Research by Finnish comparison site Kasinohai has found that half of the 50 online casinos it tested had welcome bonus wagering requirements that proved more demanding in practice than their advertising suggested. During testing carried out between 15 and 30 June 2026, researchers opened real accounts, deposited real money and claimed bonuses, recording the exact terms at the moment of receipt.
The Kasinohai report comes ahead of a major regulatory overhaul: welcome bonuses for new players will be banned entirely when Finland’s new licensed market opens on 1 July 2027. The Ministry of the Interior has already published a draft set of regulations setting out the rules for the competitive market, including maximum stakes at online casinos and requirements for gaming machines. Public consultation is open to operators, industry experts and the general public until 5 August.
What is a wagering requirement?
A wagering requirement is the condition under which a player must stake the bonus amount a specified number of times before any winnings can be withdrawn. The higher the multiplier, the more real money the player must put at risk. But equally important is the calculation base: a casino may calculate the wagering requirement against the bonus amount alone, or against the combined total of the deposit and the bonus, which doubles the required staking volume at the same nominal multiplier.
The hidden mathematics of bonuses
This is precisely where, according to Kasinohai, advertising differs from reality. At 44 per cent of casinos tested (22 out of 50), the wagering requirement was calculated on the combined deposit and bonus rather than the bonus alone, without this being made clear in the advertising. A straightforward example from the research: on a €100 deposit with a €100 bonus at a nominal 30x wagering requirement, the player must stake €3,000 if only the bonus is counted, but €6,000 if the deposit is included. A further 30 per cent of casinos (15 out of 50) did not clearly state which calculation base applied at all.
A separate issue concerns multi-stage bonus packages, which are typically split across several deposits (for example, bonuses tied to a first, second and third top-up), each bearing its own separate wagering requirement. In advertising, casinos most commonly quote a single multiplier, typically the one attached to the first deposit, creating the impression that this applies to the entire package. In practice, claiming the full advertised bonus requires completing every stage, and the wagering requirements at each stage accumulate. This is how advertised figures of 20x to 30x became 40x in practice by the time a player had worked through the full package. Across the full sample, 12 casinos held wagering requirements at 15x or below, 19 sat in the 20x to 35x range, and a further 19 were at 40x or higher.
The scale of the issue in the Finnish market is illustrated by Blask data as of 27 July 2026: the country has more than 240 tracked brands with a competitive earnings benchmark (CEB) of $701.84m.
Interest in the online casino segment, where these bonus structures are most common, fell 27.48 per cent year-on-year, while online poker grew 36.55 per cent and prediction markets nearly doubled at 99.92 per cent. The data may already be signalling that part of the audience is migrating toward segments where reward mechanics work differently or are more transparent.
Maximum stake limits became a trap
Another widespread practice involves hidden stake limits during bonus wagering. Some 44 per cent of casinos (22 out of 50) did not specify a maximum bet size in the terms available at the point of claiming the bonus. Where a limit was stated, it typically stood at around €5 per spin. According to Kasinohai, exceeding this limit is one of the most common grounds on which casinos void both the bonus and any winnings accumulated with it. A further detail is even more restrictive: 58 per cent of casinos capped the maximum winnings that could be earned from a bonus, with the lower end of those caps falling below €100.
Blask data shows the main motivations of Finnish casino players to be winning money and enjoying the thrill, each cited by 40 per cent of respondents, followed by the desire to win and enjoyment of the process, both at 35 per cent. In other words, a significant share of the audience sits down to play specifically for financial returns. For these players, opaque wagering terms and hidden winnings caps carry the most direct financial consequences.
The reform guarantees an end to bonuses
The Gambling Act (Rahapelilaki 10/2026) brings the era of welcome bonuses to a close alongside the end of state operator Veikkaus’s monopoly. From the launch of the licensed market, attracting new customers through bonuses will be prohibited. Finnplay Managing Director Jaakko Soininen has previously noted that this fundamentally changes the logic of competition. If aggressive player acquisition is restricted, operators can no longer rely on bonuses and fast-turnaround marketing campaigns, and the focus will inevitably shift toward trust and product quality.
Legal Gaming Attorneys at Law consultant Antti Koivula has warned that the new rules risk causing disruption. The restrictions could “result in a surge of marketing in traditional media channels (where the rules are comparatively lenient) which may in turn provoke public backlash. This scenario might lead to further regulatory responses, such as additional advertising restrictions, which would ultimately benefit the black market rather than the licensed ecosystem”.
Some see room for optimism
Not everyone in the industry is convinced the new rules will remain this strict indefinitely. Jari Vähänen, co-founder of The Finnish Gambling Consultants, told iGaming Expert: “If the channelisation rate remains lower than expected and the number of problems does not increase, then I expect the legislation to be relaxed, at least for affiliates and possibly for welcome bonuses as well”.
For now, the Kasinohai research captures what Finland’s bonus market looked like in the final months before the rules change permanently. Regardless of whether requirements are later tightened further or partially relaxed as Vähänen suggests, the underlying cause of the ban, the gap between what casinos promise in their advertising and what players actually find in the small print, will not disappear unless the market is actively supervised. It is precisely this phenomenon that Kasinohai’s data has documented, among the last to do so before oversight becomes a state obligation rather than a player’s own responsibility.
This article was first published on the Russian SiGMA News page on 27 July 2026.
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