GGR vs NGR: Formulas, Worked Examples & Industry Averages 2026

GGR is total player wagers minus the winnings paid back to players; NGR is what remains after the operator additionally deducts bonus costs, payment processing fees, gaming taxes, and platform or content fees. Across regulated iGaming markets, NGR typically lands at 55-75% of GGR, and every RevShare contract, tax filing, and valuation model in the industry depends on which of the two lines it references. This page is the working reference: exact formulas, three fully worked examples, standard deduction ranges, NGR/GGR benchmarks by vertical, and the contract clauses that decide whether a commission deal on NGR pays what its headline percentage implies. It is reviewed quarterly.

GGR and NGR: Exact Definitions and Formulas

Gross gaming revenue is the money players lose to the house in aggregate: every wager placed, minus every win paid out, before a single operating cost is deducted. Net gaming revenue is the operator's realized gaming margin: GGR minus the direct, revenue-linked costs of generating it. The two formulas, written out in full:

GGR = Total wagers - Player winnings. For sportsbooks the same identity is usually expressed through hold: GGR = Handle x Hold %. For casino products it is expressed through game margin: GGR = Turnover x (1 - RTP), where RTP is the return-to-player percentage of the game mix.

NGR = GGR - Bonus costs - Payment processing fees - Gaming taxes and levies - Platform, content, and data fees. Some contracts also subtract chargebacks, progressive jackpot contributions, and fraud write-offs. NGR is a contractual quantity, not an accounting standard: two operators with identical GGR can report materially different NGR because their deduction lists differ, which is why every RevShare agreement must enumerate its deductions explicitly.

1. Start with GGR for the period: total wagers minus player winnings, per brand and per market.
2. Subtract bonus costs, using the basis the contract defines (bonuses converted to withdrawable balance is the defensible standard).
3. Subtract payment costs: PSP fees, acquiring fees, and chargebacks with their fees.
4. Subtract gaming taxes and regulatory levies for the license under which the revenue was generated.
5. Subtract platform, game content, and data feed fees that scale with revenue.
6. The remainder is NGR: the base on which NGR-denominated RevShare commissions are calculated.

Three Worked Examples with Real Numbers

Three worked examples show the same arithmetic under three cost structures: a regulated online casino, a regulated sportsbook, and an offshore crypto casino. The line items are the ones a finance team actually books, and each example ends with the NGR/GGR ratio so the benchmarks in the next section have concrete anchors.

Example 1: Regulated online casino

A regulated online casino takes $25,000,000 in monthly wagers and pays back $24,000,000 in winnings, producing $1,000,000 GGR (a 4% blended game margin). Deductions: $180,000 bonus costs, $50,000 payment fees, $150,000 gaming tax at 15%, and $70,000 platform and content fees. NGR is $550,000, an NGR/GGR ratio of 55%.

Example 2: Regulated sportsbook

A regulated sportsbook takes $10,000,000 in handle at an 8% hold, producing $800,000 GGR. Deductions: $96,000 in free bets and promotions (12%), $40,000 payment fees (5%), $120,000 gaming tax at 15%, and $40,000 platform and data feed fees (5%). NGR is $504,000, a ratio of 63%. Run the same book in a 40% or 51% tax state and the ratio collapses toward 35-45%, which is why sportsbook affiliate deals in high-tax US states increasingly quote CPA instead of RevShare.

Example 3: Offshore crypto casino

An offshore crypto casino generates $500,000 GGR under a 0% GGR-tax license. Deductions: $100,000 bonus costs (20%), $15,000 in payment and network fees (3%, crypto rails are cheap), zero gaming tax, and $50,000 platform and game content fees (10%). NGR is $335,000, a ratio of 67%. The absent tax line is the entire reason offshore NGR ratios beat regulated ones; the trade-off is the market access and payment limitations that come with the license.

Standard NGR Deductions: What Operators Subtract

Four deduction categories account for nearly the entire GGR-to-NGR gap: bonus costs (typically 15-25% of GGR), gaming taxes (0-54% depending on jurisdiction), payment processing (4-6% of GGR), and platform, content, and data fees (5-10%). Everything else that appears in contracts, such as chargebacks, jackpot contributions, and fraud write-offs, is real but small, usually 1-3% of GGR combined. The table gives the standard ranges Track360 observes across operator programs, with the negotiation notes that matter when the deduction list is being drafted.

NGR/GGR Ratio: Industry Averages by Vertical

NGR lands between 55% and 75% of GGR across most regulated iGaming verticals, with the tax line explaining almost all of the spread between markets. These benchmarks are Track360 platform analysis across operator affiliate programs, consistent with the regulated-market revenue reporting frameworks operators file under EGBA-tracked EU regimes, the UKGC's LCCP reporting, and MGA licensee obligations. Use them as sanity checks on a program's reported deductions: an operator reporting 40% NGR/GGR in a 15%-tax market is either buried in bonus spend or running an aggressive deduction list.

RevShare on NGR vs GGR: What the Base Does to Affiliate Payouts

A 35% RevShare on NGR pays less than a 25% RevShare on GGR whenever NGR runs below 71.4% of GGR, which is almost everywhere in regulated markets. That single break-even divides the two contract families: GGR deals give the affiliate a clean, auditable base and shift cost risk to the operator; NGR deals align the affiliate with real operator economics and shift bonus, tax, and fee risk onto the partner. Neither is wrong, but comparing headline percentages across bases is meaningless, and programs quoting NGR rates against competitors' GGR rates are exploiting exactly that confusion. CPA and hybrid deals (CPA plus a reduced RevShare) exist largely to route around the deduction argument entirely.

The commission engine has to enforce whichever base the contract defines. That means deduction-aware payout calculation, per-market tax rates applied at the player level, negative carryover handling when a month's NGR goes negative under bonus load, and qualification rules that keep bonus abuse, multi-account, and self-referral traffic from inflating the commissionable base. Programs that reconcile affiliate-facing NGR statements against finance-side NGR monthly, with the deduction list itemized per line, close the single largest trust gap in iGaming affiliate management.

Common Contract Pitfalls in NGR Definitions

Five contract clauses move an NGR deal's real value more than the headline rate does: the deduction list, the bonus cost basis, deduction ordering, the admin fee, and the tax change pass-through. Every one of them is negotiable at signature and expensive to dispute afterward.

• Open-ended deduction lists: contracts saying deductions include but are not limited to hand the operator a blank check. The list must be exhaustive and closed.
• Undefined bonus basis: bonuses granted can run double bonuses converted to withdrawable balance. Specify the basis and the reporting that evidences it.
• Admin and management fees: a 10-15% flat skim on GGR before other deductions silently cuts every NGR payout by the same fraction. Resist, cap, or price it into the rate.
• Deduction ordering: tax applied before or after bonus deduction changes the base in bonus-heavy months. The formula should be written as an ordered sequence, not prose.
• Tax change pass-through: the UK's Remote Gaming Duty jump from 21% to 40% in April 2026 cut UK-facing NGR overnight; contracts without a change-in-law clause left affiliates absorbing the whole hit.
• Negative carryover scope: define whether negative NGR months carry forward per brand, per player cohort, or program-wide, and whether carryover expires. Unbounded cross-brand carryover is the harshest common variant.
• Cross-vertical netting: letting casino losses offset sportsbook commissions in one net figure buries vertical performance. Require per-vertical NGR statements.

Recent Changes: Tax and Deduction Changelog

Four tax changes moved NGR math materially between mid-2025 and mid-2026, all in the same direction: bigger tax deductions, thinner NGR. Each entry below states the change and what it does to the NGR line for operators and NGR-based affiliates exposed to that market.

How to Use and Cite This Page

Two rules keep citations of this reference accurate. First, quote formulas and benchmarks with their definitions attached: an NGR/GGR ratio is meaningless without the deduction list behind it, so cite the range together with its vertical and tax context. Second, attach the as-of date; the changelog above shows how quickly tax lines move the math, and this page's updated date changes with every revision.

Methodology & Sources

Two source classes back this page: regulator reporting frameworks and Track360 platform analysis. GGR definitions follow the usage in UKGC licence conditions and reporting, MGA licensee obligations, and the German GGL and Italian ADM regimes; European market-level revenue context draws on EGBA annual data, and industry commission-structure coverage is cross-checked against iGaming Business and SBC News reporting. NGR deduction ranges and NGR/GGR benchmarks are Track360 analysis of operator affiliate programs running on the platform, aggregated and rounded; they are benchmarks for sanity-checking, not audited statistics. Worked examples use round illustrative numbers chosen to sit inside the observed ranges.

Last updated July 18, 2026. This reference is reviewed quarterly (January, April, July, October), with out-of-cycle updates when a major market changes its gaming tax or a widely used deduction practice shifts. Superseded figures remain in the changelog for at least four quarters.

GGR is a fact; NGR is a contract. Every dispute between an operator and an affiliate about a RevShare payment is really a dispute about a deduction list that was never written down precisely enough.