Albania Moves to Legalize Sports Betting, With Up to 10 Online Licenses and Foreign Operators Welcome

Albania is preparing to end seven years of a total sports betting ban and replace it with a tightly controlled online-only regime. For PSPs, the detail that matters is simple: cash betting stays out, payments must run through Albanian banks or licensed e-money institutions, and the market is being set up to favor operators that can clear fairly high compliance bars.

1. In July, the Albanian government finished a new regulatory framework that would allow up to 10 online operators to be licensed. The final number will be decided by the Licensing Commission, but the direction of travel is clear: formalize the market instead of pretending the demand disappeared in 2019.
2. Albania banned betting halls, slot machines, and all forms of online gambling in 2019. Before that, the market was large for a country of 2.8 million people: in 2018 it generated about $760 million a year and had 4,000 betting shops, many clustered near schools and residential neighborhoods.
3. The ban did not stop activity; it pushed it underground. Gambling Compliance International (GCI) estimates that the unregulated online sports betting market produced $117 million in gross gaming revenue (GGR) in 2024, rising to $126 million in 2025. If online casinos and poker are included, the unregulated total reached about $229 million last year.
4. Under the new regime, only online betting will be allowed. Physical betting shops and slot halls will remain banned, while casinos will stay limited to five-star hotels. The government says the scheme could bring in about $21.6 million a year in public revenue.
5. Payments are where the compliance picture gets interesting. Users will have to register with an ID document, cash betting will be prohibited, and payments may be processed only through Albanian banks or authorized e-money entities. Operators will also need to keep player records for at least three years and respect a national self-exclusion register, which family members can also use to request enrollment for a relative.

Albania still does not have a specialized treatment center for gambling addiction, but from a payments and licensing standpoint the more immediate point is that the regime is being written for a small number of operators, with banking rails and local entity requirements doing most of the filtering. For PSPs and acquirers, that usually means fewer licenses, more paperwork, and much less room for improvisation.