Gambling Commission mandates personal limits, staff alerts on gaming machines
New technical standards for land-based machines will force default play limits, staff alerts and a ban on turbo modes, phased in from 2027.
The Gambling Commission has confirmed a new set of technical standards for land-based gaming machines, setting out requirements it says are intended to make play fairer and safer.
The measures, published on Wednesday in the regulator's response to its 2025 consultation, apply to new category A, B and certain C machines, with implementation phased between March 2027 and October 2028.
Under the rules, new machines must prompt players at the start of each session to actively set personal limits on playing time and monetary loss, or accept default settings. Playing without any limit in place will not be permitted.
Consumer-set limits can run up to 60 minutes and £450 ($597) in net loss. Default limits are capped at 20 minutes and £150 in net loss. Reaching either triggers an alert and a mandatory break.
Break lengths vary. Where default time limits apply, the first two breaks last 10 and 20 seconds respectively; all subsequent breaks, including those under custom-set limits, run for a minimum of 30 seconds. Safer gambling information must be shown throughout, explaining the interruption and giving players the option to end the session or change their limits.
New machines and new games on multi-game "compendiums" will display net position and elapsed session time by default, though players may hide this after viewing it for at least 10 seconds.
Machines will also send real-time alerts to staff when a player hits or changes a time or loss limit, though the Commission said these alerts do not require immediate staff intervention. To limit alert volume and staff fatigue, no alert will fire at the first two default time thresholds — 20 and 40 minutes — where those defaults were chosen at the start of the session.
The standards ban audiovisual "celebrations" for returns at or below the player's last stake, and prohibit features that speed up outcomes, such as turbo or quick spin modes. The Commission did ease some restrictions on "game links" and will allow live jackpot gambling where it is player-initiated and within prize limits.
The standards apply to category A, B1, B2, B3, B3A and B4 games classed as "new" after 30 June 2027. Existing machines are largely exempt, reflecting the technical and financial difficulty of retrofitting; the industry had estimated that around 7,770 machines could face removal if forced upgrades were required. On compendium platforms mixing old and new games, adding any new game means the whole platform must meet the updated standards.
Rollout comes in three stages: a session-definition requirement from 30 March 2027, most of the technical changes from 30 June 2027, and the staff-alert obligation becoming law on 3 October 2028.
The Commission's business impact assessment put consolidation costs at £12,000 and testing strategy costs at £3,200. It estimated £500,000 to £1 million for limit-setting functionality and £554,000 to £1.154 million for sessional information displays on new games. Staff alerts were flagged as the costliest element, at an estimated £20.76 million to £41.63 million a year, largely from data systems and extra personnel — though exemptions for existing machines and reduced alerting at lower-risk thresholds are expected to roughly halve potential alert volumes.
The regulator noted the scale of the market it is regulating, with machines generating gross gambling yield of £2.6 billion between April 2024 and March 2025, 88.5% of it from category B machines, alongside steady growth in machine-based play since 2019.
Helen Rhodes, the Commission's director of major policy projects and evaluation, said the measures would "help both to empower consumers to understand and manage their gambling and ensure operators play their part." She added that "consultation feedback from a range of stakeholders helped to inform our thinking and where there was legitimate and evidenced concern, we made changes."
The reforms stem from the UK government's 2023 Gambling Act Review white paper. The Commission received 1,065 responses to its 2025 consultation from industry bodies, clubs and advocacy groups, feedback it said led it to adopt net position as the monetary metric, refine session definitions to reduce unnecessary interruptions, and exempt existing machines to balance harm reduction against economic impact.