NEW YORK - Potential iGaming stakeholders remain optimistic about New York online casino gaming legislation that has been stalled in the state legislature for years.
- Gaming industry stakeholders remain cautiously optimistic that New York will eventually legalize online casino gaming, potentially creating the nation’s largest iGaming market.
- Political concerns about gambling expansion and opposition from some brick-and-mortar casinos have stalled iGaming legislation for years.
- Advocates believe strong sports betting tax revenues and new downstate casinos could eventually push lawmakers to approve iGaming.
Multiple speakers at a gaming industry conference this week expressed cautious optimism that legal real-money digital slots and table games could be coming to the Empire State. Though legal iGaming could be years away, the potential remains for what would be the nation’s highest-grossing regulated market.
Seneca Niagara Casino COO Kimberlee Dunlop said her property was preparing for legal iGaming within the next five years, she told attendees of this week’s NEXT Summit NYC. In a different session, Caesars Digital president Eric Hession said he believes potential tax revenues could spur iGaming growth.
“Betting is much more tolerable from a politician's perspective than the online iCasino, and I can see why. However, iCasino is certainly the fastest way if the politicians would like to get tax revenue,” Hession said. “If you already have sports betting, you could probably get it up and running in a few months to raise money, so I'm hopeful that it'll start to progress a little bit faster.”
Obstacles for legal iGaming
Unlike legal single-game sports betting, which was federally banned outside Nevada until 2018, there has been no federal prohibition on online casinos. Thirty-nine states now have a form of legal sports betting; only eight have approved iGaming.
Real-money slots and table games have proved far less politically palatable than sports betting, as lawmakers worry expanded gambling available 24 hours a day could spark addiction problems or other societal ills. Gaming stakeholders have also been divided, with some major regional casino operators lobbying against iGaming over fears it would cannibalize brick-and-mortar revenues.
In New York, both these sets of fears have helped stall iGaming legalization for years. Despite support from several key lawmakers and gaming stakeholders, the bill has made little progress in previous legislative sessions.
An attempt introduced in 2026 has not yet received a vote or committee hearing. Multiple other speakers at this week’s conference believed there was little chance New York’s iGaming passes in 2026.
👀👀Buffalo-area Seneca Niagara Resort & Casino is preparing for iGaming legalization in New York within the next five years, said Kimberlee Dunlop, COO of Seneca Casinos & Resorts during today's NEXT Summit NYC
— Ryan Butler (@ButlerBets) March 10, 2026
Still, proponents believe the potential is too great for iGaming to remain illegal in the distant future.
New York’s legal mobile sportsbooks generated more than $1.3 billion in taxes last calendar year. Paying 51% of gross gaming revenue, the highest of any legal sports betting jurisdiction, that rate and the state’s population have made it the nation’s highest-grossing sports betting market by handle, operator revenue, and taxes.
A tax rate of just half the sportsbook fees would likely generate even more revenue than sports betting.
Downstate New York is set to open three new or renovated “Las Vegas-style” casinos in the coming years. With these new gaming centers established, iGaming advocates believe the opportunity to complement land-based gaming with online options will, eventually, become too much for lawmakers to pass up.
Nationwide iCasino gaming trends
Though only eight states have approved legal iGaming, most are in the same region as New York.
Maine later this year is set to become the eighth state with live legal iCasino. It will join New England neighbors Rhode Island and Connecticut. New York neighbors Pennsylvania and New Jersey also have legal iGaming, as do Michigan, Delaware, and West Virginia.
Both chambers of the Virginia legislature passed an iGaming legalization bill, but key differences between the two bills need to be agreed to before the bill could go into law. The current proposal also would require the bill to be passed by the full legislature again in 2027, meaning it would likely be at least 18 months before regulated iGaming could go live.
Maryland is one of the few remaining states seriously considering iGaming legalization this year. Aside from Maine, it appears unlikely that any other iGaming states will go live this calendar year.
