A YouGov report commissioned by gambling charity GambleAware has revealed a generally positive view of UK gamblers towards the National Lottery.
The Treatment and Support Survey 2024, conducted in November and December last year, used a total pool of 17,933 people, of which 60.8% stated they’ve gambled at least once over the past 12 months prior to the survey.
A majority (84%) agreed that the National Lottery is a form of gambling and its products are not entirely harmless. However, most people (45%) stated that the Lottery is overall good for society overall against the 14% that disagreed.
Players do make a distinction between products. However, with the lottery’s draw games usually believed to carry less risk due to the “delayed gratification” and “lower cost per play” they offer, while instant win games were considered more harmful because of their “ease of access”, among others.
YouGov further highlighted that the National Lottery remains the most common type of gambling among UK players, standing at 41.4% engagement rate at the time of the survey. However, this was lower than the 43% in 2023, the 44.4% in 2022, and the 44.2% in 2021.
Around 74% of players said they would like to see the GambleAware logo and website being signposted on National Lottery products, which further strengthened the findings that the lottery is still not clear of public scrutiny.
More assumptions than facts
Separate from the National Lottery angle, the study was used by GambleAware to try and state that more than five million people in the UK want to either reduce or stop their gambling overall.
The estimates, however, were made based on a purely speculative approach, with the gambling charity pitting the pool of 17,933 against the official UK population of 53 million as per ONS statistics.
This raised more questions about the charity’s portrayal of the UK gambling market, despite GambleAware serving as the commissioner for research, education, and treatment of gambling harm – until this transitions over to three new commissioners under a new UK government mandate in 2026.