR in France fell 2% to €3.43bn on weaker EuroMillions jackpots and heatwave-hit retail footfall, and PMU's retail horse racing GGR fell 5.8% to €782m, its third consecutive first-half decline
• The ANJ says full-year growth will depend on whether World Cup recruits keep betting, and on FDJ United, which holds 61% of the market and is targeting stable GGR from its French network in 2026

Online Carried a Market That Otherwise Shrank

The ANJ published its semi-annual market analysis on 15 October. GGR reached €5.66bn in the six months to 30 June, up 0.5%, after 4.1% growth a year earlier. The total covers the online market and the exclusive-rights businesses of FDJ United and PMU; casinos and gaming clubs report once a year.

Online added 2.5 percentage points of growth, according to the report, while FDJ United's exclusive-rights activities took off 1.2 points and PMU's 0.8 points. A year earlier FDJ United had added 2.7 points. Online GGR rose 11% to €1.45bn, against 8.2% growth a year earlier, with sports betting supplying 7.9 points of that, poker 2.6 and horse racing 0.3. The ANJ notes that 2025 online figures were restated after a change in scope.

Active online accounts rose 24% to 5.85 million and unique players 17% to 4.06 million, so the average player now holds 1.44 accounts against 1.37. Rewards paid to players rose 28% to €199m, 2.5 times faster than online GGR, and equalled 13.8% of it against 11.9%.

The World Cup Was a June Event

Online sports betting GGR rose 11.6% to €995m. Stakes rose 4% from January to May and 47% in June, the month the World Cup began; football stakes rose 116% in June. Monthly active accounts grew between 2% and 11% a year from January to May, then 69% in June, to 3.1 million.

The ANJ links the recruitment to a promotional effort concentrated on June. Sports betting rewards rose 35% to €129m, with €35.5m paid in June against €14.5m in June 2025, and acquisition bonuses, down 6% from January to May, rose to €9.0m in June from €2.4m. Stakes per active account fell 14% over the half.

Poker grew more evenly: GGR rose 13.4% to €290m and active accounts 38.5% to 2.3 million, while GGR per account fell 18%. Sit&Go formats, almost all with variable prize pools, generated 70% of poker GGR. Online horse racing stakes rose 15.8% to €920m, the largest increase since 2021, while GGR rose 2.8% to €164m.

FDJ United and PMU Pulled the Other Way

FDJ United's exclusive-rights GGR in France fell €69m, of which the lottery accounted for €64m. Draw games fell 7.6%, which the operator attributes to fewer and smaller EuroMillions jackpots and lower footfall during second-quarter heatwaves; excluding long EuroMillions cycles, lottery GGR rose 1%, according to the operator. At group level, the ANJ's summary of FDJ United's results shows revenue down 4.5% to €1.8bn, three points of it from €52m of tax increases in France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Romania, and a swing from a €136m profit to a €16m loss after €135m of impairments on the online business linked to regulatory changes in those last three markets.

PMU's exclusive-rights stakes fell 3.8% to €3.1bn and GGR fell faster, which the ANJ partly attributes to a rise in the payout rate on PMU's retail Simple bet from 83.6% to 84.6% from October 2025. PMU's market share fell to 13.8% from 14.7%, and online sports betting, which overtook it in the first half of 2025, is now 3.8 points ahead. PMU's 2026 budget provides €725m for the racing industry, against €802m in 2025.

June Flatters the Online Number, and the Second Half Will Test It

Strip out June and French online sports betting grew by low single digits. The rest fits a market that bought its growth: stakes per account down 14%, acquisition bonuses up nearly fourfold in one month, rewards growing 2.5 times faster than revenue. The ANJ's July note put French online stakes on the tournament above €1.3bn, with about 1 million accounts opened during it, and France also topped DATA.BET's World Cup betting figures. The final was on 19 July, so some of the effect lands in the second half; after that there is no tournament to lean on. The ANJ says these players' activity in the second half will show whether the World Cup durably widened the pool of bettors, and accounts growing faster than players suggests some sign-ups were existing bettors adding operators. The regulator, which has just found that bettors it flags as excessive dominate niche bet types, will be watching the less welcome kind of retention too.

France's Online Market Is Growing Without the Product That Drives Others

Online casino games are not authorised in France, the ANJ states, and the 2024 attempt to change that was abandoned within days: the government withdrew a budget amendment that would have legalised them by ordinance after opposition from land-based casinos and local mayors, as Europe 1 reported, naming France and Cyprus as the only EU countries with the ban. Reaching 25.6% of the market without casino games is notable for that reason, but the gap has a cost. A PwC study for the ANJ, published in December 2023, estimated the illegal offer's GGR at between €748m and €1.54bn in 2023, 5% to 11% of the whole market, dominated by online casino games. The fastest-growing licensed product this half was poker, led by variable-prize Sit&Go games that are arguably the nearest thing to casino-style play the law allows. Pascal Chevremont, the ANJ's new president, has named the illegal market a priority, as noted in our report on the ANJ's renewed advertising pact with the ARPP, but legalisation is a decision for Parliament, and the land-based sector won that argument in 2024.

FDJ United Is the Number That Decides the Year

FDJ United holds 61% of the market the ANJ measures, so a 2% fall in its French business took 1.2 points off growth, almost half of what an 11% rise online added. Its own explanation, jackpot cycles and the weather, describes revenue it does not control, and its stated aim for 2026 is stability in the French network, not growth. The wider group is under pressure too: tax rises in four markets and a €135m impairment on the online division it has been moving onto the Kindred platform. PMU's decline matters for a fiscal reason: it funds French racing, and a cut from €802m to €725m is the cost of a retail network losing ground to online channels, including PMU's own.

France's licensed market held its ground in the first half only because online betting had one exceptional month. The full-year figures will show whether June moved the market or merely borrowed from it.