Commercial non-tribal gaming in the US slipped just under $5 billion in April, but the total was enough to make it the second-highest month on record, according to the American Gaming Association (AGA).
April’s total of approximately $4,987,900,000 — which includes retail and online sports betting, casinos and poker — marked a 6.1% decline from March, the all-time record for revenue at $5.3 billion, according to the AGA’s latest Commercial Gaming Revenue Tracker.
The report also found that commercial gaming revenue was up 12.4% year-to-year, as the industry continues to lap the pandemic year. Many restrictions related to COVID-19 were still in effect in April 2021.
AGA added that commercial gaming revenue totaled $19.3 billion in the first four months of 2022, up 24.2% from the same period the year before. At that rate, full-year revenue for 2022 could approach $58 billion – a new record. The current record of $53 billion was set in 2021.
“While persistent macroeconomic concerns remain, including supply chain disruptions, labor shortages and rising inflation rates, the gaming industry’s growth rate at the start of 2022 has the potential to be another record-setting year,” the AGA said.
Sports Betting and iGaming Take Back Seat to Slots and Table Games
Drilling down into the numbers, the nearly $5 billion in April revenue included $497.5 million from sports betting – both retail and online – and $416.4 million from US online casinos and poker sites. The combined verticals accounted for $913.9 million of commercial gaming revenue for the month, or 18.3% of the total. That was down from 19.2% the month prior.
AGA said revenue in both verticals “continued to grow by double-digit percentages in April over 2021.”
Sports betting revenue for April 2022 includes 25 states but not Arizona; the Grand Canyon State didn’t report its revenue in time for publication. Still, sports betting was up 74.6% year-to-year, when only 20 jurisdictions were live. Excluding the five new markets, sports betting revenue was up 67.9% year-to-year, according to AGA.
Meanwhile, iGaming in the six states where it is legal – Connecticut, Delaware, Michigan, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia – grossed $416.4 million in April. AGA said the mark was $6 million short of record revenue for the vertical in March, but was also a 38.8% improvement over the pandemic year.
The AGA’s revenue figures for iGaming comport with calculations made by US Gaming Review, which found that New Jersey led the field with $136.9 million in April revenue. Michigan was second ($132.4 million), followed by Pennsylvania ($113.1 million), Connecticut ($22.8 million), West Virginia ($8.6 million), and Delaware ($1.2 million).
Connecticut launched online casino gaming in October 2021, so it was not a revenue contributor in April 2021. Without the additional market, the other five iGaming states saw revenue in April increase 31.2% year-to-year.
For the first four months of 2022, gross gaming revenue from sports betting ($2 billion) was up 64.4% from the pandemic year while iGaming revenue ($1.6 billion) was up 49.8% from January to April 2021.
Combined, the verticals grossed $913.9 million in April and accounted for 18.3% of the near-$5 billion commercial gaming total. By comparison, the combined sports betting and iGaming verticals made up 19.2% of all commercial gaming revenue in March.
Slots were the big moneymaker in April with more than $2.9 billion in revenue, up 2.2% year-to-year. Table games were a distant second with $786.7 million in revenue, up 26.3% from the pandemic year. Gross gaming revenue in the first four months of 2022 from slots ($11.1 billion) and table games ($3.2 billion) were up 14.3% and 38.2% from the year before, respectively.
Most Commercial Gaming States Grew Revenue Year-to-Year
AGA said that 24 of the 31 states where commercial gaming was operational a year ago had revenue growth year-to-year.
The top five states that saw revenue increases were Virginia ($36.3 million, up 86.6% year-to-year), Tennessee ($27.1 million, up 75.1%), New York ($358.5 million, up 51.7%), West Virginia ($71.6 million, up 48.7%), and Oregon ($3.8 million, up 40.2%). Nevada was the top state in terms of revenue at $1.1 billion.
Jurisdictions that lost revenue included the District of Columbia ($1.4 million, down 31.4% year-to-year), Montana ($400k, down 22.4%), and Mississippi ($206.1 million, down 21.1%).
Arkansas, Louisiana, Ohio, and South Dakota posted smaller declines in revenue year-to-year. Three states – Arizona, Connecticut, and Wyoming – had not launched at this point last year.
