Online gambling could become an even bigger part of American culture in 2021. This is because it’s looking likely that more states will legalize it, enabling millions more Americans to spend money playing casino games and betting on sports over the internet without facing prosecution for doing so. Gambling is already ingrained in the country’s culture – think Vegas, poker nights, Atlantic City and slot machines (which were invented in San Francisco). Real-life gambling, i.e. playing in land-based casinos and going to sports betting shops, is more popular than online gambling, though the latter is doing a very good job of catching up.

The Reality Today

As of early 2021, out of America’s 50 states, only 11 have actually legalized online gambling. The first was New Jersey back in 2010 and because it was a success – the state was able to generate additional revenue through taxing its online gambling activity – other states followed suit. Even though the legalization of online gambling has been a slow process, it’s better than nothing. If the current pace is stuck to, it would take fewer than 40 years for online gambling to become legal across all 50 states.

What’s encouraging is that the pace seems to be picking up a lot. In fact, there are quite a few states that, if rumors are to be believed, are keen to have online gambling legalized and want to get it done quickly. What’s motivating these states is mainly the fact that online gambling can be a lu-crative source of income. There’s also the fact that online gambling has experienced a surge during the global COVID-19 pandemic; it’s exceedingly popular, which means that there’s a lot of money in it. Also, in states where it isn’t legal, more and more people will be gambling online and breaking the law. In a way, it makes sense for something that lots of people are doing to be legalized so it can at least be regulated.

So, Who’s Next?

Even though many Americans still have a negative view of gambling, there’s still been enough momentum to get it legalized in certain places. If states such as New Jersey, California, Illinois, New Hampshire and Delaware can get it done, so can others. So what states are meant to be get-ting close to legalizing online gambling in 2021?

First, there’s the biggest state of them all: Texas. Home to over 29 million people, it’s the country’s second most populous state and has a potentially huge market to unlock if it goes ahead and makes it legal to gamble online. There’s a lot of money to be made here, which is the key reason why there’s a big push being made to get things done. Efforts are being made to not only make gambling online legal, but also to allow people in the state to gamble at land-based casinos, some-thing which isn’t actually legal right now.

Another state to watch out for is Virginia. It’s already been confirmed that online and mobile sports betting have been approved and there are to be casinos in a total of five of the state’s cities. While the focus is on sports betting, there’s no word yet on whether online casinos will be approved of, but if the current plans prove successful, online casinos could well be legalized very soon indeed.

Then there’s Michigan. This state is soon to be one of the most gambling-friendly in all of America, as in 2021 it will have legalized just about every type of gambling there is. It has over two dozen land-based casinos (some commercial, some tribal) and many of these are expected to launch their own online casinos throughout 2021 and beyond.

Over in Massachusetts, gambling in land-based casinos is allowed, though there’s currently no plans to make online casinos legal, despite it looking very likely that online sports betting will be ap-proved in some form in 2021. Ohio is in a similar position: there’s a high chance of the state legaliz-ing online sports betting in 2021, though lawmakers aren’t currently looking at online casinos; the focus is very much on the sports betting market.

These are just some of the states that could legalize gambling in one way or another in 2021. What you’ll have noticed is that the states mentioned aren’t legalizing every single type of online gam-bling, they’re mostly favoring sports betting and aren’t bothering with the casino side. It’s encourag-ing that at least one form of online gambling is being made more accessible throughout America, but it seems that it’s still going to take some time before online casino games are able to catch up.