Legal and live since November 2023 — but structured unlike anywhere else. All statewide mobile licenses belong to Maine’s four Wabanaki tribes: DraftKings runs the Passamaquoddy skin, and Caesars runs the other three. In practice that’s a two-app market. Betting is 21+, taxed at 10%.
Newly legal, not yet live. In January 2026 Maine became the 8th state to legalize online casino gaming, again giving exclusive licenses to the four tribes (taxed at 16%). But it hasn’t launched — rulemaking is underway, with a realistic start in late 2026 or 2027 — and it faces a lawsuit and a possible repeal effort. Until it goes live, there is no legal online casino in Maine.
Legal — two commercial casinos, no tribal ones. Hollywood Casino Bangor (a racino, with harness racing) and Oxford Casino both run full slots and table games. Because of a 1980 federal settlement, Maine’s tribes can’t run land-based casinos, so these two are the only casino floors in the state.
Legal, but at one room only. Hollywood Casino Bangor reopened its poker room in July 2024 after a four-year closure — four tables of hold’em, Omaha and stud, plus daily tournaments. Oxford Casino, despite what some listings say, has no live poker room; its ‘poker’ is house-banked table games and video poker.
Legal and regulated since 2017. DraftKings and FanDuel are licensed here, for players 18 and up. Prop-style ‘pick’em’ fantasy is a moving target — Maine fined one operator and later authorized player-versus-player pick’em, so check current availability for apps like PrizePicks and Underdog.
Legal since 1974. The Maine State Lottery sells Powerball, Mega Millions and scratch tickets in stores; players must be 18. There are no official online ticket sales, though the Jackpocket courier app will buy tickets on your behalf.
Legal, and part of Maine’s heritage. You can bet pari-mutuel on live Standardbred harness racing (Bangor Raceway, First Tracks Cumberland and the fair circuit) and on simulcast year-round, and advance-deposit horse-betting apps are permitted — confirm current operator eligibility. Longtime Scarborough Downs closed in 2020.
Legal for qualified nonprofits. Maine calls bingo ‘beano,’ and licensed charities can run beano, raffles and games of chance. A distinctive carve-out lets the state license high-stakes beano — prizes up to 25,000 dollars — specifically to a federally recognized tribe.
Banned. In April 2026 Maine outlawed online ‘dual-currency’ sweepstakes casinos that mimic real-money slots and betting, with fines up to 100,000 dollars per violation. They are no longer legal to offer here.
Maine became the 8th state to legalize online casino gaming when LD 1164 — again giving the tribes exclusive licenses — became law in January. Weeks later the state banned online sweepstakes casinos and barred credit-card funding of online bets.
Hollywood Casino Bangor reopened its poker room in July after a four-year closure, restoring the only live poker room in the state.
Maine’s tribe-run sportsbooks — DraftKings and Caesars — went live on November 3. The same year, Governor Mills vetoed a broad tribal-sovereignty bill, LD 2004, showing the limits of her support for expanding tribal rights.
LD 585 legalized sports betting and, in a first-of-its-kind move, handed all statewide mobile licenses to the four Wabanaki Nations as economic development.
Voters approved slot gaming at Bangor in 2003 (Hollywood, later adding table games) and a full casino at Oxford in 2010 — the state’s only two casino floors.
A federal appeals court held that the 1988 Indian Gaming Regulatory Act does not reach Maine — so, unlike almost everywhere else, Maine’s tribes could not open casinos under federal law.
A landmark federal settlement resolved the tribes’ land claims but subjected the Wabanaki Nations to Maine state law — the constraint that still shapes every gambling question in the state.
Maine’s online-gambling story is changing fast, and it runs entirely through the state’s four tribes. Mobile sports betting has been live since late 2023, and in January 2026 Maine went further, becoming the 8th state to legalize online casino gaming — the same tribal-exclusive model, extended from sportsbooks to slots and table games.
So is online casino legal in Maine? Yes — but you can’t play it yet. The law is on the books, but the Gambling Control Unit still has to write the rules and license operators, so a realistic launch is late 2026 or 2027. It also faces a lawsuit over the tribes-only structure and a possible repeal effort at the ballot box, so nothing is guaranteed. Until it goes live, there is no legal, regulated online casino or online poker in Maine — the only online product you can actually use today is the tribes’ own sportsbooks, run by DraftKings and Caesars — a two-app duopoly, and a contrast with neighboring New Hampshire, where DraftKings alone holds the state’s only sportsbook license.
When iGaming does arrive, Maine will join full online-casino states like Pennsylvania, Michigan and New Jersey — but with a twist those states don’t share: the licenses belong to the tribes, much as neighboring Connecticut routes its online casino through its two tribal operators. For poker specifically, there’s no online poker in Maine yet and none announced separately from the broader iGaming rollout. Live poker means one room — Hollywood Casino Bangor — while online play, for now, means unregulated offshore sites with no state protection.
The practical reality: Today you can bet sports on your phone (via the tribes’ DraftKings and Caesars apps), play at two casinos, and enter daily fantasy. Online casino gaming is now legal but hasn’t launched — expect it in late 2026 or 2027 — and sweepstakes sites were just banned. For live poker, Hollywood Casino Bangor is the only room in the state.
Maine’s gambling runs through two casinos and the tribes’ sports-betting apps. Online casino is legal now but not yet live, and there’s a single live poker room in the state.
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Maine’s casino picture is shaped by one unusual fact: its tribes cannot run land-based casinos. Under the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act of 1980, the Wabanaki Nations — the Passamaquoddy Tribe, Penobscot Nation, Houlton Band of Maliseet Indians and Mi’kmaq Nation — are broadly subject to state law, unlike tribes almost anywhere else. When a federal court ruled in 1996 that the Indian Gaming Regulatory Act doesn’t reach Maine, it settled the question: no tribal casinos here.
That’s why Maine has just two commercial casinos, both non-tribal. Hollywood Casino Bangor, run by Penn Entertainment, is a racino — it hosts live harness racing at Bangor Raceway alongside its slots, table games and the state’s only poker room. Oxford Casino, owned by Churchill Downs, has slots and a big table-games pit but no live poker. Between them they cover most of what a casino floor offers; neither is huge by national standards.
The workaround for the tribes has been to move the gaming online. Rather than IGRA casinos, the state gave the four nations exclusive statewide online licenses — first for mobile sports betting in 2022, then for online casino gaming in 2026. It’s a deliberate trade: no tribal casino buildings, but tribal control of Maine’s digital gambling market. Governor Janet Mills has backed these narrow, regulated expansions while resisting broader tribal-sovereignty bills — a balance that keeps Maine’s model distinct from the tribal casinos you’ll find in Connecticut or out west in Michigan.
The Maine Gambling Control Unit licenses the tribes' sportsbooks and the two casinos, with responsible-gaming rules and voluntary self-exclusion programs — separate lists for casinos and for sports wagering, from one year to lifetime.
The state lottery, licensed daily fantasy operators and pari-mutuel harness racing are all regulated, with consumer protections and a state-funded problem-gambling program behind them.
No Maine protection. Until legal online casino launches, offshore casino and poker sites remain unlicensed here — no fund segregation, no recourse. Online sweepstakes casinos are now banned outright.
Our guidance: Maine’s regulated options are solid — tribe-run mobile sportsbooks, two licensed casinos, live poker at Bangor, and daily fantasy — all overseen by the Gambling Control Unit, with state self-exclusion available. Online casino is legal but not live yet, so for now there’s no regulated online casino or poker; any online casino play means offshore sites with no Maine protection. Sweepstakes sites are now banned outright. If gambling stops being fun, Maine’s own resources are below.
If gambling stops being fun — or you're chasing losses — free, confidential help is available 24/7. Maine funds its own problem-gambling services and points residents first to 211 Maine.
Primary sources cited throughout this guide.
