Spot the signs, take action, get support – Safer Gambling Week 2025
Originally called Responsible Gambling Week, this initiative started in 2017 and quickly underwent a rebrand to what we now know as Safer Gambling Week (SGW). It’s organised by the Betting & Gaming Council (BGC) with additional support and involvement from British Amusement Catering Trade Association (Bacta), the Bingo Association and the Lotteries Council. The objective is to raise awareness of how people can gamble more safely. Each year its scope and reach grows, so we expect SGW 2025, running from 17-23 November, to be bigger than ever.
Safer Gambling Week 2025 – this year’s focus
SGW aims to support all players, no matter where they are in their safer gambling journey. Whether somebody is concerned that they spend a little too much time spinning online slots, or they have a serious gambling problem, help is available. Tools, advice, and support offered during SGW aim to help everybody equally, without prejudice. Importantly, SGW isn't only for those with problems, it's to raise awareness for all players to keep it safe and spot the signs, including those who already gamble responsibly/for fun.
The core aims of the week are broken into 3 key elements, which we will look into in detail shortly. They are:
- Let’s talk about safer gambling
- Take action: safer gambling tools
- Get support: advice and helplines
Let’s talk about safer gambling
The first aim of SGW is to help you to ‘Equip yourself with the knowledge and tools to help you gamble more safely.’ It seems simple enough, but what does this entail and how does SGW hope to deliver?
SGW prioritises telling people about the warning signs of gambling that is becoming problematic and encourages conversation around ways it can be curbed.
How do you spot the warning signs?
SGW talks about warning signs that your gambling may be becoming problematic. This includes, but isn’t limited to:
- Thinking of gambling as a way to make money
- Gambling interfering with your relationships with friends and family
- Spending more on gambling than you can afford
- Losing interest in other activities that you usually enjoy
- Feeling the need to lie about or hide your gambling
- Gambling with increasingly large amounts of money to get a ‘buzz’
- Not being able to put gambling out of your mind
- Feeling anxious, irritable, or depressed
Take action: use the safer gambling tools
If you’ve realised that you’re exhibiting one or more of the warning signs, the next stage is to take action. The primary way that SGW suggests tackling this issue is with the use of responsible gambling tools. Below are some of the tools available to you.
Deposit limits – what are they and how do they work?
400,000 deposit limits are set every single month in the UK. This is such an easy tool to use and a tool that all Gambling Commission (UKGC)-licensed casinos are required to provide. It can help to stop your habit from becoming unaffordable – and for some people, it’s just an excellent budgeting tool. There’s no downside to setting a deposit limit, so for SGW 2025, consider setting yours.
How to control the gambling you see
We are all vulnerable to the power of advertising, so if you think you’d benefit from not being able to see gambling advertisements or content, you can make that happen! SGW explains how to control gambling content across platforms including Facebook, YouTube, and X (Twitter).
Consider self exclusion?
If deposit limits aren’t quite cutting it, then sometimes taking some time off is the best way forward. All UKGC-licensed casinos are legally-bound to make the option to self exclude available. This doesn’t close your account, but it does prevent you from accessing it for a time period of your choosing.
Get support: advice and helplines
Discovering you have an unhealthy relationship with gambling can feel scary, alienating, embarrassing – any number of difficult emotions. The important thing about the ‘Get support’ part of SGW is to know that there’s impartial, unbiased, friendly support available to you, whenever you’re ready to receive it.
SGW recommends key providers such as:
- The National Gambling Support Network: 0808 8020 133
- GamCare: 0808 8020 133 or Live Chat
- GamCare’s Support for Young People: 0808 8020 133
Knowing these providers exist is the first step, but if you, or someone you know, has a problem with gambling, reaching out for help is the most important thing you can do.
Safer Gambling Week – history and background
Having started in 2017 and rebranded as Safer Gambling Week in 2020, this initiative was designed to start a dialogue around gambling more safely. It aimed to show people the tools that are available all year round, and direct those that need help to free advice and support.
SGW spans all sections of the UK and Irish gambling industry from online casinos and sports betting sites, to bingo halls, amusement arcades, and all other gaming operators. It’s also widely supported, by gambling charities, youth associations, and the Betting & Gaming Council.
Despite only lasting a week, SGW’s scope is vast. In 2024, it generated 60 million impressions across social platforms, and there are regular peaks in the setting of deposit limits during this week.
While some pressure groups comment that it should last longer, on the whole the industry, and the general public has a hugely positive perception of the initiative – and the good it manages to do year round.
How effective is Safer Gambling Week?
It’s very difficult to measure the effectiveness of a week-long campaign, after all, safer habits take many months and even years to form. However, some of the best ways to measure success are to look at:
- Who sees it
- What happens during the week
In answer to the first point, in 2024, 60 million social media users engaged with at least one post from SGW.
In answer to the second? During SGW 2024 more than 1.5 million unique online gambling accounts used a safer gambling tool.
If millions are choosing to take action towards a better attitude to gambling, we can only view the week as a success.
Final words, and what about the future?
SGW 2025 runs as a charity, it doesn’t make money, it just supports those who need it and raises awareness for people who may not yet even know that they need help. It continues to make a big impression across the month of November and beyond, so it’s important that if we can, we support it.
What and where next?
Online gambling is growing rapidly and with it, we must acknowledge that the rate of problematic gambling will grow too. This puts pressure on the BGC to prepare for more people who need to use these services.
Being able to raise funds to support the work of SGW and the charities it promotes is essential if people are to keep receiving the help they need.
Funding shift
As GambleAware prepares for its doors to close, the burden on SGW looks heavier than ever. The mandatory levy will see money provided for the research, prevention, and cure of problem gambling. The cure part will be given directly to the NHS (around 40 - 60% of the £90 million they anticipate collecting).
Hopefully, the NHS will be able to match the incredible job that GamCare has done in supporting problem gamblers. However, it’s not unrealistic to expect there will be teething problems. With gambling (in general) on the rise, SGW 2026 will have more people to help and may be left with fewer services available to them.
Remember to always play safe
We fully endorse and support the Safer Gambling Week messages that encourage responsible gambling and recommend players make use of the available resources. Please play responsibly.