Online Casinos in South Carolina

Real-money online casinos

Not legal, none licensed

Online sports betting

Not legal, S.444 stalled in committee

Online lottery

Not offered, retail tickets only

Sweepstakes / social casinos

Available, no state ban

Commercial casinos

None in the state

Tribal casinos

None inside SC, Catawba runs Two Kings across the NC line

Charitable gaming

Bingo and nonprofit raffles only

Minimum gambling age

18 for lottery, bingo, raffles

Key statutes

SC Const. Art. XVII Sec. 7; SC Code Title 16 Chapter 19

Machines at peak

~33,000Roughly one machine for every 100 residents in 1999. SC had more gambling locations than any other state, three times Nevada’s count.

Annual industry size

$2.8BRevenue at peak. Second-largest legal coin-operated gambling sector in the country outside Nevada.

SC Supreme Court vote

5-0October 1999 ruling held the keep-or-kill voter referendum was an unconstitutional delegation of legislative power.

Ban effective

Jul 1, 2000Largest single-state rollback of legal gambling in U.S. history. Possession of a machine became a crime, and seizures began within a week.

That ruling is still the deepest reason gambling bills move slowly in Columbia. Lawmakers watched a $2.8 billion industry vanish in a single year, and the legislators who voted to legalize the lottery in 2001 spent months reassuring voters this was not the same thing. Today’s sports-betting and casino fights inherit that history. Even Gov. McMaster’s standing veto threat is shaped by what the 2000 ban demonstrated, that a 5-0 court can take a multi-billion-dollar gambling sector off the table in a single morning.

1. Jul 1, 2000

   Video poker industry banned statewide

   After the SC Supreme Court struck down the 1999 keep-or-kill referendum, roughly 33,000 video poker machines went dark. It was the largest legal gambling sector outside Nevada at the time.

2. Jan 7, 2002

   SC Education Lottery sales begin

   Voters approved a constitutional amendment in November 2000, the General Assembly passed the Education Lottery Act in 2001, and tickets went on sale at licensed retailers only. Online lottery sales were not authorized.

3. Jan 14, 2025

   H.3625 sports wagering and H.J. 3353 gambling amendment introduced

   The 2025-2026 session opened with paired bills to authorize online sports betting and to put broader gambling expansion before voters. Neither cleared committee.

4. Feb 19, 2026

   Senate subcommittee hears S.444, takes no vote

   Senators Tom Davis and Matthew Leber's sports-betting bill would cap licenses at eight operators with a 12.5% tax on adjusted gross revenue. The subcommittee adjourned without voting; Governor McMaster stayed opposed.

Eligible counties

3Orangeburg, Marlboro, and Dillon. The only counties on I-95 that fall in the lowest job-tax-credit tier the bill requires.

Investment floor

$200MMinimum capital commitment for the applicant. Plus a mandatory economic impact study filed with the proposed gaming commission.

License freeze

10 yearsOnly one casino license issued under the bill, with no additional licenses authorized for a full decade after the first opens.

Conservation set-aside

35%Rep. Bruce Bannister’s House Ways and Means amendment routes 35% of casino revenue to the SC Conservation Bank. Gov. McMaster rejected the compromise.

The shovel-ready site behind H.4176 is a vacant outlet mall in Santee, Orangeburg County, owned by Republican donor Wallace Cheves, an experienced casino developer. Even if a future governor signs the bill, the 10-year single-license freeze means the state would end with one casino, not a Gulf Coast cluster. Sports betting moves on a separate track under S.444 with the same McMaster veto threat in the way.

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Per-machine penalty

$500 + 1 yrState misdemeanor cap under SC Code 12-21-2710. The statute also orders any prohibited machine seized and destroyed on a magistrate’s sign-off.

Bubba forfeiture

$367KCorporate profits Bubba Technology Group of Piedmont forfeited in its Dec 2022 federal sentencing for running an illegal gambling business on fish machines.

Retailer penalties

$673KConvenience stores and bars caught up in the same federal case paid a combined $673,408 on top of dozens of machines seized by Homeland Security Investigations and SLED.

Skill defense

ClosedSC Court of Appeals reinstated the magistrate’s seizure order in Dragon’s Ascent v SLED on March 5, 2025, holding 12-21-2710 reaches devices used for gambling whether skill predominates or not.

The Bubba charges came out of a joint Homeland Security Investigations and SLED probe filed in July 2021. Fish machines accept cash, display an arcade shooting game, and print a paper ticket the player redeems with the business owner. Courts have treated that redemption step as what turns the arcade frame into a gambling device. The SC Court of Appeals reinforced the same read in Dragon’s Ascent VGM SC LLC v SLED, decided March 5, 2025, when it reinstated a seizure order on a skill-based machine at a Hanahan restaurant and rejected the skill-vs- chance defense. State law sets the floor at a misdemeanor. Federal prosecutors layer an illegal- gambling-business count on top once an operation crosses multi-site or revenue thresholds, which is why a Piedmont vendor ended up in U.S. District Court rather than a Greenville magistrate.

Cumulative to education

$7.8BTransferred to the General Assembly for educational programs since the first ticket sold January 7, 2002.

Scholarships funded

2.8M+LIFE, HOPE, Palmetto Fellows, Needs-Based Grants, Tuition Assistance, and National Guard tuition.

Years over $500M

5 straightFY2021 through FY2025. Each fiscal year transferred more than half a billion dollars to education.

Advertising ratio

~0.50%Of gross sales at FY2025 close. Among the lowest of any U.S. lottery with annual sales under $4 billion.

What it does not do is sell online. The 2001 Education Lottery Act authorized retail tickets only, and no amendment to add an iLottery channel is in front of the General Assembly in 2025-2026. Tennessee found a way around the same problem in January 2025 by reading its existing statute to allow digital sales of Powerball, Mega Millions, Cash 3, and Cash 4 through the TN iLottery app. South Carolina has not tried that path, so every ticket still has to be bought from a licensed retailer.

• SC Education Lottery

  Authorized by a 2000 voter referendum and launched on January 7, 2002. The lottery sells draw and instant tickets, but only at licensed retail outlets. There is no internet purchase channel and no iLottery app. Minimum age is 18.

• Sweepstakes & Social Casinos

  South Carolina has no statute banning the sweepstakes promotional model. Free-to-play social slots and dual-currency sweepstakes sites are accessible to residents, the closest legal substitute for online casino games here. SC is not among the seven states that banned sweeps in 2025-2026.

• Charitable Bingo & Nonprofit Raffles

  Nonprofit bingo is licensed and taxed through the SC Department of Revenue. Nonprofit raffles need a $50 annual filing with the Secretary of State. "Casino night" and "Las Vegas night" fundraisers with real wagering are not allowed.

• Catawba Two Kings Casino (Across the NC Line)

  The Catawba Indian Nation's 1993 federal settlement bars tribal gaming inside South Carolina, so its Two Kings Casino sits in Kings Mountain, North Carolina, about 35 miles from Rock Hill. SC residents drive there to play slots and table games.

Settlement act

PL 103-116Catawba Indian Tribe of South Carolina Land Claims Settlement Act, enacted in 1993. The unique provision: IGRA does not apply to the Catawba inside South Carolina.

Tribal HQ

Rock Hill, SCAbout 35 miles south of Kings Mountain, NC, where the Two Kings facility actually operates. The Catawba cannot legally run a casino on their SC reservation.

Years to a casino

28From the 1993 settlement to the December 27, 2021 Catawba Indian Nation Lands Act that ratified the Kings Mountain trust by federal statute.

EBCI lawsuit outcome

Mooted by statuteEastern Band of Cherokee Indians sued in March 2020 to block the trust acquisition. The FY2022 NDAA provision ended the appeal in December 2021.

To open any casino, the Catawba had to apply to the Bureau of Indian Affairs in August 2013 to take 16 to 17 acres in Kings Mountain into federal trust under the discretionary path. BIA approved the application in September 2018. The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians sued the Department of the Interior in March 2020 to block the trust acquisition, arguing it was the first off-reservation casino approved that way. A federal judge sided with the Catawba in April 2021, and Congress closed the door entirely by ratifying the trust in the FY2022 NDAA, signed by Pres. Biden on December 27, 2021. The same carve-out that pushed Two Kings into North Carolina also blocks any iGaming compact with the Catawba inside SC, which rules out a tribal path to online casinos here.

Ships in operation

2Ship I and Ship II both sail year-round from Little River. Ship II joined the fleet in June 2015 after relocating from Fort Myers, FL.

Gaming machines

408159 slots on Ship I, 249 on the larger Ship II, plus 14 live tables with blackjack limits running $5 to $1,000 per hand on Ship II.

Daily sailings

2Day cruise departs 10:30 a.m. and returns 4:30 p.m. Evening cruise departs 6:00 p.m. and returns 11:45 p.m. Buffet is not bundled into the cruise fare.

Legal basis

International watersThe ships clear the 3-mile state limit before opening the gaming floor. Once in international waters, federal and SC anti-gambling statutes no longer apply. Minimum age 21.

Ship I is the smaller of the two boats, with 159 gaming machines and a more limited table layout. Ship II carries 249 slots plus 14 live tables, including blackjack with limits running $5 to $1,000 per hand, three-card poker, craps, roulette, and Let It Ride. Day cruises depart at 10:30 a.m. and dock back at 4:30 p.m. Evening cruises depart at 6:00 p.m. and dock at 11:45 p.m. The buffet is not bundled into the cruise fare. Minimum age on board is 21, three years above the SC Education Lottery’s 18-year floor.

Kalshi sports launch

Jan 2025Kalshi began listing NFL and NCAA event contracts four days after the second Trump inauguration. The Biden CFTC had fought the same products in court.

Sports share of volume

~80%Bank of America Securities analyst note on Kalshi pegged sports event contracts at roughly 80% of the platform’s 2025 transaction mix.

CFTC pivot

Jan 2026Chair Michael Selig directed staff to pull the proposed sports/politics ban rule and rescind the 2025 cautionary advisory. The agency now intends to write clear standards rather than a prohibition.

SC AG opinion on DFS

None issuedDraftKings and FanDuel both accept paid contests from SC residents. The SC Attorney General has issued no opinion on the legality of paid daily fantasy under state law either way.

Daily fantasy sits in the same gray zone. DraftKings and FanDuel both accept paid contests from SC residents under no enabling statute, and the SC Attorney General has issued no opinion on the legality of paid DFS either way. The CFTC drew a line in late January 2026 when chair Michael Selig directed staff to withdraw the Biden-era proposed rule that would have banned sports and politics event contracts, and to rescind the 2025 staff advisory urging exchanges to be cautious about listing them. That leaves SC residents with two real-money sports-adjacent products operating today, neither of which touches SLED, the SC Department of Revenue, or the SC Education Lottery Commission, while S.444 sits in committee under the same governor who has promised a veto on any state-level sports-betting bill.