GamblersArea Gies to Maryland – From Lotteries to Live Casinos

Six casinos, a fifty-year-old lottery, and a mobile sportsbook doing billions a year — but Maryland's bid for legal online casinos just died in committee, again. That's the state of gambling in Maryland heading into the second half of 2026: a market that's mature and profitable almost everywhere except the one place regulators keep reaching for and missing. Sports betting joined the mix in 2021 and 2022. Online casino gaming, so far, hasn't.

• Legal: Casino gaming (six properties), the state lottery, retail and mobile sports betting
• Not Legal: Real-money online casino gaming (iGaming)
• Model: Six privately owned commercial casinos, a state-run lottery, and a competitive multi-operator mobile sportsbook market
• Key Regulator: Maryland Lottery and Gaming Control Agency (MLGCA)
• Age Requirement: 18 for the lottery and daily fantasy sports; 21 for casino gaming and sports wagering

Maryland's casino industry runs on constitutional amendments, not ordinary statutes. A 2008 referendum authorized slot-machine gambling at up to five sites, and Hollywood Casino Perryville opened in Cecil County in 2010 as the state's first, followed by Ocean Downs Casino in Berlin in 2011. A second referendum in 2012 added table games and a sixth license, clearing the way for Live! Casino & Hotel in Hanover, Rocky Gap Casino Resort near Cumberland, Horseshoe Casino Baltimore, and finally MGM National Harbor in Oxon Hill, which opened in December 2016.

MGM National Harbor, a roughly $1.4 billion resort just off the Woodrow Wilson Bridge, became the flagship almost immediately — a 135,000-square-foot floor, a 23-story hotel, and Maryland's highest-grossing property. It's also part of state history: then-Governor Larry Hogan placed Maryland's first legal sports bet there in December 2021. Live! Casino & Hotel, meanwhile, holds the state's largest gaming floor by machine count, with roughly 4,000 slots and more than 200 table games.

Together, Maryland's six casinos generated $1.965 billion in gaming revenue in fiscal year 2025 — the third-best year in the program's 15-year history — and returned $831.3 million to the state, including $606.2 million to the Education Trust Fund that supports Maryland's public schools.

The lottery predates every casino in the state by decades. Voters approved a constitutional amendment for a state-run lottery in 1972, and the first drawing followed on January 2, 1973. More than fifty years and roughly 4,300 retail locations later, it has returned over $20.7 billion to the state.

The lottery also carries Maryland's one meaningful age exception: players need only be 18 to buy a ticket or play draw games like Pick 3, Pick 4, and Pick 5, while casino gaming and sports wagering both require bettors to be 21. It's a small but real distinction in Maryland gambling laws, the only vertical in the state with a lower bar to entry.

Sports betting in Maryland took a slower path than the casinos did. Voters approved a 2020 ballot question by roughly 67%, and Governor Hogan signed the enabling law, House Bill 940, in May 2021. Retail sportsbooks opened that December, but mobile betting stalled for nearly a year after that: HB 940 required the state's licensing body to build minority- and women-owned business participation into the rollout, a process that pushed rulemaking well past its original timeline. Ten operators were finally licensed in mid-November 2022, and seven sportsbooks went live on November 23, putting Maryland in line with most of the country, where mobile sports betting is now the norm rather than the exception.

The wait paid off. Maryland sportsbooks accepted $6.91 billion in wagers in fiscal year 2026, up 11.1% year-over-year, and returned $132.3 million to the state, most of it earmarked for the Blueprint for Maryland's Future education fund. A tax increase from 15% to 20% on mobile operators, effective mid-2025, helped push that contribution up nearly 49% year-over-year.

iGaming is where Maryland keeps stalling. State Senator Ron Watson introduced two 2026 bills — SB 761, a constitutional referendum question, and SB 885, the regulatory framework that would only take effect if voters approved it — to let the six existing casinos offer real-money slots and table games online. Maryland's constitution requires any gambling expansion to clear a statewide referendum, so both bills needed to move together.

They didn't get the chance. The Senate Budget and Taxation Committee canceled SB 761's hearing on March 10, 2026, and Watson withdrew the bill three days later, citing the state's roughly $1.5 billion budget deficit and the political cost of asking voters to expand gambling during a fiscal squeeze. Opposition came from several directions: Ocean Downs Casino warned of cannibalized in-person visits, and the Maryland Center of Excellence on Problem Gambling flagged the addiction risk of round-the-clock mobile access. A late-2025 poll cited during the debate found roughly 71% of Maryland voters opposed expanding internet gambling.

A separate bill fared better: HB 295, which would ban unlicensed sweepstakes casinos rather than legalize anything new, passed the House 105-24 in March 2026. Until that or something like it becomes law, Maryland's sweepstakes market sits in the same gray area as much of the country.

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Maryland's neighbors are arguably closer to legal online casinos right now. In Virginia, two 2026 bills — HB 161 and SB 118 — each cleared their own chamber, but lawmakers never reconciled the differences before the session ended, so neither became law. It was Virginia's second consecutive year falling short, with another attempt expected in 2027.

Washington, DC has gone further still. The Internet Gaming and Consumer Protection Act of 2026, introduced in April, would legalize online casino play and ban sweepstakes-style gambling in the same bill, setting a 21+ age minimum for online casino games versus the 18+ threshold DC already applies to sports betting. It was still working through committee as of mid-2026, but it's a genuine bill in motion, which is more than Maryland's effort can currently claim.

Probably, eventually. The fiscal logic hasn't gone away: state budget estimates put potential iGaming tax revenue in the billions over a multi-year horizon, money that currently flows to offshore sites and unregulated sweepstakes platforms instead of Annapolis. But 2026 showed that math alone isn't enough to overcome a skeptical public and a nervous legislature in a deficit year. Senator Watson has already signaled he'll try again — whether 2027 looks any different depends on whether Maryland's budget picture, and its voters, have shifted by then.