Gambling ads achieve 96.2% compliance in ASA's four-month sweep

The UK's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has reported that the licensed gambling sector maintained a high level of compliance across online ads during a four-month period from July to November 2025. Gambling ads achieved a 96.2% compliance rate, with only one confirmed breach out of thousands of checks.

The regulator's findings are based on its new Active Ad Monitoring system, an AI-powered tool that was rolled out over the past year to strengthen oversight. During the monitoring period, the system scanned approximately 13,000 unique paid-for and organic advertisements from both the alcohol and gambling sectors, flagging any that appeared to feature people under 25.

Alcohol ads performed less well, with 86.7% found fully compliant, 10.8% flagged as possible breaches, and 2.5% confirmed as definite rule violations. In the gambling category, by contrast, confirmed failures stood at just 0.4% (the single ad), while 3.4% were deemed potential breaches.

The ASA noted that organic social media posts featuring user-generated content posed a higher risk of non-compliance. The regulator also stated that "Alcohol ads were also more likely to be flagged as high risk than gambling ads."

Advertisers whose ads were flagged as definite breaches have already provided assurances to the ASA that they will comply. The watchdog plans to share its findings with stakeholders and continue monitoring both sectors to safeguard under-25s from inappropriate marketing.