How Much Does a Gambling Licence Cost in 2026? Real Fees, Compared

Every fee in one table

The figures below match our jurisdiction pages, which track regulator fee schedules. “Application” is what you pay to get in; “annual” is what keeps the licence alive.

Jurisdiction	Application	Annual cost	Gaming tax	Timeline
Anjouan	EUR 17,828 (incl. due diligence)	EUR 17,828 renewal	0%	1-2 months
Costa Rica	No licence; USD 3,000-8,000 company + patente (adviser-reported)	USD 1,000-4,000 upkeep	Law 9050: 57-113 base salaries a year by headcount (CRC 26.3m+ in 2026) if the company processes bets	2-6 weeks
Curaçao	EUR 4,592 per licence	EUR 47,450/yr B2C; EUR 24,490/yr B2B	0%	3-4 months
Romania	EUR 3,500 + EUR 10,500 admin (reported); EUR 2m-5m guarantee	EUR 300,000 licence + EUR 500,000 contribution	30% of GGR, min EUR 480,000 (from 1 Aug 2025) + 2% of deposits	30 days statutory; ~4 months in practice
Sweden	SEK 230,000 (~EUR 20,000; one fee for online gambling + betting together)	SEK 240,000 supervision fee per licence (SIFS 2026:1, from 1 March 2026)	22% of GGR	6-9 months
Denmark	DKK 296,000 (~EUR 40,000)	DKK 50,000-7M (banded)	28% of GGR	4-6 months
Spain	EUR 10,000 per licence + EUR 38,000 technical report + EUR 2,500 registration; EUR 2m guarantee	0.075% of stakes levy	20% of net income (10% Ceuta/Melilla; 24% regional ceiling)	Only inside a call; none since Dec 2018
Malta	EUR 5,000 + EUR 25,000-50,000 due diligence	EUR 25,000 B2C, EUR 25,000-35,000 B2B + tiered compliance contribution	5% on Maltese players only; 15% Type 1 and 10% Types 2-4 from 1 Oct 2026	6-12 months
Isle of Man	GBP 5,250 application (all licence types, schedule from 6 July 2023)	GBP 36,750 full licence; GBP 52,500 network or token/blockchain B2B; GBP 5,250 sub-licence	1.5% of GGY to GBP 20m, 0.5% to GBP 40m, 0.1% above	10-12 weeks from GSC acceptance
Gibraltar	GBP 30,000	GBP 100,000 (B2C)	0.15%, capped at GBP 425,000/yr	6-9 months
United Kingdom	GBP 9,664-153,000+ (banded by GGY)	GBP 5,500-1,000,000+ (banded by GGY)	40% RGD from 1 April 2026; 15% betting duty (25% remote from April 2027)	4-7 months
Brazil	BRL 30,000,000 (~USD 5.5M), five years	~BRL 54,000-1,944,000/month inspection fee	12% of GGR	None: betting banned 25 September 2026

Two rows carry caveats. Costa Rica isn’t a licence at all — it’s a company registration in a country with no gambling regulator, and it sits in the table only because agencies sell it as if it were one. Brazil’s BRL 30,000,000 buys a five-year authorisation covering up to 3 brands, so it was an entry ticket to one specific market rather than a general operating base. Provisional Measure 1,394 banned fixed-odds betting on 25 September 2026, so that ticket can no longer be bought, and the authorisations already sold end on 25 October 2026 without a refund.

The fee is not the cost

Every price list you’ll find quotes the application fee. Almost none quote what surrounds it, and that’s where the real budget lives.

Three layers sit on top of the headline number. First, recurring fees: Curaçao advertises a EUR 4,592 application, then charges EUR 47,450 a year for B2C. Anjouan flips that shape with EUR 17,828 up front and EUR 17,828 renewals. Same archetype, opposite cost curves. Second, substance: Malta sets no headcount or residency test but requires key persons who are fit and proper and readily available to the Authority, Gibraltar requires local management and real operations, and Curaçao’s LOK demands resident management, at least one full-time Key Person on the local population register (three from December 2028) and dedicated premises. Anjouan asks for a local address and nothing more, which is exactly why its renewal is so cheap. Third, gaming tax, which barely registers at launch and dominates at scale. The UK takes 40% Remote Gaming Duty on casino gross yield since 1 April 2026. Gibraltar takes 0.15% of yield capped at GBP 425,000 a year — at large-operator revenue, that gap is worth more than every fee in the table combined.

So read the table twice. Once for year one, once for year three.

What year one actually stacks up to

Take four representative first-year stacks, built only from the fees above.

Anjouan: EUR 17,828 covers the application, due diligence and compliance in one payment. The EUR 17,828 renewal starts in year two. That’s the cheapest real first year on this page.

Curaçao (B2C): EUR 4,592 to apply, then EUR 47,450 a year: EUR 24,490 to the National Treasury and EUR 22,960 to the CGA. The application is the smallest line by a factor of ten.

Malta (one type): EUR 5,000 application, EUR 25,000-50,000 in due diligence and consultancy, then EUR 25,000 for the annual B2C licence. The compliance contribution on top is tiered by type, with an annual floor: EUR 15,000 for Type 1 and EUR 25,000 for Type 2 or Type 3, so it is a fixed cost long before it is a percentage.

Romania (Class 1): EUR 3,500 plus EUR 10,500 in administrative fees as advisers report them, then EUR 300,000 licence tax, EUR 500,000 responsible-gambling contribution and an authorisation tax of 30% of GGR that cannot fall below EUR 480,000 (Law 141/2025, from 1 August 2025). Before the first stake, the state has collected EUR 1.28 million, more than most offshore operators spend in a decade.

The pattern holds across the table: the application fee predicts almost nothing about the first-year total. The annual fee and the tax base do.

The three cost archetypes

Twelve fee schedules collapse into three shapes, and knowing your shape matters more than knowing any single number.

Offshore-cheap: Anjouan, Curaçao, Costa Rica

You’re buying speed and a 0% gaming tax. Anjouan is the floor for a real licence: EUR 17,828 to issue and EUR 17,828 every year after, live in one to two months. Curaçao costs more to keep (EUR 47,450 a year B2C) but buys a direct CGA licence with meaningfully better acceptance. Costa Rica isn’t a licence at all, and its “0% gaming tax” is a myth for any company that processes bets: Law 9050 charges 57 to 113 base salaries a year by headcount, CRC 26.3m at the lowest band in 2026 — see the Costa Rica licence-check guide.

EU-regional-mid: Romania, Sweden, Denmark, Spain

You’re buying one regulated national market per licence. The entry fees look moderate (Sweden’s SEK 230,000, Denmark’s DKK 296,000, Spain’s EUR 10,000 per licence plus a EUR 38,000 technical report, though Spain has had no call since December 2018), but each market takes 20-28% of GGR in tax, and Romania’s EUR 1.28 million of fixed annual charges only makes sense above serious revenue. These are single-market economics: the licence pays for itself only if that market is your actual business.

Tier-1 premium: Malta, UK, Gibraltar, Isle of Man

You’re buying reputation, banking access and supplier credibility. Malta’s EUR 5,000 application looks friendly until the EUR 25,000-50,000 due-diligence bill and EUR 25,000-35,000 per-Type annual fees arrive. Gibraltar charges GBP 100,000 a year and expects genuine local operations. The Isle of Man is the quiet value play here: GBP 5,250 to apply, GBP 36,750 a year for a full licence (GBP 52,500 for a network or token/blockchain B2B licence), and gambling duty that steps down from 1.5% to 0.1% as yield grows. The UK is its own case: banded fees from GBP 9,664 to 153,000+ and a 40% duty, mandatory if you want UK players at all.

When the cheapest licence costs more

The failure mode nobody prices in: payment rejection. Offshore licences trade acceptance for cost. Many major processors and acquiring banks decline Curaçao-licensed operators, and Anjouan fares worse — advisers report that for most of its licensees crypto rails end up the dependable path. If your market pays by card and your payment provider will not onboard you, the renewal you saved becomes irrelevant, because you cannot collect deposits.

That’s why the honest comparison isn’t Anjouan versus Malta on fees. It’s Anjouan-plus-crypto-rails versus a licence your PSP already accepts. Confirm your banking and processing stack before you pick a jurisdiction, and treat any agency that quotes fees without asking about your payment mix as a red flag.

Who shouldn’t pick each archetype

Skip offshore-cheap if your players pay by card in regulated markets, you plan to raise institutional money, or your brand needs to survive due-diligence questionnaires. The licence works; the payment and reputation ceiling doesn’t.

Skip EU-regional-mid if you’re pre-revenue or spread across many small markets. Romania’s EUR 1.28 million a year and Sweden’s 22% tax assume you’re committed to that market — as a toe-dip, both are expensive ways to learn.

Skip tier-1 if you’re testing product-market fit on a startup budget. Malta’s substance bar and Gibraltar’s GBP 100,000 annual fee reward operators who already know their model works. Buying reputation before you have revenue is the most common sequencing mistake we see.

How to choose from here

Start with where your players are and how they pay — those two answers eliminate most of the table. Then run the numbers at your projected revenue, since flat fees decide the ranking at launch and gaming tax decides it at scale. Our cheapest-licence shortlist for startups works through the low-budget path in detail, and the jurisdiction finder matches all twelve regimes against your product, markets and payment mix.