Test criteria and their weighting in detail

Test groups

6 weights fixed before testing

Single criteria

42 each scored 0–10

Heaviest group

25 % licence and supervision

Exclusion threshold

4.0 in any one group

Why licence and supervision carry a quarter of the grade

Nine criteria sit in this group, and they decide whether anything else is worth measuring. They cover the entry on the whitelist of the Gemeinsame Glücksspielbehörde der Länder (GGL), the scope of that permission, the operator's seat and the route a complaint actually takes.

Scope is the part most readers skip and most mistakes live in. A German permission is granted per form of gambling, not as a blanket licence. As at 31 December 2025 the GGL recorded 28 permission holders for sports betting, 37 for virtual slot machines, 5 for online poker and 5 for online horse race betting — 135 holders in total across 232 websites. A company with a betting permission is not thereby allowed to offer slot games, and the whitelist is where that distinction is visible. Our page on the GGL and its whitelist sets out how to read the entry.

The complaints route is graded separately from the permission because it is what a reader eventually needs. A German permission means a German supervisory authority is competent, in German, with an address. A licence from another EU member state has no effect in Germany, whatever the footer of a website says, and an operator without a German permission leaves a disputed account with no domestic authority to take it to.

Payouts, 20 per cent: the only group made of measured time

Seven criteria, and they are the ones we can put a clock on: processing time from request to money arriving, how much verification is demanded and when it is demanded, how reversals and cancelled withdrawals are handled, and what minimum amounts apply.

Timing matters more than the number of payment methods on the footer. A withdrawal requested before verification is complete is a different experience from one requested after, and an operator that leaves identity checks until the first withdrawal converts a two-day process into a two-week one. We score when the check is triggered, not only how long it takes.

Player protection, 20 per cent: what is mandatory and what is done well

Eight criteria, and the group needs care because almost everything in it is legally required. Connection to OASIS is compulsory, a deposit limit is compulsory, the panic button under § 6i(3) GlüStV is compulsory. If the grade simply recorded the presence of mandatory features, every licensed operator would score the same and the group would be worthless.

So the criteria measure execution rather than existence. How many clicks lie between the lobby and the limit page. Whether a reduction takes effect at once, as § 6c requires, without a confirmation dialogue that invites second thoughts. Whether the panic button is, in the words of the statute, a clearly recognisable and unambiguously labelled control, or a grey line of text in a menu. Whether the pointer to counselling is a real link or a footer decoration. Whether the account closure route actually closes an account.

The deposit limit itself is not graded as a feature, because the ceiling is not the operator's to choose — 1,000 euro per calendar month across all operators, enforced through the limit file in LUGAS. What is graded is how the operator handles it: whether the current figure is visible, whether the seven-day waiting period before an increase is explained, and whether raised limits are pushed at the reader, which advertising them is not permitted to do. The detail sits on our page about the 1,000 euro deposit limit.

And the group carries our most explicit limitation. The early-detection system under § 6i(1) GlüStV is algorithmic and invisible from outside. We record that the obligation exists and note any visible intervention, and we do not pretend to grade the algorithm.

The three lighter groups, and why they are lighter

Game range takes 15 per cent across six criteria: the number of individually approved games, the breadth of studios behind them, the live offer and the table games. The German market makes this group smaller than it would be elsewhere, because the licensed catalogue is narrower by law. Each virtual slot machine needs its own official approval under § 22a(1) GlüStV, and virtual slot games that reproduce classic banked table games — roulette, black jack, baccarat — are not permitted under a GGL permission at all. A catalogue of a few thousand approved titles is therefore normal, and a much larger number is a signal to check the permission rather than a point in the operator's favour.

Costs and limits takes 12 per cent across six criteria: fees per payment route, stake limits, the cooling-off function and, where a bonus exists, its wagering conditions. The stake criterion changed shape in 2026. The statutory maximum is one euro per game under § 22a(7) GlüStV, but since 1 July 2026 the GGL has allowed staged increases to 3 euros from age 21 and to 5 euros after a 90-day qualifying period without problem-gambling indicators and with behavioural monitoring; the arrangement runs to the end of 2027. What we grade is whether the operator explains its own setting clearly, not that a higher stake is available.

Service and transparency takes 8 per cent across six criteria: availability of support, the language it answers in, the imprint, and whether the terms can be read by the person bound by them. It is the smallest weight and the one we are asked about most. Good support is valuable, but it is a comfort; a missing permission is a defect.

How 42 scores become one verdict

Each single criterion is scored from 0 to 10 against a written expectation, so that the score records a state rather than an impression. A group grade is the unweighted mean of its criteria — inside a group every criterion counts equally, which is why the number of criteria per group matters as much as the percentage next to it. The verdict is the weighted mean of the six group grades.

Then one rule overrides the arithmetic. If any single group falls below 4.0, the recommendation is withdrawn no matter what the weighted mean says. A mean is designed to let strength compensate weakness, and for most qualities that is correct. It is not correct for a payout process that fails, and it is not correct for player protection that exists only on paper. The threshold exists so that a strong game range cannot carry a broken group across the line.

The procedure that produces the scores — what is opened, deposited, measured and logged, in what order — is described separately under how we test. This page is the catalogue; that page is the method.

What is deliberately not in the catalogue

The bonus is the notable absence. A welcome offer is a marketing instrument with a wagering requirement attached; it does not improve the expected return and it changes more often than a tested page can follow. Where a bonus exists, its conditions are read and any unusual term is described in the review text — but it does not earn points.

Payout percentages are the second absence. A figure printed by an operator or a studio is a theoretical value over a very large number of rounds; it cannot be verified from outside in a test of ordinary length.

Finally, nothing about a Spielbank is graded here. The land-based houses run under the individual federal states' Spielbank legislation rather than under a GGL permission, and they are described rather than scored on our state casinos pages.

The catalogue and its weights

Frequently asked

Sources

1. Glücksspielstaatsvertrag 2021, § 22a (virtual slot machines: individual approval, stake, minimum duration), § 6c (deposit limit), § 6i (early detection, panic button) — <a href="https://www.gesetze-bayern.de/Content/Document/StVGlueStV2021-22a">gesetze-bayern.de</a>
2. GGL, whitelist of permitted operators under § 9(8) GlüStV — <a href="https://www.gluecksspiel-behoerde.de/de/fuer-spielende/uebersicht-erlaubter-anbieter-whitelist">gluecksspiel-behoerde.de</a>
3. GGL, activity report 2025 (permission holders and websites as at 31 December 2025) — <a href="https://www.gluecksspiel-behoerde.de/">gluecksspiel-behoerde.de</a>
4. GGL, FAQ on the deposit limit and the maximum stake — <a href="https://www.gluecksspiel-behoerde.de/de/fuer-spielende/informationen-fuer-spielende-faqs/faq-einzahlungslimit-und-hoechsteinsatz">gluecksspiel-behoerde.de</a>