Belgium Gambling Help Site Sees Summer Spike
Visits to gokhulp.be, the Flemish online gambling help platform, surged during the summer of 2026, with nearly 30,000 people seeking information in July alone — more than double the June figure and roughly three times the level recorded a year earlier. The figures, obtained by Flemish Member of Parliament Freya Perdaens (N-VA), coincided with a sports calendar packed with the FIFA World Cup, the Tour de France and the Olympics.
The data, first reported by VRT NWS, has reignited debate over the growing harms of online sports betting in Belgium and whether the country’s regulatory framework is keeping pace with the market.
A Pattern Linked to Big Matches
Gambling counselor Ronny Willemen, an expert at gokhulp.be, said the platform’s figures from 2021 through July 2026 had been compared against major sporting events, revealing a consistent pattern.
“We did indeed see more visitors at times of major sporting events,” Willemen told VRT. Peaks occurred especially during World Cup matches, finals, and when Belgium’s national team, the Red Devils, were playing.
Willemen welcomed the rise in information-seeking but cautioned that it signals a deeper problem. “It is very good that more people find their way to reliable information, but it also shows that online betting is on the rise,” he said. “And that is a global concern. There is increasing gambling harm from people participating in bets, especially online bets.”
Perdaens, who requested the visit figures, said the July peak stood out immediately. “Almost 30,000 visitors in one month — that naturally jumps out at you,” she said, adding that well-filled sports summers are “important moments to pay attention to the risks of problematic gambling behavior.”
A Market Dominated by Sports Betting
The spike comes against a backdrop of rapid growth in Belgium’s regulated betting market. In a pre-World Cup press release, the Gaming Commission (Kansspelcommissie) noted that nearly 500,000 active player accounts were registered on licensed online betting sites, with 86% of betting gross gaming revenue deriving from sports betting — three-quarters of that from football.
During the UEFA Euro 2024 tournament, 109,029 player accounts were created and 31,481 new players registered. Belgium currently licenses 25 sports betting websites, all regulated by the Gaming Commission.
“Sports betting can be fun and relaxing, but it also carries real risks, both financial and personal,” said Magali Clavie, chair of the Gaming Commission. “That is why it must always be practiced responsibly. Our priority remains protecting players.”
gokhulp.be is designed as a low-threshold entry point, offering free, fully anonymous support including scientific information, self-tests, a self-help program and online counselor guidance. Other help channels include VAD, the Flemish expertise centre for alcohol and other drugs, De Druglijn, and the free 24/7 anonymous SOS Spelen line at 0800 35 777.
The Wider Trend
The surge in help-seeking fits a broader pattern of expanding gambling participation in Belgium. In January 2026, VRT NWS reported that the National Lottery booked a record turnover of 1.66 billion euros in 2025, with more than 1.2 million Belgians gambling online and participant numbers rising by nearly 20%. Addiction experts warned at the time about the implications of that growth.
The country has also struggled to curb gambling advertising. A March 2026 VRT NWS investigation, drawing on research from Ghent University, indicated that stricter advertising rules had produced little measurable effect, with former gambling addicts describing how easily they had been drawn back in.
Reading the Numbers with Caution
Not everyone interprets the gokhulp.be figures the same way. The media-analysis outlet gekleurd.be noted that a website visit is not the same as seeking help, and that spikes may also be driven by media attention or promotional campaigns around major tournaments. It flagged the claim that “there is increasing gambling harm” as a general trend statement by a counselor that the visit figures alone do not substantiate.
The original VRT article relied on a single expert and a single politician, and did not include skeptical voices or the perspective of betting operators.
What to Watch
Belgium’s regulatory approach — combining its 1999 Gambling Act, tighter advertising restrictions and the EPIS self-exclusion system that blocks access to gambling across websites, betting shops and terminals in newsagents — will face fresh scrutiny as the market continues to expand.
Open questions remain about the true scale of harm. Researchers and regulators have yet to publish problem-gambling prevalence figures for 2025–2026, and it is unclear how many of gokhulp.be’s visitors translate into actual counseling trajectories. Those numbers may prove more telling than the visits themselves.