Nov. 5 is the next deadline for Austria’s planned overhaul of its online gambling market, as that’s when the European Commission’s standstill period for the Gambling Reform Act 2026 is due to end. The Finance Ministry submitted the draft to the Commission’s Technical Regulation Information System, or TRIS, on Aug. 4, after putting the reform out for domestic consultation in June, and Austria can’t adopt the notified provisions until the standstill runs out.
Austria’s online market is currently a monopoly, with Österreichische Lotterien holding the only national online concession through win2day, an authorisation that runs until Sept. 30, 2027. The draft would replace that with a system letting several licensed operators offer casino and other online gambling products, and under the proposed timetable, multiple operators could enter the regulated market from Oct. 1, 2027.
TRIS gives the Commission and other EU member states time to check national technical rules for possible barriers to the free movement of goods and services, so the end of the standstill isn’t the same as the Commission approving the legislation. Comments don’t extend the three-month standstill, though a detailed opinion can push it to four months for information society services, and the Commission can impose a longer delay in certain circumstances.
Austria’s notification covers the planned licensing system together with new powers for internet and payment blocking against unlicensed gambling operators. The Commission’s TRIS record says the reform aims to tackle the growth of illegal gambling and confirms that several providers would be able to offer online gambling under the new rules, instead of the current single concession.
Applicants for an Austrian online licence would need at least €10 million in share capital and would have to meet compliance requirements covering anti-money laundering and player protection. The reform would also set up an independent gambling regulator, taking supervision away from the Finance Ministry, which currently handles both regulation and policy for the sector. Consultation on the draft opened on June 29 and took responses until July 15.
Operators that have been serving Austrian customers without a domestic licence would have to shut those operations by the end of 2026 if they want into the new regulated market. Anyone still operating after that could be excluded from receiving a concession for 18 months, with later breaches bringing longer exclusion periods.
Former operators would also need to settle outstanding Austrian tax liabilities and comply with final court judgments tied to player protection claims before getting a concession. How to treat companies that have worked under licences issued elsewhere in Europe has been one of the most contested parts of the reform, especially since several major international gambling groups have served Austrian players without holding the country’s sole national online licence.
Entain has already talked to investors about the expected opening and sees Austria as a market where bwin could compete once multiple licences become available. It has still criticised parts of the proposed transition, including the cooling-off requirements for operators that previously ran without Austrian authorisation. Austria currently treats a licence from another EU or EEA country as insufficient on its own to legally offer gambling to Austrian customers.
A central register in the draft would cover self-exclusion and operator-imposed exclusions across online gambling, casinos, and gaming machines. Operators would also be hooked into a digital supervisory system for cross-operator limits, players would set their own spending and time limits, and any increase to a self-selected limit would only take effect after a 72-hour wait.
Operators that keep offering gambling without an Austrian concession would face payment blocking, website blocking, and blacklisting. Some of those enforcement and player protection measures are set to start from January 2027, months before new licensed online operators could start taking customers in October, which gives authorities a transition period to go after companies that stay outside the new system.
Parliament can keep working through the Gambling Reform Act while the TRIS standstill is in force, but it can’t adopt the notified technical provisions until the European process allows it. The Commission currently records Nov. 5 as the end of the standstill for notification 2026/0415/AT, which makes that the next point at which Austria can move the reform toward a parliamentary vote and the planned 2027 market opening.