ASA finds gambling ad compliance strong in under-25 age rule review

The UK’s advertising watchdog has reported that licensed gambling operators are largely adhering to rules prohibiting the use of people under 25 in advertisements, following a five-month monitoring sweep from July to November 2025. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) employed its new AI-driven Active Ad Monitoring tool to scan approximately 13,000 distinct paid and organic ads across both the gambling and alcohol sectors.

Among gambling-related advertisements, the ASA recorded a confirmed breach rate of just 0.4%, with a further 3.4% of ads flagged as potential infractions. The vast majority—96.2%—were found to be fully compliant. By comparison, the alcohol sector saw a lower compliance level of 86.7%, with 10.8% flagged as possible breaches and 2.5% confirmed as breaking the rule.

The ASA noted that organic social media posts containing user-generated content posed a higher risk of non-compliance, particularly in the alcohol category. “Our findings indicate that a small percentage of online alcohol and gambling ads feature a person who is or clearly appears to be under the age of 25, in clear breach of the advertising rules,” the regulator stated, adding that it “secured assurances” from advertisers found to have run non-compliant material.