Sports Betting in 2026: Bigger, Faster, and Harder to Ignore

The sports betting industry has just grown in 2026; it has pushed past another ceiling. Global estimates now sit around $231 billion, up from roughly $203 billion last year. That’s not incremental growth. That’s momentum.

And it’s not coming from retail sportsbooks. It’s coming from phones.

More than 80% of wagers are now placed through mobile devices. For most bettors, placing a wager isn’t a planned activity anymore. It happens between plays. During halftime. Sometimes, while watching a different game entirely. The technology has removed almost every layer of friction. Logging in takes seconds. Funding accounts is nearly instant. Placing a bet can be faster than ordering coffee. That speed changes betting behavior.

The barrier isn’t physical anymore. You don’t have to go anywhere. That alone has widened the audience. The audience has shifted, too. The average bettor is younger than just a few years ago, mid-30s now, and female participation continues to climb. Close to 38% of active users globally are women. That number would have surprised industry analysts not long ago.

Some of that change is cultural. Betting talk is everywhere: pregame shows, podcasts, social feeds. Some of it is simply design. Apps are cleaner. Simpler. More intuitive. You don’t need to “know the system” anymore.

Live betting may be the clearest sign of how much things have changed. Roughly 64% of all wagers are now placed after games begin. That used to be under half.

Instead of making one decision before kickoff and waiting it out, bettors are reacting to moments. A turnover. A scoring run. An injury. Odds adjust instantly, and so do wagers. The experience is interactive now. Faster. More layered. It also means more time inside apps.

Growth, though, brings pressure. Responsible gambling tools are getting more use than they did even two years ago. Around 38% of users have set daily deposit limits. Roughly a third regularly review monthly spending summaries. Session reminders are becoming standard. Short-term “take a break” features are used by more than one in five bettors.

Permanent self-exclusion numbers remain small, about 2% of users, but awareness is clearly rising. Surveys suggest players who receive consistent spending reports tend to scale back deposits over time. It’s not a perfect system. But it’s not stagnant either.

Betting preferences still follow regional sports culture. Football dominates in some parts of the world. Basketball leads elsewhere. Average wager size varies widely, sometimes $15, sometimes closer to $50, depending on local income levels and market maturity.

Payments are evolving too. Digital wallets now account for roughly 44% of transactions, overtaking traditional debit and credit cards. Bank transfers remain common for larger deposits. Cryptocurrency hovers near 6% of activity. It had a surge period, but that surge has cooled.

What stands out most in 2026 isn’t just the size of the industry. It’s how embedded it feels.

Betting is part of the viewing experience now. Discussed openly. Marketed heavily. Integrated directly into broadcasts.

The regulatory conversations aren’t going away. Neither are the debates about consumer protection.

But from a growth standpoint, this isn’t a peak. It feels more like a shift. And it’s being driven almost entirely by the device in your pocket.