Simon’s Seychelles Casino and Gambling Guide

Casino gambling in the Seychelles is legal and licensed under the 2014 Seychelles Gambling Act. Currently, there are four reported land based casinos in operation in the Seychelles. Most of  them are located in and around the country’s capital, Victoria.

Although, according to the Gambling Act, online casinos are eligible for a licence, in practice no such permit was issued to date. The act makes it illegal for players to gamble on unlicensed platforms, but there is no info on whether this ban is actually enforced. It’s safe to assume, that individual players are not prosecuted in practice (I didn’t find a single reported case on the internet).

Bingo in the Seychelles is not expressly mentioned in any legislation, but the Gambling Act defines casino gambling rather broadly, which almost certainly includes bingo. However, none of the legal and licensed casinos in the Seychelles appear to operate a bingo hall. An unofficial source suggests, that the State Lottery company on the Seychelles operates a nation-wide bingo game*.

Online bingo is licensed and regulated under the sections of the Gambling Act pertaining to interactive gambling, but authorities are yet to start issuing licences. According to the legislation, no unlicensed operators can offer their services on the Seychelles legally, and it is also technically illegal for players to take part in games offered by such platforms. However, this ban is extremely unlikely to be enforced on individual players (I couldn’t find any reported cases).

Land based poker is legal and regulated inside licensed casinos in the Seychelles. All of the four such venues offer poker games to their players.

Online poker operators – as providers of all other forms of online gambling – are eligible for a licence under the Gambling Act of 2014. However, to date, there are no online gambling platforms operating under a Seychelles licence.

Although, foreign operators are deemed illegal in the legislation, there are no reported cases of players being fined for gambling online on foreign platforms from the Seychelles.

Land based sports betting is legal and licensed in the Seychelles, although locals’ options to bet on sports were extremely limited until 2011. In that year, a local sports betting company named David Hill was established*. The company opened betting shops around the country. They were the first commercial operator to run a betting business on the Seychelles.

Online sports betting is legal and licensed, although there don’t appear to be any legally operating, licensed Seychelles based online sports books so far. There are no reported cases on the internet where players from the Seychelles were fined for placing bets online.

Lottery is legal in the Seychelles, and the company Inter-Lotto has a monopoly for conducting lottery games on the islands. They don’t appear to operate an online platform (in fact, they don’t seem to have a website at all).

Licenses for online operators are not being issued yet, however, once the authorities proceed with the licensing, online lottery providers will also be eligible for a permit to conduct online lotteries from the islands.

I couldn’t find any reported cases on the internet, where players from the Seychelles were fined for playing any from of online gambling on unlicensed platforms.

There are no laws in place in the Seychelles for restricting the use of Bitcoin or other digital currencies. Although, the Gambling Act of 2014 makes it possible for regulators to issue online gambling licences, no such permits were handed out so far. It is unclear, whether Bitcoin gambling ventures will be eligible for a Seychelles gambling licence, once authorities proceed with their licensing plans.

For now, it is safe to assume, that players of foreign Bitcoin gambling websites are not in any way penalised by the authorities in the Seychelles.