The Gaming Technologies Association (GTA) has recently finalised its latest World Count of Gaming report, a study on the number of gaming machines operating globally in 2019.
The GTA estimates that the number of authorised gaming machines installed worldwide in 2019 was 7,431,125, up 0.39 per cent from 2018.
Australia was estimated to have 192,800 machines installed in 2019, a reduction of 3501 machines from 2018. The study suggests that in 2019 Australia operated 2.59 per cent of the world’s legally installed machines.
All jurisdictions across Australia, except for Western Australia, saw a decline in gaming machine numbers compared to the previous year.
The GTA first commissioned the World Count of Gaming report in 1999 in response to exaggerated Australian figures that were circulating at that time.
“The World Count of Gaming Machines 2019 is a valuable source of factual data about global gaming machine numbers,” stated Chris Muir, CEO of the GTA.
“The 2020 edition of GTA’s annual worldwide survey of gaming machine numbers once again dispels myths around the proportion of gaming machine numbers in Australia.”
Australia is in fact ranked sixth in the world for gaming machines, dwarfed by the world number one, Japan, with almost 4.2 million machines. Japan has almost double the gaming machines of the rest of the top ten combined. The United States has the second largest amount of gaming machines, with 900,074; while a European trio of Italy, Germany and Spain round out the rest of the top five.
Of Australia’s 192,800 gaming machines, 92,818 are located in New South Wales, making it the eighth largest jurisdiction in the world for gaming.
The report also found that Australia continues to have some of the lowest maximum bets in the world.