How Much of Kick Is Gambling? 7.2% vs 1.7% on Twitch

Gambling took 7.2% of all viewing on Kick in the week of September 26 to October 2, 2026, according to PlayerSells' one-week study. PlayerSells is a social account marketplace that runs its own live samplers on both platforms. Slots alone drew 7.1%. Twitch's gambling categories took 1.7% to 1.9% in the same week, which puts Kick's share at roughly 3.8 to 4.2 times Twitch's.

What are the key findings?

The key findings are five numbers from PlayerSells' measurement of Kick and Twitch in the week of September 26 to October 2, 2026, taken with one method on both platforms.

• Gambling took 7.2% of Kick viewing across 201,070 channels, and the Slots & Casino category took 7.1%.
• Twitch's Slots, Poker and Virtual Casino categories together took 1.7%, or about 1.9% after PlayerSells adjusted for gambling streams its Twitch sampler misses.
• Kick's gambling share was 3.8 to 4.2 times Twitch's.
• 5,903 Kick channels streamed slots at least once, and the top 100 took 44.1% of Slots viewing.
• The daily gambling share on Kick ranged from 5.9% on October 2 to 8.7% on October 1.

How much of Kick's viewing is gambling?

Gambling accounted for 7.2% of concurrent viewing on Kick from September 26 to October 2, 2026, which works out to about one minute in every fourteen watched. PlayerSells put Slots & Casino at 7.1%, Poker at 0.09% and Sports Betting at 0.004%.

Slots & Casino was the fifth largest category on Kick that week. Only Just Chatting, IRL, Grand Theft Auto V and Minecraft drew more viewing, as the table shows.

Source: PlayerSells, Kick, September 26 to October 2, 2026. By EPR's arithmetic from the same table, Slots & Casino at 7.1% drew more viewing than Counter-Strike 2, League of Legends and Valorant combined, which total 6.0%.

The share moved from day to day, from 5.9% on October 2 to 8.7% on October 1. As a cross-check, PlayerSells also weighted each Kick reading by the time until the next reading for the same stream, and that method put gambling at 7.5%, slightly above the headline figure.

How does Kick's gambling share compare with Twitch's?

Twitch's gambling categories took 1.7% of viewing in the same week, about a quarter of Kick's 7.2% on PlayerSells' raw readings.

Slots alone was 7.1% of Kick viewing against 1.2% on Twitch, a factor of 6.0. Poker is the one category where Twitch's share was higher, at 0.28% against 0.09%.

PlayerSells says its Twitch reading is probably too low. In a spot check on October 3, 2026, its sampler held about 62% of the viewers Twitch's own counters showed in Slots, Virtual Casino and Poker, against about 70% in Twitch's other large categories. Scaling for that gap lifts Twitch's gambling share to about 1.9% and trims Kick's lead to about 3.8 times.

A share is not the same as an audience size. In the 30 days to October 3, PlayerSells counted 19,937 Twitch channels averaging 100 or more viewers against 10,835 on Kick, and it notes that a 7.2% share on Kick is a share of a smaller audience.

Why is gambling so much bigger on Kick than on Twitch?

Platform policy is the most direct explanation, because Twitch restricted unlicensed gambling streams in 2022 and Kick launched in the same period with ties to a gambling operator.

In September 2022 Twitch announced that from October 18 it would bar streaming of slots, roulette and dice sites that were not licensed in the U.S. or comparable jurisdictions, and NBC News reported that the named sites were Stake, Rollbit, Duelbits and Roobet. CNBC reported that sports betting, fantasy sports and poker were not covered by the ban.

Twitch said in August 2023 that views of gambling streams had fallen 75% since the crackdown began, Tubefilter reported. The same report said Kick and Rumble had pitched themselves as alternatives that welcome content Twitch disapproves of, including gambling.

Kick was founded in 2022 by Ed Craven and Bijan Tehrani, the co-founders of gambling operator Stake. EPR's profile of Kick and Stake covers who owns the platform and how Stake funds it, and EPR's coverage of xQc's reported $100 million Kick deal shows how the platform has courted large streamers.

What does research say about people who watch gambling streams?

Peer-reviewed research links watching gambling streams with higher gambling cravings and higher problem gambling severity among viewers, although the studies describe associations and do not prove that a stream causes gambling.

A 2024 study in the Journal of Behavioral Addictions compared gambling stream viewers with non-viewers across two preregistered online studies. Viewers were younger, more often men, and reported higher problem gambling and cravings. The authors found that viewers with higher problem gambling used streams to manage cravings, and that doing so might evoke cravings instead.

A University of Sydney study funded by the NSW Responsible Gambling Fund surveyed more than 300 viewers and observed 25 channels on Twitch and Kick. The university's summary of the findings says most surveyed viewers reported that gambling streams would encourage them to gamble, and that stream chats often carried irrational beliefs about luck.

These are the studies a regulator or reporter is most likely to cite when asking a brand about gambling streams, which is why the size of Kick's gambling category matters beyond viewership.

What does Kick's gambling share mean for PR and marketing teams?

Brands and operators should treat Kick's gambling share as a placement and reputation variable, not only an audience statistic. EPR's overview of gambling social media trends lists creators and live streams among the channels shaping the category, and the PlayerSells data puts a number on one of them.

1. Ask for category-level reporting before buying Kick placements. About one minute in every fourteen watched on Kick that week went to gambling, so a brand buying broad placements cannot assume its sponsorship runs away from gambling streams.
2. Check platform rules before any licensed operator campaign. EPR's guide to gambling advertising platform rules shows Google, Meta, TikTok, X and Snap allow gambling ads only for licensed, approved operators, and Kick's treatment of operator ads should be checked the same way.
3. Write disclosure and age controls into creator contracts. The University of Sydney researchers raised concern about age restrictions on streaming platforms, and EPR's analysis of the Wall Street Journal's Polymarket investigation shows how staged or undisclosed gambling content becomes a reputation problem.
4. Prepare a holding statement on streaming-related gambling harm. Operators and agencies that sponsor streamers can expect questions once the research above is cited, and EPR's gambling public relations guide covers responsible gambling messaging and crisis response.
5. Track the share every week. The daily gambling share on Kick moved from 5.9% to 8.7% within a single week, and EPR's analysis of the Sidemen model covers how UK creators restructured after advertising rules tightened in 2024.

How reliable are the PlayerSells numbers?

The PlayerSells figures are a one-week reading from the company's own crawlers, so they describe viewing shares for September 26 to October 2, 2026 and not a standing trend. PlayerSells operates a marketplace that sells social media accounts and related services, and EPR has not independently reproduced its measurement.

PlayerSells lists its own limits in the full study:

• The figures cover one week, and gambling viewing moves with events and individual streamers.
• The Twitch figure is a sampler reading that probably understates gambling, which is why PlayerSells quotes a ratio range of 3.8 to 4.2 times.
• Category labels are chosen by streamers, so a slots stream filed under Just Chatting counts as Just Chatting and both platforms' gambling shares may be understated.
• Viewer counts are what the platforms display, and PlayerSells cannot separate real viewers from embedded players, bots or inflated counts.
• PlayerSells does not publish hours watched, because its samplers measure shares more reliably than totals.