Is gambling legal in the state of California? The short answer is yes. Does the law cover USA online casinos? Again, the answer is yes. We’ll be taking a look at what specifically is legal in the Golden State in terms of gambling (and include any restrictions, if any). The tangible benefits of online gambling legislation in California number in the billions. It is estimated that Californians place around $10 billion or more annually in illegal wagers. California has attempted to legalize online gambling in the state multiple times. California has legalized daily fantasy sports, however, DFS has the distinction of not being classified as online betting. Despite some progress on the issue, the attempts to legalize online sports betting hasn’t become reality. Of course, again, gambling online with an offshore casino or betting site does not constitute illegal gambling in CA. The Impact of Federal Gambling Laws On California Players Of the two remaining federal gambling laws that govern various forms of betting entertainment throughout the US, neither criminalizes the individual for betting online.

• Is Online Gambling Illegal In California Right Now
• Is Online Gambling Illegal In California Unemployment

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Is gambling legal in the state of California? The short answer is yes. Does the law cover USA online casinos?

Again, the answer is yes. We’ll be taking a look at what specifically is legal in the Golden State in terms of gambling (and include any restrictions, if any). While the state is one of the tourist hotbeds in the country, not a lot of people think of gambling when traveling there.

On top of that, it’s also legal to gamble in your home depending on the factors. With that said, we’ll discuss basic information about California’s gambling laws along with how online casinos are able to operate within the state.

When did gambling become legal in California?

The state of California passed a law in 1984 to legalize gambling. Soon after, gambling establishments were soon open. New language was amended to the current law in 2003 when the popularity of online casinos was growing at a fast rate.

How The Law Works

In accordance to California state law, there are games that are labeled “percentage games”. Prime examples of these games are blackjack, craps, slots, roulette, and other casino games. Basically, they are the main games that you’ll see being played at any casino.

However, there seems to be confusion about the law. In accordance to California Penal Code 330, percentage games are forbidden. This includes games where the house may not have to participate in the game itself.

To set the record straight, this part of the law DOES NOT pertain to online gambling. So you can still be able to play the same casino games in an online setting. Plus, there are workarounds of the law pertaining to poker.

In the game of poker, a casino or host taking a rake on pot sizes may be considered illegal. However, some poker hosts will rake games without breaking the law due to some of the loopholes that exist.

Poker games whether they are legal or online are totally fine to play in California. Even though it is legal to play online casino games in California, the real irony lies in the operation part. That’s because in the state, it’s actually illegal to start an online casino or gambling business.

Also, California is very finicky when it comes to tax law. So any earnings you win from online gambling must be taxed. If you pay taxes, then you should have nothing to worry about.

What Exceptions Are There?

Despite the laws changing all the time, the exceptions may be subject to change. For the moment, the gambling laws in California have exceptions. These include the following:

Casinos allowed with restrictions: Casinos in the state of California are prohibited. However, the only exception would be if the casino operated on an Indian reservation.

Horse race betting: Horse and harness racing on-track is permitted. However, the state of California restricts is to pari-mutuel betting. Off-track betting is illegal in the state.

State lottery: These include but are not limited to scratch tickets and electronic gaming lotto tickets like Mega Millions, Powerball, etc.

What is considered illegal?

Now that we have pointed out some of the exceptions, let’s take a look at what is prohibited from the state’s gambling laws. As mentioned before, off-track betting, percentage games, and casinos not located on Indian reservations are prohibited. Here are some other gambling-related activities that are prohibited:

Dice and card games: Card games (I.e – “razzle-dazzle”) and dice games are prohibited. It is also illegal to possess dice that has more than six faces. In other words, a 20 sided die that you would find in a Dungeons and Dragons game can’t be used for gambling purposes.

Draw poker: Draw poker is best known as five-card poker. The law states that it is banned in counties that have a population of 4 million people or more.

Other games prohibited: The following games are considered illegal: roulette, fan-tan, tan, rondo, rouge et noire, Hokey-pokey, Seven-and-a-half, Monte, and Faro.

FAQ

Is online gambling regulated in the state of California?

Is Online Gambling Illegal In California Right Now

Unlike some states where they regulate and license online casinos, California does not regulate them. Therefore, online casino owners located outside of the state won’t need any kind of license from the state government in order to make online casinos available to California residents.

Is sports betting legal in the state of California?

Yes and no. To cover the “yes” aspect, it is legal to bet on sports since most of the betting sites are located outside of the state. However, physical sports gambling or booking is prohibited.

Is DraftKings Legal in California?

This is where things get really confusing. Daily fantasy sports is not considered legal in the state. DraftKings is a daily fantasy sports or DFS operator. However, they will accept players who reside in California. DraftKings and FanDuel have stated that their business practices do not constitute illegal gambling, but consider it more of a skill game.

How many Indian casinos are in California?

As of 2020, there are over fifty Indian casinos in operation. Out of the 110 Indian tribes in the state, over 60 own tribal casinos. These also include nearly a dozen of casino resorts and three mini-casinos.

Final Thoughts

Now that you know about gambling laws in California, it’s important to know that online gambling is legal to an extent. However, land-based gambling appears to be very restricted. Regardless, you can still be able to gamble and win money.

The important part though is to play responsibly and keep it fun. One of the strange things is despite being able to use online gambling platforms like casinos, it’s illegal to run one within the state limits.

The state’s law may appear to be complex, but it’s good to do your due diligence if you have any concerns pertaining to the legal aspect of gambling. Also, you might want to take a look at some of the local laws as well. For example, Los Angeles may have draw poker banned since it’s a city of over 4 million people.

When talking about gambling in the US, it should be said that the most liberal states are New Jersey, California, and, of course, Nevada. It’s needless to say that California, as one of the richest states in the country has a lot of history when it comes to gambling, both legal and illegal.

If you know the history of this state and how much population it amassed during the 20^th century, you are surely aware that we are talking about one of the most significant of all the states, for a wide array of reasons. When California intends to regulate some fields or to start a new trend, you can bet that a lot of other states will follow its lead. We can see that this state has the intention of completely regulating gambling, in all of its forms. The reason is that the revenue potential is massive.

Is Online Gambling Illegal In California Unemployment

Naturally, this is pretty good news for all the gamblers, not only from this state but from all the US. When you scratch the surface, you can see that there is a good reason why we are talking about this state as the one who will lead all others. According to the official statistics, we can see that Californians are known for their tendency to host private games, invest their money into many different markets, and are known as people who enjoy participating in the national lottery.

With all these regulations and trends, the state has decided to have pretty light penalties for people who make felonies related to gambling. In case you would like to learn all the details about how this state regulates gambling, be sure to read this guide. With all this information in mind, we would like to point out the most important questions every Californian needs to know about online gambling in their native state.

1. Having Your Own Gambling Website is Against the Law

As you could see from the previous part of our article, online gambling is permitted in this state. Naturally, you need to be at least 21 years old before you can participate in these games. However, it’s against the law to have your own gambling business or an online casino. This is regarded as a serious criminal offense, and the perpetrator can face some serious penalties, even prison, in some of the severe cases. In case you are only a player, you need to make sure that you’ve paid the revenue tax. Otherwise, you are in direct conflict with a law of the state.

2. The Tendency to Regulate Online Poker

Online poker is not permitted in the state of California. However, we can see that there are tendencies that tell us that this can be handled pretty soon. A couple of weeks ago, a bill was passed to legalize online poker. Sadly, these talks are put on hold due to the fact that the global pandemic requires the attention of all the officials in the state. Surely, they will be continued after the state deals with the pandemic. Until then, players will need to satisfy themselves with playing in some of the real casinos. Thankfully, there are a lot of them in this state.

3. The Lottery is Permitted, but Not Online

We’ve mentioned that Californians are known for their tendencies to participate in the national lottery. It goes without saying that a high percentage of the population participates in it. However, we can see that playing the lottery on online casinos is considered illegal. But we can see that it is possible to check the numbers you’ve played on in a national lottery online through an app called “California Lottery”. While some people could see this as a contradict situation, it needs to be said that this online checking is limited only to the national one. Therefore, there isn’t a chance in the world that someone would participate in a lottery on some online casinos.

4. Every Online Casino Needs to be Legal

We’ve made a pretty clear difference between operating an online casino, which is illegal in this state, and participating in online gambling, which is permitted. But it must be said that participating in a game in illegal casinos isn’t recommended in this state. For an online casino to be active in this state, it needs to have all the necessary licenses and it needs to meet the standards imposed by the state itself. Naturally, it’s not possible to control all the online casinos that are operating in this state. Therefore, you will see that one of the first things every player will be recommended is to participate only in those who have to meet all that’s required from California’s government.

5. Casinos are Against Gambling Websites

Even though we are talking about a massive potential for earnings for the state, we can see that it remains reluctant to completely legalize online casinos. One of the main reasons is that those real-life casinos are against this legalization, due to the fact that it could affect the number of people visiting them every year. We can see that this number is pretty high, therefore, we understand their hesitancy. But, the danger of them losing a high percentage of their visitors is a real one. If you take a look at a wide array of different examples in countries in Europe, you can see that land casinos suffered a major loss after the introduction and further regulation of online casinos.

When Can We Expect Complete Legalization?

According to all the trends that we’ve been able to see in the world, we are pretty sure that legalization of gambling will be conducted in California, as well as in a vast majority of other parts of the US. However, predicting these kinds of regulations is not something that anybody can do. We can see that the question of legal online poker was stopped by the global pandemic of the COVID-19, right? We can only presume that these talks will not be only about poker and that they will spread to all the online gambling in California. We are cheering for that, as you can imagine.