Free spins in Austria: Gambling Act, licences and the planned bonus rules

Anyone in Austria searching for “free spins without deposit” ends up at casinos based and licensed abroad. Whether such a free spin may be offered at all is not decided by the promotion page but by the Austrian Gambling Act (Glücksspielgesetz, GSpG). On top of that come the UWG with its rule on the word “free”, two legal principles of the Supreme Administrative Court and an amendment that sits in Parliament as a government bill. How free spins without deposit, on sign-up and in welcome packages are structured in general is shown on the free spins overview page.

This legal situation also concerns the five casinos in this catalogue – Ninlay Casino, AllySpin Casino, Wyns Casino, Kinbet Casino and Mr Pacho Casino. All five list Austria in the country list of their registration and settle in euros; none of them holds an Austrian concession. As of 09.10.2026, none of the five lists an offer of free spins without deposit.

Searches such as “casino freispiele ohne einzahlung österreich”, “no deposit bonus österreich” or “casino online österreich 25 freispiele ohne einzahlung” all aim at the same offer: spins without a prior deposit.

Gambling monopoly and win2day

Under § 3 GSpG, the right to conduct games of chance in Austria is reserved to the federal state. The law expressly calls this reservation the “Glücksspielmonopol” (gambling monopoly). According to the Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF), Österreichische Lotterien GmbH is authorised until 30 September 2027 to run, among other things, electronic lotteries on www.win2day.at.

A licence from another country does not change this. The BMF states in its FAQ on the gambling monopoly that a concession “granted” in another EU or EEA state “does not entitle the holder to offer games of chance in Austria”. The player side is regulated as well: according to the BMF, taking part in foreign electronic lotteries from within Austria is not permitted. § 52(5) GSpG penalises participation in electronic lotteries without a concession where the stakes are placed from within Austria.

For free spins this means: promotions by foreign casinos address Austria with German-language /at/ pages and euro amounts, but they sit outside the concession system. The licences of the five casinos in this catalogue, where named at all, are not Austrian. This applies to spins in a welcome package just as much as to free spins on sign-up, which are promised for a new account alone.

How the question arrives in everyday life is shown by a player from Austria who asked: “Ich wohne in Österreich. Kann ich als Österreiche beispielsweise legal Lotto 6 aus 49” – in other words, whether he could use a foreign online offer. The BMF answer is the one quoted above. Another player describes the licensed offer itself: “Habe 1200 Euro auf mein Konto gehabt die ganze Zeit war der Einsatz 4.50 von 1200 Euro kein einziges freispiel”. What he means is the free spin feature of a slot at win2day, not a bonus.

Licences of the 5 casinos and players from Austria

The five casinos in this catalogue accept players from Austria. Their licensing differs and is disputed at three of them; the information comes from the operators and from the portals AskGamblers, LCB and Casino.Guru (as of 09.10.2026).

At the five casinos, free spins come through deposit promotions. According to Wayback captures, the offer headlines on the /at/ pages read, for example, “Willkommenspaket 250% bis zu €2,500 + 250 FS +1 Bonus Crab” (Ninlay Casino), “Casino Willkommenspaket 250% bis zu €1,000 + 200 FS + 3 Bonus Crab” (AllySpin Casino) and “Casino Willkommenspaket 250% bis zu €3,000 + 350 FS + 1 Bonus Crab” (Kinbet Casino). Which machines such spins run on is shown in the list of eligible slots.

• Ninlay Casino: according to AskGamblers and LCB Anjouan (Anjouan Gaming Board), according to Casino.Guru “without a valid licence”; the operator pages name no licence. Operator according to AskGamblers: Casolinia Group; the terms and footer name no company.
• AllySpin Casino: no gambling licence known, according to Casino.Guru “Keine Lizenz!”, according to LCB “No license”. Operator: Stellar Ltd.
• Wyns Casino: Tobique Gaming Commission (Canada, New Brunswick), licence no. 0000071. Operator: DREAMLINE VENTURES SRL.
• Kinbet Casino: according to AskGamblers Anjouan Gaming Board, according to Casino.Guru without a valid licence. Operator according to AskGamblers: NovaForge Ltd.
• Mr Pacho Casino: according to the footer seal in the website code and LCB Anjouan, according to Casino.Guru no official licence. Operator according to LCB: Liernin Enterprises LTD.

Austria is in the registration country list of all five, currency EUR in each case. All five run German-language versions under /at/. None of the five excludes Austria from promotions: Ninlay Casino, Wyns Casino, Kinbet Casino and Mr Pacho Casino restrict promotions for Armenia, Tunisia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Indonesia, Georgia and Malaysia; at AllySpin Casino the only country list concerns the max-win rule (Thailand, Brazil, Chile, Peru).

Spins without a prior deposit: no information at any of the five, even though the terms of Ninlay Casino, Wyns Casino, Kinbet Casino and Mr Pacho Casino contain a general win cap of 80 EUR for that case. Winnings from free spins carry 40x wagering at all five, with a deadline of 10 days from bonus activation; how factor, deadline and maximum bet interact is explained under free-spin wagering requirements.

Free spin = a stake of zero? What the VwGH says

The Supreme Administrative Court (Verwaltungsgerichtshof, VwGH) has addressed free spins in two legal principles. In case Ro 2018/17/0003 it states: “Im Falle eines Freispiels ist hinsichtlich dieses Teilnehmers von einem Einsatz von Null auszugehen” – in the case of a free spin, a stake of zero is to be assumed for this participant. In 2024 the VwGH confirmed this in Ra 2022/16/0076: “Im Falle eines Freispiels ist von einem Einsatz von Null auszugehen (vgl. VwGH 24.6.2020, Ro 2018/17/0003).”

Both decisions relate to the question of how stakes are to be assessed for gambling levies. They describe the amount with which a free spin enters that assessment, namely zero. The quoted legal principles contain no statement on whether free spins are permitted, whether they would not be gambling, or whether a foreign casino may offer them in Austria. For those questions, § 3 GSpG and the BMF statements on the monopoly remain decisive.

In the casinos’ terms, a free spin looks different from “zero”. The spin itself costs no separate stake, but it is tied to a deposit and its winnings are tied to wagering. Wyns Casino gives 200 free spins on the first deposit, together with 100% up to €500; winnings from them are subject to 40x wagering, and AskGamblers lists the value as “Free Spins WR 40x”. Details on distribution, deadline and win cap are on the Wyns Casino free spins page.

Alongside the welcome package, Wyns Casino awards 50 free spins weekly on the first deposit from Monday to Thursday from 20 EUR; these spins are valid for 7 days and also carry 40x. At the weekend there is 50% up to €700 plus 50 free spins, the free spins there from a deposit of 50 EUR. These reload spins, too, require a deposit before the first spin starts.

Ninlay Casino names 250 FS in the offer headline of its /at/ page; the terms spread the spins over several deposits. Here too, winnings from free spins carry 40x wagering; the deadline is 10 days after activation according to the bonus terms and 10 days after receipt according to T&C 7.12. Ninlay Casino explains the factor with an example in its own FAQ: “Wenn die Umsatzbedingungen x40 sind und du 10 EUR gewonnen hast, musst du 400 EUR einsetzen” – with x40 wagering and 10 EUR won, 400 EUR must be wagered. How the stages are distributed is shown on the Ninlay Casino free spins page.

For players, the VwGH principle is therefore no statement about the value of a bonus. Whether a free-spin win becomes withdrawable is decided by wagering, deadline, win cap and maximum bet in the terms of the casino concerned.

Advertising bonus offers (§ 56 GSpG, UWG)

Two levels apply to gambling advertising in Austria. § 56(1) GSpG obliges concession holders to maintain “a responsible standard” in their advertising. For providers without a concession, § 52(1) no. 9 GSpG is relevant: an administrative offence is committed by anyone who advertises prohibited gaming within Austria or enables such advertising, unless an authorisation under § 56(2) exists.

The second level concerns wording. Annex no. 20 of the UWG lists among the practices that are always unfair “describing a product as ‘gratis’, ‘free’, ‘without charge’ or similar if the consumer has to pay anything other than” unavoidable costs – in the original: „gratis“, „umsonst“, „kostenfrei“. For free spins this point is central, because at the five casinos in this catalogue the spins are tied to deposits and their winnings to 40x wagering.

Offer headlines therefore often show only part of the terms. At Ninlay Casino the terms spread the 250 FS over several deposit stages, two of which the operator calls “third deposit”. At Kinbet Casino the headline names 350 FS, and the terms assign them to the 1st, 3rd and 4th deposit. How number, stages and minimum deposit look in detail is shown on the free spins in welcome packages page.

Players from Austria report that advertising also arrives where it is no longer wanted. One player from Austria writes about a request for a block: “The casino did not comply with this request; instead, they promised me new bonuses.”

Planned: bonus rules from 2027 (RV 594 d.B., draft)

The next change for free spins is in the GSpG amendment that sits in Parliament as government bill 594 d.B. According to Parliament it lies with the Finance Committee, and deliberations have not yet started. All of the following rules are therefore planned and apply only once the amendment has been passed.

Bonuses as stakes: according to the government bill, a new § 57a is to define bonuses as “free or partly paid stakes of any kind, such as promotion tickets, gratis and free spins, credits, discounts” – in the original “unentgeltliche oder teilentgeltliche Spieleinsätze jeglicher Art, wie beispielsweise Promotiontickets, Gratis- und Freispiele, Gutschriften, Rabattierungen”. Free spins would thus be named expressly in the law.

Entry into force: according to the text of the bill, § 57a is to enter into force on 1 January 2027, subject to its adoption.

Advertising: § 56 is to become § 31d “Permitted advertising”; advertising would then have to maintain a responsible standard and observe the protection of children and young people.

Blocking: the draft provides for blocking orders against hosting, caching, search engine and internet access services, i.e. network blocking.

New online concessions: according to the Parliamentary Correspondence, new online concessions are to be awarded from 1.1.2027 and to apply from 1.10.2027. The current authorisation of Österreichische Lotterien GmbH for win2day runs until 30 September 2027 according to the BMF.

Today, only the casinos’ terms decide whether a free-spin win still has to be wagered after the spin. At the five casinos in this catalogue this is the case throughout; an offer without a factor is not listed at any of them. What “wager-free” means in the rules and how to recognise it is explained on the wager-free spins page.

Until it is passed, § 3, § 52 and § 56 GSpG in their current version remain the framework for free spins in Austria.

Player protection with bonus offers

At the five casinos, free spins are bound to deadlines, and conflicts described by players from Austria also attach to deadlines and blocks. Mr Pacho Casino spreads its 200 free spins over 20 spins per day for 10 days, and each block expires after 24 hours. Free spins there are only activated after the active casino bonus has been completed, and the bonus stages are activated one after another in the profile area after the deposit. The minimum deposit for the bonus at Mr Pacho Casino is 20 EUR. Spins not used within the deadline are lost under the casino’s terms, regardless of whether a break was intended.

Anyone who wants to be blocked sometimes runs into open spins. One player writes: “Wollte mich sperren lassen,aber dann sagte man mir ich hätte noch 30 freespins”. What happens to these spins in the event of a block is governed by the terms of each casino; for the five casinos in this catalogue no specific rule on this is listed.

Conversely, players report that an account was blocked during a free-spin round: “Und während des spiels wurde mein konto gesperrt” – the account was blocked during play. Another describes that after a block, collected loyalty credits had disappeared as well: “Siehe da alles auf 0 obwohl die mich gesperrt haben ohne einen Grund”.

At these casinos, every withdrawal is preceded by a check. Kinbet Casino states in its terms that all withdrawals are processed with a check of the gaming history and account verification; deposits and withdrawals may be blocked until verification is completed. Win caps come on top: Mr Pacho Casino names 50 EUR for up to 50 free spins and 100 EUR for more than 50 free spins. Which steps lie between a free-spin win and the payout is shown on the withdrawing free-spin winnings page.

The maximum bet with an active bonus is another point where winnings can be lost. At Mr Pacho Casino the operator names 100 EUR, LCB €5; bonus wagering there is 35x on deposit and bonus.

On the legal side, player protection today is tied above all to the concession: § 56(1) GSpG requires concession holders to keep a responsible standard in advertising. At the five casinos in this catalogue, which hold no Austrian concession, the rules on deadlines, blocks and payouts are in their own terms.