Licensed inside and outside the EEA
EU casinos without a Swedish licence: how to see where an operator is licensed
A licence from an EU or EEA country is issued by a European gambling authority and stands in its register. Here is how to find out where an operator is licensed and registered, and where the licences in our ranking come from.
An EU casino without a Swedish licence means an operator whose gambling licence comes from an authority in an EU or EEA country. The question comes up when foreign operators are compared, and the answer sits in the register of the authority that issued the licence. In our ranking, Curaçao and Anjouan are the licensing countries that appear, and both lie outside the EEA.
This page explains what an EEA licence is, how to tell the licensing country from the country of the company, and how to check the entry yourself. The examples come from the operators in our comparison with fact boxes.
What an EEA licence is
The EEA consists of the EU member states plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. Gambling is regulated country by country, so there is no common European gambling licence. Each country has its own gambling authority, its own licence types and its own register of licence holders.
An EEA licence therefore means that an authority in one of those countries has examined the company and entered it in its register. Malta is the country most often named in this connection, and how the Maltese register works, together with those of Curaçao and Anjouan, is described on the page about the licence registers and their entries.
The practical value lies in traceability. A licence inside the EEA stands in a public register with the holder's name and status, and the authority has an address in Europe you can write to. The same kind of check can be made for licences outside the EEA, but then in a register in the Caribbean or the Indian Ocean.
Licensing country and company country are two different entries
The commonest confusion concerns where the company is registered and where the licence comes from. A company name carrying B.V., N.V., SRL or Ltd says something about the company form but nothing about which authority granted the gambling licence.
The operators in the ranking show how the entries can drift apart:
- Wild Fortune is run by Metlait SRL. Clause 1.1 of the terms names a licence from Tobique with the number 0000064, while the Anjouan register lists the same company under ALSI-202509073-FI2.
- Metaspins gives the company 3-102-959384 SRL as operator and prints an Anjouan number in the terms. In the Curaçao register one finds Metaspins N.V. instead, licence OGL/2024/1063/0437.
- Wild.io: the certificate is made out to Nonce Gaming B.V., while the contracting party in the terms is called Stack Gaming Ltd.
- Rocketpot prints 1668/JAZ as a registration number in clause 1.2 and as a licence in the footer. At our two readings of the Curaçao portal, on 12 and 13 September 2026, the number carried the status “not valid”.
None of these combinations is odd in itself. A company can be registered in one place, hold a licence in another and run several brands under the same number. But anyone looking for a European licence finds several countries and companies in these cases, and none of the licensing countries lies inside the EEA.
How to recognise one
You do not have to guess from logos or seals in a footer. Follow these steps instead, in this order:
- Find the number and the authority. They usually stand in the footer and in the first clause of the terms. Note exactly what it says and where.
- Recognise the form. In our list the Curaçao licences take the form OGL followed by a year and a serial number, the Anjouan ones the form ALSI followed by digits. A licence inside the EEA carries a number from that country's authority.
- Search in the authority's register. In the Curaçao portal cert.cga.cw it is the domain or the company name that gives a hit, not the number. The Anjouan register lists company, status, dates and domains.
- Compare the holder with the contracting party. The company in the register should be the same company the terms give. Where it is not, as at Wild.io, you have two entries to weigh.
- Read the status and the expiry date. A licence can be active, invalid or about to expire. Wild Fortune's Anjouan licence runs to 29 September 2026.
- Check that the domain is listed. On 12 September 2026 Vave's certificate in Curaçao listed the domain vavegame.com, but not vave.com.
If you get stuck at one of the steps, for instance because the register does not find the domain, ask the operator in writing before you deposit. A link to the certificate or a clause number in the answer weighs more than an assurance in a chat window.
The addresses of the registers and the dates we read them are gathered under sources with dates of reading.
Where the ranking's licences come from
Of the licences in the material for the ranking, none was issued inside the EEA. Curaçao dominates: Vave (Latcas B.V.), Bitcasino.io (Moon Technologies B.V.), Shuffle.com (Natural Nine B.V.), Bitsler (Oyine N.V.), Jack.com (Data Link Digital B.V.) and Wild.io (Nonce Gaming B.V.) hold certificates there, and Thunderpick's number OGL/2024/677/0722 stands as active in the register.
Anjouan is the other licensing country. Wild Fortune stands in the Anjouan register, and Wolfbet prints the number ALSI-132405048-FI3 in its terms. Metaspins belongs to both groups, with an Anjouan number in the terms and a Curaçao certificate in the register. Rainbet publishes no number, and clause 21.6 names the body Gaming Services Provider N.V.
This is a description of the list as it stands today, not a rule. Should an operator licensed inside the EEA enter the list, the number is checked in that country's register in the same way as we do with Curaçao and Anjouan.
If you want to find a European-licensed operator yourself, the same six steps apply. The difference is that the register then sits with a European authority, and that the number carries that country's form instead of OGL or ALSI. The company in the register still has to be the same as the contracting party in the terms, and the domain still has to appear in the entry. How the five criteria are applied is described in our method step by step.
What the licensing country affects in practice
The licensing country decides which authority you turn to when a case with the operator gets stuck. If the operator holds a licence from Curaçao it is the Curaçao Gaming Authority; if it comes from Anjouan it is the island's licensing authority. Keep the holder's name and the licence number before you deposit.
Bear in mind that terms change, too. Read the date or the version at the top of the document and keep a copy of the version you accepted when you opened the account. That text is what you cite if a case goes on to the authority, and it makes it easier to show what applied at a given moment.
What the licensing country does not decide is what the terms say about your identity check, your withdrawals or your bonus. That stands in the operator's own clauses. Bitcasino.io writes out 2,500 € as the amount for documents (cl. 6.6), Vave reserves the right to check identity before every payout (cl. 8.7), and Rocketpot gives 30 calendar days for the documents (cl. 12.2), even though all three point to Curaçao.
What the operators themselves publish about getting a win paid out has a walkthrough of its own under payouts and the terms behind them.
Anyone who wants to see how the licence works together with cashier, bonus and withdrawals will find the whole picture in our practical guide to foreign operators. The registers also differ in method between jurisdictions, which is gone through in the walkthrough of new foreign operators.