Albania Finalises Online Sports Betting Framework With Up to 10 Licences

Albania has completed the regulatory framework needed to reopen its licensed online sports betting market, more than two years after parliament approved the return of the sector. The final implementing regulations were completed in 2026, clearing the legal groundwork for a competitive licensing process involving up to 10 operators.

The first licensing round has not yet been announced, but the framework marks the final stage of a policy reversal that began after Albania’s broad gambling restrictions took effect in 2019. The country is now preparing to replace outright prohibition in online sports betting with a limited and closely monitored licensing model.

Albania’s Betting Ban Took Effect in 2019

Albania adopted sweeping gambling restrictions in 2018, with the measures taking effect at the beginning of 2019. Betting shops, slot halls and online gambling were removed from the legal market as Prime Minister Edi Rama’s government sought to reduce the social and financial impact of gambling.

Before the restrictions, Albania had around 4,000 betting shops for a population of roughly 2.8 million. Annual sports betting turnover was estimated at about €700 million, while betting outlets had become highly visible in residential areas and around schools.

Rama strongly defended the intervention, arguing that the expansion of gambling had created serious problems for households and young people. He also repeatedly rejected the idea of returning to the widespread retail betting model that existed before the ban, a position that remains unchanged under the current reform, which applies specifically to online sports betting.

Rama Signalled a Change in Online Betting Policy in 2022

The government’s approach to online betting began to shift publicly in August 2022 during a meeting between Rama, senior ministers and representatives of Albanian sports federations.

Rama said international experts had warned the government before the 2019 restrictions that online betting should be treated differently from physical gambling because digital activity was more likely to move underground than disappear once legal access was removed. The government nevertheless chose a broader prohibition at the time.

By 2022, Rama said police operations had disrupted illegal operators but had failed to produce a meaningful decline in either online betting activity or participation. He also linked parts of the underground market to organised crime and said consultations with technology specialists and officials from other countries had repeatedly led to the same conclusion: “online is unstoppable.”

That assessment pushed the government toward a different model. Rather than reopening physical betting shops, Albania began considering whether online sports betting could be brought into a regulated system where operators, players and financial transactions could be identified and monitored. Sports federations also supported formalisation, arguing that money already circulating through the illegal market could instead contribute to sport, youth and cultural projects.

Parliament Legalised Online Sports Betting in 2024

The policy shift became law in 2024 when Albania amended its gambling legislation to allow licensed online sports betting under a limited regulatory model. The legislation entered into force in March 2024, but operators could not immediately apply for licences because the government still needed to establish the technical, financial and enforcement rules behind the new system.

That process took more than two years. By July 2026, Albania’s Gambling Supervision Authority confirmed that all eight implementing regulations required for the framework had been completed, including the final measures covering licence suspension and revocation and the management of gambling-related public funds.

With the secondary legislation now in place, the remaining step is the launch of the first competitive licensing procedure.

How Albania’s New Online Betting Market Will Work

Albania plans to create a relatively small market aimed at established operators rather than opening licensing without restriction. The Licensing Commission can award up to 10 licences, although it can decide to offer fewer licences during an individual application round. As of 18 August 2026, the authorities had not announced when the first process would begin or how many licences would initially be available.

The main requirements include:

• Applicants must operate through an Albanian-registered joint-stock company.
• The company must meet minimum capital requirements and demonstrate gambling experience in at least three EU or OECD countries.
• The applicant or a qualifying shareholder must have generated gambling turnover equivalent to roughly €20 million in the previous financial year.
• The minimum financial bid for a licence is approximately €4 million.
• Licences can run for 10 years.
• Applications will also be assessed on industry experience, corporate structure, technology and business planning.

The payment structure is designed around financial traceability. Players will need verified accounts, while deposits and withdrawals must pass through authorised banks or licensed payment institutions. Cash betting will not form part of the online model, and operators will also need systems capable of recording and monitoring player activity and retaining the required customer information.

A share equivalent to 15% of GGR will be directed to a special fund supporting areas including sport, culture, technology and innovation. Government estimates have suggested that the regulated sector could generate roughly €20 million a year in public revenue.

The size of the existing offshore market helps explain the commercial interest. Gaming Compliance International estimated illegal online sports betting GGR in Albania at around €109 million in 2025 when converted from its dollar estimate, while the estimated unregulated market approached €198 million when online casino and poker were included. These figures are industry estimates rather than official Albanian government statistics.

Hendri Hanaj of Hashtag Lawyers has argued that the combination of international experience requirements, turnover thresholds and licensing costs is likely to favour established international operators over new domestic companies. No major operator has yet been confirmed as an applicant, and no licence has been awarded.

Albania and Turkey Are Following Different Paths

Albania’s policy shift creates a clear comparison with Turkey, where private online betting and online casino operations remain prohibited. Turkey has continued to strengthen its response to illegal gambling through access restrictions, financial controls, criminal investigations and tougher enforcement, with recent measures focusing particularly on bank accounts, electronic money institutions, payment traffic and identity verification.

The underlying Turkish policy remains that tighter controls can reduce the illegal online market without opening private betting to licensing. Albania started from a similarly restrictive position in 2019 but eventually reached a different conclusion on online sports betting after its government accepted that prohibition and police operations had not removed digital betting from the market.

Its response was not full liberalisation. Albania instead stepped back from prohibition in one area and created a limited licensing model designed to move existing activity into identifiable accounts, regulated payment channels and supervised operators.

Turkey has not made the same policy shift and is still pursuing stronger restrictions as the primary response to illegal online gambling. Albania, by contrast, has moved beyond the assumption that online betting can be eliminated through prohibition alone, making its first licensing round an important test of whether a regulated market can draw a meaningful share of activity away from offshore operators.