Portugal Gaming License

What is a Portugal gaming license?

A Portugal gaming license authorises an operator to offer online games and betting to players in Portugal. The license sits under the Regime Jurídico dos Jogos e Apostas Online (RJO), approved by Decreto-Lei n.º 66/2015. SRIJ supervises the license. Each license runs an initial three years and covers only the categories and game types written into it.

Portugal opened its licensed online market in 2016. The RJO replaced a position where online play had no domestic licensing route. Six amendments have followed, most recently Lei n.º 2/2020, which reset the tax rates.

Three separate things get confused with the RJO license, so it helps to separate them at the start.

• The RJO online license covers online games and betting. That is the subject of this page.

• Land-based casino concessions run under Decreto-Lei n.º 422/89 and are awarded by public tender for a defined gaming zone. A concession is not an online license.

• Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa (SCML) holds the national position on lotteries and mutual sports betting. That position sits outside the RJO and is not open to application.

Who regulates online gambling in Portugal?

The Serviço de Regulação e Inspeção de Jogos (SRIJ) regulates online gambling in Portugal. SRIJ is a body inside Turismo de Portugal, I.P., and it runs the licensing procedure, homologates gaming systems, supervises licensees and acts on illegal supply. There is no entity called the "Portuguese Gambling Commission", a name that appears on several competitor pages.

The precise arrangement matters if you are drafting filings. Turismo de Portugal, I.P., holds the regulatory duties for online gambling, and under Decreto-Lei n.º 66/2015 it exercises them through two bodies: the Comissão de Jogos and SRIJ. The Comissão de Jogos steers and supervises SRIJ and holds the management-board powers delegated to it. SRIJ is the body you deal with.

Three names appear in Portuguese online gambling compliance and only one of them is your regulator.

• SRIJ runs licensing, homologation, supervision and enforcement. This is your counterparty.

• Comissão de Jogos steers SRIJ and holds the delegated board powers of Turismo de Portugal, I.P.

• SCML operates lotteries and mutual sports betting outside the RJO and regulates nothing.

What types of online gambling licenses does Portugal issue?

Portugal issues licenses per vertical under art. 12 of the RJO, not per company. An operator that wants sportsbook and casino applies for two licenses and pays an issuance fee on each. A license covers only the categories and game types named in it, and adding a type later means certification, homologation and a further fee.

New game types reach the market through a defined route rather than a product decision. The operator applies to SRIJ, SRIJ approves the game rules by regulation where none exist yet, an SRIJ-recognised entity certifies the change, SRIJ homologates it, and the operator pays €2,413.52 for the type. The "saque ou crash" category arrived that way, through Regulamento n.º 308/2023.

Portugal licenses operators, which means B2C. There is no standalone B2B supplier license of the Swedish or Italian kind. A supplier can sell into Portugal commercially, and the licensed operator carries the regulatory and certification responsibility for the platform and the games it runs.

Who can apply for a Portugal gaming license?

Any private company incorporated as a sociedade anónima or equivalent can apply for a Portugal gaming license. The company's seat must sit in an EU or EEA state bound to administrative cooperation on tax and money laundering. A foreign company must hold a branch, a sucursal, in Portugal. SRIJ then tests suitability, technical capacity and financial capacity.

Non-Portuguese operators can and do hold RJO licenses. 888, Betano, PokerStars and Skill On Net all appear in SRIJ's register through Portuguese branches or subsidiaries.

Four conditions sit on the applying company itself, and each of them shapes the corporate work.

• Legal form. Sociedade anónima or an equivalent form under the law of the seat.

• Seat and branch. Seat in the EU or EEA, plus a branch in Portugal for a foreign company.

• Company object. The object must include operating games and betting throughout the license term, not only at the point of application.

• Share identifiability. At least 60% of the share capital must be represented by shares that let the issuer know who holds them at any time. Acquisitions, transfers and pledges of those shares are notified to SRIJ.

No minimum share capital applies under the RJO. Economic and financial capacity is tested by a ratio instead. Financial autonomy is equity divided by total net assets, multiplied by 100, taken from the last balance sheet, and it must be 35% or higher. SRIJ can set a different percentage by regulation. Convictions inside the last five years count against suitability.

How much does a Portugal gaming license cost?

SRIJ publishes every fee. The values below come from Portaria n.º 211/2015 and were indexed and updated on 1 March 2026. One license plus initial homologation with one category or game type comes to €38,616.27 in SRIJ fees for sports betting, horse racing or games of chance, and to €26,548.69 for bingo.

All values as of 1 March 2026 and indexed annually under art. 4 of Portaria n.º 211/2015 against the INE consumer price index.

The cauções sit outside that table and are not fees.

• €500,000 guarantees legal obligations, player-account balances and any fines.

• €100,000 guarantees payment of IEJO.

Two points about the cauções change the business case. First, they are security, not a fee. Under art. 18(2) they can be posted as a bank deposit or an autonomous bank guarantee rather than €600,000 of trapped cash, and the running cost is the bank's commission. Second, they are reviewed once the operation has traded. SRIJ can reset the general caução to between 60% and 90% of the average half-year balance on player accounts. The number moves with your player liability, up or down.

Outside SRIJ, the real spend is laboratory certification, the Portuguese branch, Portuguese-language filings, counsel, audit and an AML function. Those are market rates, not published fees, and they scale with how many verticals and game types you launch. We scope them per project rather than publish a range that would mislead.

Renewal and extension costs

Renewal is priced on the same line as issuance. Portaria n.º 211/2015 charges "emissão ou prorrogação" identically, so extending a games-of-chance license for another three years costs €14,481.10, and extending bingo costs €2,413.52. Adding a game type to a live license costs €2,413.52, reduced in proportion to the time left on the license.

Renewal is not automatic on payment. Art. 20(3) sets six cumulative conditions, and all six have to hold.

• Tax and social-security position regular.

• Suitability, technical capacity and economic and financial capacity still met.

• The extension fee paid.

• No RJO fines outstanding.

• Any order to top up the cauções complied with.

• No substantial or persistent failure on an essential requirement that led to a conviction for a serious or very serious offence.

File the extension request 90 days before the current term ends. The extension is then endorsed on the license itself.

What taxes apply to a Portugal gaming license holder?

Portugal taxes licensed online gambling through the Imposto Especial de Jogo Online (IEJO), charged on the operator and assessed monthly. The rate and the base depend on the vertical: games of chance are taxed on gross revenue, fixed-odds betting on the amount wagered. Lei n.º 2/2020 removed the progressive brackets on 1 April 2020, so the rates are flat.

Two details in the RJO change how the rates land in a model. Commissions charged to the player by a games-of-chance operator count inside gross revenue under art. 89(6), so poker rake is taxed at 25% and not separately. Where an operator charges a commission on top of a fixed-odds bet, art. 90(2) taxes that commission at 8% as well.

IEJO displaces corporate income tax on the gaming activity itself. Art. 87 provides that revenue deriving directly from IEJO-liable activity is not liable to Corporate Income Tax (IRC) or Stamp Duty. That is narrower than "no corporate tax in Portugal". Income outside the licensed gaming activity stays inside the ordinary IRC rules. Dividends out to a foreign parent are a separate question for Portuguese tax counsel.

Filing runs on a fixed monthly cycle. SRIJ assesses IEJO monthly, sends the collection document by the 5th day of the following month, and the operator pays on or before the 15th of that month.

Player winnings from an SRIJ-licensed operator are not taxed in the player's hands under IRS. Games run by SCML sit under a different rule, where Imposto do Selo of 20% applies to the part of a prize above €5,000.

What ongoing compliance obligations apply after licensing?

Once licensed, an RJO operator carries continuous duties on self-exclusion, responsible gaming, player identification, monthly reporting, AML and advertising. The heaviest change of 2026 is self-exclusion: SRIJ launched a redesigned centralised self-exclusion portal on 8 April 2026, and licensees must now check against it in real time and act on SRIJ notifications as they arrive.

Self-exclusion. A player can self-exclude on the operator's site or on SRIJ's, and an exclusion registered with SRIJ blocks that player across every licensed operator. The minimum period is three months, and an exclusion with no end date runs indefinitely. Ending one takes effect a month after the player asks. Operators check the list at registration and at every login, block registration, deposits and play for excluded players, and report exclusions to SRIJ within 24 hours. Failure here is a very serious offence.

Responsible gaming. The art. 7 plan has to be in place before launch, with warnings and information, protection of minors, deposit, stake and loss limits, self-exclusion and complaint channels. Prohibited players under art. 6 include minors, the self-excluded and the judicially excluded, people with a sports-integrity conflict, and operator and SRIJ staff.

Player identification. Identity, age and residence are verified before play begins, through SRIJ's secure interface. Anonymous accounts and accounts opened in someone else's name are prohibited, and a player holds one account per site.

Reporting. IEJO is filed monthly on the cycle above. Changes to company bodies go to SRIJ within ten days.

Change of control. Art. 21 requires SRIJ's prior authorisation before the licensed position passes to anyone else. The trigger is the acquisition of a majority holding in the capital, the acquisition of more than half the voting rights, or the power to appoint more than half the members of the management body, including where that happens through a merger, a demerger or a contribution of assets. Transferring a license without prior authorisation is a very serious offence under art. 56 f) and a ground for revoking the license under art. 23(1)(d).

AML. RJO operators are obliged entities under Lei n.º 83/2017 and SRIJ is their AML supervisor. Customer identification applies from €2,000, records are kept for seven years, and suspicious transactions are reported to the Unidade de Informação Financeira (UIF) and the DCIAP.

Advertising. Art. 21 of the Código da Publicidade governs gambling advertising. Every advertisement carries a responsible-gaming message in Portuguese, a clear 18+ notice and a route to SRIJ's self-exclusion portal, and SICAD is named in the mandatory messaging.

Four changes are pending in the Portuguese parliament and none of them is law yet. A draft art. 21-B would impose a general prohibition on all forms of gambling advertising, including indirect and digital promotion. Separate proposals would tax player winnings above €500 a year, raise the sports federations' share of sports-betting IEJO from 37.5% to 45%, and extend the minimum self-exclusion period from three months to six. Plan for them as risk, not as current law.

Is a Portugal gaming license valid in other EU countries?

No. A Portugal gaming license authorises play in Portugal and nowhere else. Art. 9(3) of the RJO settles the point in both directions: operating in Portugal requires a license from SRIJ, and "licenses or other qualifying instruments granted by other States shall not be valid in Portugal". No passporting, no single European license, no EU market access.

The reverse follows for anyone holding a Portuguese license and looking at Spain, Italy, Germany or the Netherlands. Each of those markets licenses separately. The Court of Justice of the European Union confirmed the point in the Lottoland litigation in April 2026. EU law does not require Member States to recognise each other's gambling authorisations.

In practice you build market by market. If Portugal is one of several European targets, the licenses stack rather than substitute: see our Malta, Romania, Curaçao and Germany pages for how those regimes price and gate the same activity.

Are crypto payments allowed under a Portugal gaming license?

No. Art. 42(1) of the RJO permits "only electronic payment methods using the legal tender in Portugal", which is the euro. Art. 42(2) adds that player accounts may be funded only through payment methods supplied by payment service providers authorised by the competent authorities, and only where the payer can be identified. Virtual assets do not meet either test.

Two further limits sit in the same article and in the account rules. Operators, their company officers and their staff cannot lend to players or set up any mechanism for players to lend to each other. Every transaction connected to the licensed activity passes through the operator's account at an EU credit institution, and nothing else passes through it.

Two licensed operators run a narrow workaround. Casino Portugal and Solverde accept a crypto deposit through an external wallet that converts it to euros before the money reaches the player account, and neither pays winnings out in crypto. The player account is funded in euros throughout, which is what art. 42 requires. SRIJ has not authorised crypto as a payment method for licensees, and this route does not change that.

Portugal's virtual-asset regime is a separate one and should not be read across. Virtual asset service providers register with Banco de Portugal under Lei n.º 83/2017, the AML law. That registration is not a gaming authorisation, and holding it does not let an RJO licensee accept crypto stakes. Portugal is not a crypto-friendly gaming jurisdiction, whatever a comparison table says.

How does a Portugal gaming license compare with Malta, Romania and Curaçao?

Portugal is a national market with a high fiscal load that falls unevenly. Casino at 25% of GGR is competitive against Romania. Sports betting at 8% of turnover is heavier than any GGR-based rate here. Malta taxes only Malta-player revenue. Curaçao taxes gaming revenue at zero. The comparison is about market access against tax base.

Read the sports-betting row before anything else. A GGR rate and a turnover rate are not comparable at face value, and the next section converts one into the other.

What are the advantages of a Portugal gaming license?

Portugal offers a licensed EU market of real size, with no cap on licenses, active enforcement against unlicensed supply, and a tax rule that removes corporate income tax from the gaming activity. Online gross gaming revenue passed €1.2bn across 2025 and IEJO returned €353m to the State that year, on SRIJ figures.

Market size, with the split. On SRIJ's quarterly statistics, online casino produced €204.2m in the first quarter of 2026, or 63.1% of revenue, and sports betting €119.5m, or 36.9%. The fourth quarter of 2025 remains the record quarter at €337.6m. Portugal is a casino-led market, and a casino-led operator meets the friendlier of the two tax rates.

No cap and no queue. SRIJ sets no limit on the number of licenses and applications can be filed at any moment, individually or together. The register grew during 2026: Retabet took licenses 033 and 034 and Vincino took 035.

Enforcement that runs in your favour. Under art. 27, an internet service provider has a maximum of 48 hours from an SRIJ notification to block access to an unlicensed offer. The mechanism exists and has been used: in January 2026 SRIJ ruled Polymarket unlicensed and ordered it to cease inside 48 hours. The 48-hour deadline passed on 19 January without a block, and the network operators closed access on 20 and 21 January.

Corporate income tax removed from the gaming activity. Art. 87 takes revenue deriving directly from IEJO-liable activity out of IRC and Stamp Duty. The tax you model is IEJO, not IEJO plus IRC.

Player winnings untaxed. A player who wins on an SRIJ-licensed site pays no IRS on the win. That is worth saying out loud to a player weighing an offshore site, so put it in the acquisition copy.

What are the disadvantages of a Portugal gaming license?

The turnover tax on sports betting is the defining problem. At 8% of stakes rather than gross revenue, a sportsbook running a 20% margin pays roughly 40% of its GGR, and the share rises as margin falls. The rest of the load is per-vertical licensing, a branch requirement, €600,000 of guarantees and no route to other EU markets.

What 8% of turnover really costs a sportsbook. The rate is charged on the amount wagered, so the effective burden depends entirely on your hold. Same tax, same stakes, three margins.

A casino operator in Portugal pays 25% of GGR. A sportsbook at a 15% margin pays the equivalent of 53%. Any comparison that puts "8%" next to another market's "20% of GGR" has the ranking backwards.

Corporate form and local establishment. You have to apply as a sociedade anónima or equivalent with an EU or EEA seat, and a foreign company needs a Portuguese branch. Filings are in Portuguese. That is more setup than a single-entity offshore route.

Guarantees before revenue. €500,000 and €100,000 are posted before the Portugal gaming license is issued. They can be posted as an autonomous bank guarantee rather than funded in cash, but the instruments have to be in place and priced.

Per-vertical licensing with repeated certification. Each vertical is a separate license with its own issuance fee, and every new game type needs certification, homologation and €2,413.52. A multi-product roadmap multiplies both the fees and the testing calendar.

No crypto. Art. 42 limits payment to electronic methods in Portugal's legal tender through authorised providers. An operator whose deposit mix depends on virtual assets has no route here.

No access to other EU markets. A Portuguese license serves Portuguese players. Spain, Italy, Germany and the Netherlands each require their own.

Advertising is tightening. Art. 21 already carries mandatory warnings and 18+ messaging, and a draft art. 21-B before parliament would prohibit nearly all gambling advertising. Assume paid channels narrow, and plan acquisition around that.

Why choose MGL for a Portugal gaming license?

MGL is a licensing advisory. On Portugal we build the corporate structure, assemble the suitability and capacity file to SRIJ's standard, coordinate certification and homologation, arrange the cauções and taxas, and set up the post-license compliance function. Our team has obtained 300+ licenses across offshore, onshore and EU regimes.

What that covers on a Portugal application:

• Corporate. Sociedade anónima or equivalent, the Portuguese branch, and the 60% share-identifiability requirement built into the cap table rather than fixed afterwards.

• The SRIJ file. Suitability, technical capacity, and the economic and financial capacity evidence against the 35% financial-autonomy ratio, filed in Portuguese.

• Technical route. Confirming that your testing entity is SRIJ-recognised for the categories you are applying for, before testing spend starts, and running the homologation stage with SRIJ.

• Guarantees and fees. Arranging the €500,000 and €100,000 cauções as deposits or autonomous bank guarantees, and mapping the taxas to the verticals and game types you actually want.

• After the license. Responsible-gaming plan, self-exclusion integration against the SRIJ portal, monthly IEJO filing, AML function and change-control notifications.

MGL will also tell you when Portugal is the wrong answer. A sports-led book at a 15% margin faces an effective 53% of GGR here, and for that operator the honest recommendation is a different jurisdiction, not a Portuguese application. We do not promise approval, and we do not quote a decision date SRIJ has never committed to.

If you are still choosing between regimes rather than applying, start from our gambling license overview and narrow from there.