Michigan

Last verified September 27, 2026

By the Legal Sportsbooks US editorial team

Michigan

Online and retail

Legal since

March 2020 (retail); January 22, 2021 (online)

Minimum age

21 (18 for daily fantasy)

Regulator

Michigan Gaming Control Board

Licensed apps

13 online sportsbooks

State law

MCL 432.401 et seq. (Lawful Sports Betting Act, 2019 PA 149)

Is sports betting legal in Michigan?

Yes, in person and online. The Lawful Sports Betting Act, Public Act 149 of 2019, was signed December 20, 2019. Detroit casinos took the first legal bets on March 11, 2020, and online betting started January 22, 2021. Bettors must be 21, and every sportsbook runs under a license tied to a Detroit commercial casino or a Michigan tribe.

Where you can bet

The Michigan Gaming Control Board (MGCB) reported that 15 commercial and tribal operators were authorized for online casino games or sports betting as of August 2026, and 13 of them offered online sports betting. Online handle that month was $330.5 million, with $24.2 million in adjusted gross receipts.

Each app is attached to one licensee. On the MGCB's platform list, BetMGM runs under MGM Grand Detroit, FanDuel under MotorCity Casino, DraftKings under the Bay Mills Indian Community, BetRivers under the Little River Band of Ottawa Indians, Fanatics under the Lac Vieux Desert Band and Caesars under the Grand Traverse Band. FireKeepers and Four Winds run tribal-branded books. On April 17, 2026, the board approved bet365 as the platform for the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, replacing PokerStars.

For in-person bets, the three Detroit casinos (MGM Grand Detroit, MotorCity and Greektown) have sportsbooks, and so do tribal casinos around the state.

How Michigan legalized sports betting

Tribal compacts and the Detroit casinos

Casino gaming in Michigan started on tribal land. Governor John Engler negotiated 20-year compacts under the federal Indian Gaming Regulatory Act with 11 tribes in the 1990s. The first compacts date to 1993. Four more tribes signed in January 1997, and the Legislature approved those compacts by House Concurrent Resolution 115 in 1998. Under the compacts, tribes agreed to pay 8% of electronic gaming revenue to the Michigan Strategic Fund and 2% to local governments.

Detroit's commercial casinos needed a statewide vote. Voters passed Proposal E on November 5, 1996, 1,878,542 to 1,768,156 (51.51%). It enacted the Michigan Gaming Control and Revenue Act (Initiated Law 1 of 1996), which allowed up to three casinos in Detroit, and the Legislature amended it through Public Act 69 of 1997, effective July 17, 1997. The act makes running an unlicensed gambling operation a felony carrying up to 10 years in prison, a $100,000 fine, or both.

On November 2, 2004, voters approved Proposal 04-1, 2,689,448 to 1,926,721. It amended Article IV, Section 41 of the state constitution to require statewide and local voter approval for any gambling authorized after January 1, 2004, with exemptions for tribal gaming and the three Detroit casinos. The 2019 sports betting law limits licenses to those two groups.

The 2019 gaming package

Rep. Brandt Iden introduced House Bill 4916 on September 4, 2019. The House passed it 63 to 45 on October 30. The Senate passed a substitute 35 to 3 on December 11, and the House concurred 100 to 8 the same day. Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed it on December 20, 2019, with immediate effect, as Public Act 149. The Lawful Internet Gaming Act (Public Act 152) and the Fantasy Contests Consumer Protection Act (Public Act 157) were enacted with it and also took effect that day.

The act gives the MGCB jurisdiction over internet sports betting. Commercial operators pay 8.4% of adjusted gross sports betting receipts, and Detroit may add a 1.25% municipal services fee on its casinos. Tribes pay the state 8.4% of their online sports betting receipts. The 8.4% tax is split 30% to the host city, 65% to the state's internet sports betting fund and 5% to the equine industry fund, with anything over $3 million a year in the equine share going to the state fund. The fund sends $1 million a year to compulsive gaming prevention and up to $7 million to the Christopher R. Slezak first responder presumed coverage fund.

Launch dates

MGM Grand Detroit and Greektown opened sportsbooks at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, March 11, 2020, and MotorCity followed the next day. The pandemic closed casinos soon after. Online betting waited for the MGCB's rules, which Whitmer had told regulators not to rush through with emergency rulemaking. Mobile apps went live at noon on Friday, January 22, 2021, with up to 10 sportsbooks eligible that day, among them BetMGM, DraftKings, FanDuel, BetRivers and William Hill.

Amendments and tax fights

The 8.4% rate hasn't changed since 2019. Public Act 141 of 2024 (Senate Bill 933), effective April 2, 2025, changed spending for the compulsive gaming prevention fund, and Public Act 94 of 2026 (House Bill 6126), signed September 21, 2026, changed expenditures under sections 15 and 16 of the act.

Whitmer's fiscal 2027 budget, released in February 2026, proposed a fee of 25 cents per bet on each sportsbook's first 20 million wagers a year and 50 cents after that, plus an end to deductions for promotional bets. It also proposed a 36% online casino tier above $185 million in receipts. House Speaker Matt Hall said, "There will be no tax increases in this budget." The House passed its budget without the proposals on April 23, and the Senate dropped them in May.

Enforcement against unlicensed sites

The MGCB polices offshore and sweepstakes operators with cease-and-desist letters. In late 2023 it sent letters to PredictionStrike (October 19), Stake.us (November 2) and VGW's LuckyLand (December 5), and all three took steps to block Michigan players. On April 7, 2026, the board said it had sent orders to 45 offshore operators over the previous four months, including BetOnline.ag and SportsBetting.ag.

Sports betting court cases in Michigan

Taxpayers of Michigan Against Casinos v. State (2004)

A casino opponent group challenged the 1998 approval of four tribal compacts by resolution instead of by bill. On July 30, 2004, the Michigan Supreme Court upheld the approval (471 Mich 306), holding that the compacts are contracts between sovereigns that don't change state law, so the Legislature didn't have to pass a bill.

Michigan v. Bay Mills Indian Community (2014)

Bay Mills opened a casino in 2010 in Vanderbilt, a Lower Peninsula village about 125 miles from its reservation, and Michigan sued. A federal district court closed it with a preliminary injunction, and the Sixth Circuit reversed. On May 27, 2014, the U.S. Supreme Court held 5 to 4, in an opinion by Justice Elena Kagan, that tribal sovereign immunity barred the state's suit (572 U.S. 782).

Nessel v. KalshiEX (Ingham County, No. 26-001087-CZ)

Attorney General Dana Nessel sued KalshiEX LLC in Ingham County Circuit Court in a complaint dated March 3, 2026, on behalf of the People and the MGCB. The suit claims Kalshi's sports event contracts are unlicensed internet sports betting under the LSBA and asks the court to abate a public nuisance. Kalshi removed the case to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan (No. 1:26-cv-731). Judge Paul L. Maloney sent it back to state court on June 25, 2026, and denied the state's request for fees.

Judge Rosemarie E. Aquilina granted a temporary restraining order on June 29, 2026. When the court then directed Kalshi to cancel trades placed by Michigan users, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, on July 14, stayed Kalshi's emergency rule change and ordered it to honor open trades. After an August 17 hearing, Aquilina signed a preliminary injunction on September 1. It bars Kalshi from offering, accepting deposits for, advertising or opening accounts for sports contracts in Michigan, along with functionally similar products such as parlays and prop bets. Kalshi must use an MGCB-licensed geolocation provider and faces a $500,000 fine for each day it fails to geofence properly. The order cites Kalshi's 18-and-over age limit against the state's 21 minimum. It stays in place until a final order, and the case is still pending.

QCX (Polymarket US) and Robinhood v. Nessel

Polymarket's U.S. entity, QCX LLC (No. 1:26-cv-00710), and Robinhood Derivatives (No. 1:26-cv-00730) each sued state officials in the Western District on March 4, 2026, arguing the Commodity Exchange Act preempts Michigan gambling law. Maloney denied Polymarket a temporary restraining order in March, calling the threat of prosecution hypothetical. On June 17 he denied preliminary injunctions to both, finding sports event contracts are likely not "swaps" and that Congress made no clear statement displacing state gambling regulation.

Robinhood's appeal (No. 26-1542) and Polymarket's (No. 26-1552) were consolidated in the Sixth Circuit on July 2. Under a stipulated order Maloney signed on September 4, Robinhood stopped new sports contracts in Michigan on September 9 and must close open positions by October 9, and the state won't bring enforcement actions while it complies. The deal lasts until the Sixth Circuit appeals end or the Kalshi injunction is dissolved.

Coinbase v. Nessel

Coinbase Financial Markets sued in the Eastern District of Michigan on December 18, 2025 (No. 4:25-cv-14092). In August 2026 Judge Shalina D. Kumar denied a preliminary injunction, writing that "Coinbase's averments are, in a word, applesauce" and that compliance with the LSBA is not impossible "simply because it is costly and challenging." Coinbase appealed on August 10 (No. 26-1693).

The Sixth Circuit

Michigan's federal courts sit in the Sixth Circuit, so its rulings bind them. The court heard Kalshi's consolidated appeals from Ohio (KalshiEX v. Schuler, No. 26-3196) and Tennessee (KalshiEX v. Orgel, No. 26-5235) on July 30, 2026. Below, Judge Aleta A. Trauger in Tennessee had granted Kalshi a preliminary injunction on February 19, 2026, while Chief Judge Sarah D. Morrison in Ohio denied one on March 9. The panel (Judges Clay, Gibbons and Bloomekatz) decided both on September 25, 2026: it affirmed the Ohio denial, vacated the Tennessee injunction and sent both cases back to the district courts. We haven't found a ruling yet in the Michigan appeals.

Prediction markets and daily fantasy

As of September 25, 2026, Kalshi is under a state-court order to geofence Michigan and Robinhood has stopped new sports contracts under its September 4 stipulation. Federal judges have refused to shield Polymarket and Coinbase from state enforcement; the court-cases section above has the details. Novig, which operates as Ludlow Exchange, LLC, a CFTC-designated contract market since June 16, 2026, isn't available in Michigan; its eligibility page excludes the state, as it does Nevada and Arizona.

The MGCB licenses paid daily fantasy under the Fantasy Contests Consumer Protection Act, and operators must bar players under 18.

Help with a gambling problem

Michigan Problem Gambling Helpline: call 1-800-270-7117, open 24/7.

Sources

Common questions

How we track and verify state laws

What does Legal Sportsbooks US track?

Every state's legal status, the date betting became legal, the minimum age, the regulator and the licensed apps, plus the legal history and court cases behind them, for all 50 states and Washington, D.C. Our page on how we track and verify state laws explains the details.

What do the statuses mean?

Online and retail means licensed mobile apps and in-person sportsbooks both operate. Online only means betting happens through licensed apps, with no retail sportsbooks. Retail only means you can bet in person at licensed venues, but there's no statewide app. Not legal means no licensed sportsbooks operate. Legislation pending means a bill or ballot measure is moving, but betting hasn't launched. Not yet verified means we haven't confirmed the state's current status.

Can I bet on sports where I live?

The rules follow where you are when you place the bet. Licensed apps use geolocation to confirm you're inside a state where they can operate, and some states limit betting to certain premises. Find your state in the state index, or read our guide to location rules.

How old do you have to be to bet on sports?

It's 21 in 33 of the 40 jurisdictions with legal sports betting and 18 in five: Washington, D.C., Montana, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Wyoming. In North Dakota and Washington, the tribal casino sets the age.

How current is the tracker?

State laws and licenses change, so every state entry records the date it was last verified. If a status looks out of date, the state regulator's website has the official answer.

Is this legal advice?

No. We summarize public information about state sports betting laws. Confirm the rules with your state regulator before you bet, and don't wager more than you can afford to lose.