Is sports betting legal in Delaware?
Yes, and the state runs it. The Delaware Lottery has taken single-game bets at the state's three racino sportsbooks since June 5, 2018, and has offered online betting through one platform, BetRivers, since a soft launch on December 27, 2023. Bettors must be 21. Delaware was the first state outside Nevada to take single-game bets after the Supreme Court decided Murphy v. NCAA.
Where you can bet
Rush Street Interactive (RSI) runs BetRivers for the Lottery. The Lottery picked RSI in August 2023 to replace 888 as its online gaming vendor, for an initial five-year term that can be renewed one year at a time for five more years. The formal launch was January 3, 2024. At sign-up you choose one of the three casinos. Delaware Park and Harrington use the BetRivers app, while Bally's Dover has its own app, Bally Casino by BetRivers. Bets have to be placed from inside the state, and GPS checks your location. FanDuel and DraftKings didn't bid for the contract.
In person, you can bet at Delaware Park, Bally's Dover (formerly Dover Downs) and Harrington Raceway & Casino. Sports Pick retailers, including liquor and convenience stores, sell football parlay cards. In June and July 2026 the Lottery put self-service kiosks in the three casinos and 89 Sports Lottery retailers. The kiosks use a Caesars Sportsbook odds menu, and they take single bets, two-leg parlays, props, same-game parlays and live bets. Lottery director Helene Keeley told Delaware Public Media that revenue was up more than 51% since May.
The statute's definition of the sports lottery covers professional and college events but excludes college games involving a Delaware college or university and games involving a Delaware team.
Delaware takes a share of sportsbook revenue. Under 29 Del. C. § 4815(c), once winners are paid and vendor fees are taken out, the state gets 50% of what the casino books win. Horse racing purses get 10.2% at harness tracks and 9.6% at thoroughbred tracks. The American Gaming Association puts the effective rate at around 40%. Mobile and retail sports betting brought in $34.2 million in 2025, up 38.5% from 2024.
How Delaware legalized sports betting
The lottery amendment and Scoreboard (1972 to 1977)
Article II, Section 17 of the Delaware Constitution bans all gambling except state-run lotteries, charitable lotteries, pari-mutuel betting on horse races at licensed tracks, and bingo. Amendments need a two-thirds vote of the General Assembly in two successive sessions, with an election in between. The lottery exception passed in 1972 and 1973, and the Legislature set up the State Lottery Office in 1974.
For the 1976 NFL season the Lottery sold Scoreboard, which had three games. Football Bonus asked players to pick the winners, with no point spread, in one or both pools of seven games. Touchdown required the winners and point spreads of three to five games. Touchdown II paid fixed prizes of $10 to $1,200 for beating the line on four to twelve games. None of the games let a player bet on a single game. The Third Circuit wrote in 2009 that Delaware ran the scheme for four months in 1976.
PASPA and the 2009 Sports Lottery Act
The federal Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA) banned state-sponsored sports betting from January 1, 1993, with an exception for any scheme a state had conducted between January 1, 1976 and August 31, 1990. Delaware, Montana, Nevada and Oregon were the jurisdictions exempted.
In March 2009 Gov. Jack Markell proposed sports betting and table games, and on March 19 he asked the Delaware Supreme Court whether the plan fit the state constitution. He signed the Sports Lottery Act (H.B. 100) on May 14, 2009. On May 29 the court advised that multi-game betting was constitutional, and it left the question of single-game betting open. Regulations published June 30 would have allowed betting on all professional and college sports, except Delaware teams, starting September 1. The leagues sued in July, and the Third Circuit held that PASPA limited Delaware to parlays on at least three NFL games. The three racinos started taking those parlays at 10 a.m. on September 10, 2009. The Legislature passed the Delaware Gaming Competitiveness Act in 2012, and online casino games launched in 2013.
Murphy and the June 2018 launch
The Supreme Court struck down PASPA on May 14, 2018. The Department of Finance, after consulting the Attorney General's office, concluded that Delaware didn't need a new law, because the 2009 act already allowed betting on professional and college sports. At 1:30 p.m. on Tuesday, June 5, 2018, the three casinos began taking single-game and championship bets on baseball, football, hockey, basketball, soccer, golf and auto racing. Gov. John Carney's $10 bet on the Phillies won.
Going online (2023 to 2024)
The law allowed online betting all along. It wasn't offered until 2023 because of launch costs and pushback from Lottery retailers. State law also requires the Lottery to be run "in a manner which will produce the greatest income for the State," and finance officials worried that mobile betting returns a smaller share of revenue than in-person betting. The Lottery issued a request for proposals in January 2023. A legislative study found that a model with several operators would raise more revenue, but the Lottery went ahead with a single contract. Delaware became the 29th state with mobile sports betting when BetRivers went live.
Sports betting court cases in Delaware
National Football League v. Governor of Delaware (D. Del., 1977)
The NFL and its 28 clubs sued the Governor and the Lottery Director in August 1976 (Civ. A. No. 76-273). On August 11, 1977, Judge Stapleton rejected the league's misappropriation claim. He found that chance is the dominant factor in multi-game football picks, so Scoreboard counted as a lottery under the constitution. On the trademark and unfair competition claims, the only relief was an order to put a clear and conspicuous statement on all Scoreboard materials that the game was not associated with or authorized by the NFL. He also held that Touchdown II's fixed payoffs violated 29 Del. C. §§ 4805(a)(11) and 4815, which required at least 45% of revenue to go to prizes and at least 30% to the state. In the week of December 5, 1976, Touchdown II paid out 70% of what was bet. The citation is 435 F. Supp. 1372.
Opinion of the Justices (Delaware Supreme Court, 1978)
On March 27, 1978, the justices answered questions about a jai-alai bill (385 A.2d 695). The majority advised that pari-mutuel betting on jai-alai was not a permissible state lottery, because the lottery exception has to be read narrowly. It distinguished the NFL case, in part because Scoreboard was sold as lottery tickets and not through a pari-mutuel system. In 2009 the Third Circuit cited this opinion as rejecting the pari-mutuel prize pools used in Football Bonus and Touchdown.
Office of the Commissioner of Baseball v. Markell (3d Cir., 2009)
MLB, the NBA, the NCAA, the NFL and the NHL sued Markell and Lottery Director Wayne Lemons in the District of Delaware on July 24, 2009, arguing that the new law violated PASPA. The district court denied a preliminary injunction on August 5 and explained its reasons in an August 10 order. The leagues appealed (No. 09-3297), and the Third Circuit heard argument on August 24 and ruled on August 31, 2009, in an opinion by Judge Thomas Hardiman joined by Judges McKee and Fuentes, 579 F.3d 293. It held that PASPA's exception covers a scheme only "to the extent" it was actually conducted. Because Delaware conducted only multi-game NFL parlays in 1976, single-game betting and betting on other sports violated federal law. The court vacated the order and sent the case back. The Supreme Court denied Delaware's petition for certiorari on May 3, 2010 (No. 09-914). Murphy ended the PASPA limits in 2018.
KalshiEX, LLC v. Flaherty (3d Cir., 2026)
We found no lawsuit or cease-and-desist letter from Delaware against a prediction market operator, and no operator suit against Delaware officials, as of September 25, 2026. New Jersey's case against Kalshi binds federal courts in Delaware. Kalshi sued New Jersey regulators on March 28, 2025 (D.N.J. No. 1:25-cv-02152) after receiving a cease-and-desist letter, and Judge Edward S. Kiel granted a preliminary injunction. On April 6, 2026, the Third Circuit affirmed, 2 to 1 (No. 25-1922). Judge Porter wrote for himself and Chief Judge Chagares that the Commodity Exchange Act likely preempts New Jersey's gaming law, under both field and conflict preemption, as applied to sports event contracts on a CFTC-designated contract market. Judge Roth dissented. The ruling binds federal courts in Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and the Virgin Islands.
New Jersey filed a petition for certiorari on September 2, 2026, and the Supreme Court docketed it on September 8 as Flaherty v. KalshiEX, LLC, No. 26-299. On September 22 the Clerk extended Kalshi's response deadline from October 8 to November 9, 2026, and the National Council of Legislators from Gaming States filed an amicus brief. The Ninth Circuit ruled the other way on August 28, 2026, in KalshiEX, LLC v. Assad (No. 25-7516), holding that Kalshi hadn't shown the Act likely preempts Nevada's gaming rules as applied to its sports contracts. Delaware Attorney General Kathleen Jennings signed the March 10, 2026 amicus brief of Ohio, New Jersey, 37 other states and the District of Columbia that backed Nevada in that appeal.
Prediction markets and daily fantasy
CBS Sports' state tracker, updated September 24, 2026, says Delaware "has not moved to limit the options offered by prediction markets," and that Kalshi and Polymarket sports contracts are open to residents. Novig (Ludlow Exchange, LLC d/b/a Novig, designated a contract market by the CFTC on June 16, 2026) excludes only Nevada, Arizona and Michigan, so it also takes Delaware traders who are 21 or older and pass ID checks, with no fee on pregame straight trades. The Third Circuit's Flaherty ruling, covered in the court cases section, is binding precedent in the District of Delaware.
For daily fantasy, Action Network's tracker, last updated March 14, 2025, lists traditional contests as available in Delaware and pick'em contests as unavailable.
Help with a gambling problem
The Delaware Council on Gambling Problems runs a helpline at 1-888-850-8888. The Delaware Lottery lists it on every page of its site.
Sources
Delaware Constitution, Article II, Section 17 (lotteries and other gambling)
Delaware Code, Title 29, Chapter 48 (State Lottery), including §§ 4803, 4810 and 4815
National Football League v. Governor of Delaware, 435 F. Supp. 1372 (D. Del. 1977)
Office of the Commissioner of Baseball v. Markell, 579 F.3d 293 (3d Cir. 2009)
Markell v. Office of the Commissioner of Baseball, No. 09-914, certiorari denied (2010)
State of Delaware: Delaware launches full-scale sports gaming (June 2018)
Delaware Business Times: Mobile sports betting launches in Delaware (January 2, 2024)
Legal Sports Report: Delaware sports betting finally moves online with BetRivers launch
Delaware Public Media: Sports betting kiosks are up and running in Delaware
American Gaming Association: Delaware, State of the States 2026
KalshiEX, LLC v. Flaherty, Third Circuit No. 25-1922 (April 6, 2026)
KalshiEX, LLC v. Flaherty, D.N.J. No. 1:25-cv-02152 (docket)
KalshiEX, LLC v. Assad, Ninth Circuit No. 25-7516 (August 28, 2026)
CBS Sports: sports prediction market status in all 50 states