WhichBingo, has released its latest bingo player survey of the UK market, which revealed findings across spending and experience preferences. This included the monthly average player spend dropping significantly in two years.
The decline in spend from £35.25 to £15.77 from 2023 to 2025 was highlighted by the Gambling.com Group bingo brand as a “pivot toward budget-friendly engagement and lower-stake recreational play”.
Low comparison value
Comparison bingo sites suffered in the survey, with only 4% of participants having rated them as very valuable, with 33.6% finding them somewhat valuable and a large 61.1% finding them not valuable to use.
On the low value rate of comparison sites, WhichBingo managing editor Nic McBride said that “WhichBingo will need to lead the way at making sites more user-friendly.
“We are already making changes to our rating system and other key areas to provide clearer, more tailored, and trustworthy information to players, ensuring the entire bingo experience is seamless and rewarding.”
Bingo bonuses came in top for factors that would influence a player choosing a brand at 65%, followed by ease of use at 52.7%, game variety below at 30.9%, user reviews at 19.4% and free spins at 4.6%.
Platform preference questions revealed a somewhat even split with 38.5% of the 1200 participants indicating they only play in person, 36.5% only online and 25% with a mix of both.
Brand favourites
Foxy Bingo, Mecca and Gala Bingo all came out on top for favourite brands with 20.2%, 13.8% and 12.3% respectively. Tombola came in below with 11.3%, Buzzbingo with 6.6%, Jackpot Joy at 4.7%, Heart Bingo at 3.4%, Club 3000 at 2.1% and Casino Kings at 2.1%. Other brands racked up a share of 16%, which includes the group of lesser-known and niche platforms.
Whereas, 72% of participants felt that they had access to all the help and resources they needed from a player protection perspective, up from 60% in 2023. However, only 30.1% found safer gambling messaging within adverts and operator sites helpful.
For online bingo players, millennials made up the largest segment of the playing audience at 49%, followed by Gen X at 27.3%. Within this, females made up 56.7% of the online audience.
Socials & spend
On bingo-related socials, players surveyed only engaged with brands on social media apps 10.6% of the time, a sizable drop from 34% in 2023. However, 12.5% also said they had been put off by a bingo brand’s social activity, although mainly this is seen in paid ads. On a related note, there also seems to be a neutral view on celebrity influence on brand awareness, with 62.8% respondents not feeling too strongly either way on their engagement behaviour changing as a result.
In terms of spend patterns, 56.4% of participants fell into the £0 to £10 per month category, with only 4.5% spending £50 and over per month. Debit cards came in as the most favoured payment method at 68.8%, followed by PayPal at 15.3%.
An untapped AI market
AI also remains a largely untapped concept for bingo iGaming, with 77.4% of survey participants of WhichBingo having not yet explored any features developed with the technology.
“AI will no doubt transform the way people dab in the years to come, in ways we might not even consider,” added the managing editor of WhichBingo. “I predict that bingo chat rooms and immersive experiences will become a valued part of the bingo experience, as, in the face of more artificial interactions, people seek something that bingo offers: a great sense of community.”
McBride went on to say that he hopes AI technology will also be used for responsible gambling purposes and praised the rising number of players who feel they have access to safer gambling resources.
Asked on their future playing habits, 69.4% of respondents expect things to remain the same over the next 12 months, while 22.5% expect to play less, with 7.3% planning to play more - the rest remain undecided.
The managing editor also indicated that it might be time to update some of the bingo calls to give them a modern appeal to the large millennial audience.
WhichBingo was also recently named Best Bingo Affiliate at the 2025 iGB Affiliate Awards.