Gambling terms, explained straight

Online Gambling & Industry

Rakeback slots

Rakeback slots refers to a cashback or loyalty rebate paid to a player based on their slot play, rather than a feature of the slot game itself.

Regulatory treatment
The UK Gambling Commission treats rakeback payments as business costs, not gambling transactions, and they must not be counted towards GGY components A, B, or C.1
Common wording
Also called cash back or rake back in loyalty scheme descriptions.1

Key points

  • Rakeback slots is a loyalty rebate on slot play, not a game mechanic or payout feature.1
  • The UK Gambling Commission says such payments are part of business costs and do not form part of a gambling transaction.1
  • In regulatory reporting, rakeback must be excluded from gross gambling yield calculations for slots.1

Where this term is used

Online Rakeback General loyalty rebate concept in gambling. Online RNG slots Slots using a random number generator for outcomes. Online Rakeback poker Rebate on rake paid in poker games. Online Rakeback bonus Bonus tied to rakeback or cashback offers. Online Rakeback bc game Rakeback offer specific to BC Game casino. Online RNG meaning Definition of random number generator in gambling.

Sources

  1. Reporting gross gambling yield (GGY) on regulatory returns gamblingcommission.gov.uk Defines rakeback as a loyalty scheme and states it must not be counted towards GGY.

Sources are drawn from regulators, universities and published research, and each one is labelled with what it actually is — a preprint is not called a paper. Bookmaker and affiliate pages are never cited here, because a page that sells betting is not a neutral authority on it.

Written and maintained by Ellis Warrender, writer and maintainer.

Last updated 28 July 2026. Spotted an error? Tell me and it gets fixed and logged on the corrections page.