US Virgin Islands Sports Betting: History, Current Laws, and What’s Next in 2026

The US Virgin Islands has a strange distinction in American gambling: it’s a U.S. territory with legal casinos, a legal online gaming law that’s been on the books since 2001, and yet still no regulated sports betting of any kind. If you’re sitting on a beach in St. Croix or St. Thomas wondering whether you can legally bet on the game, the honest answer is more complicated than a simple yes or no. Here’s the full picture of how the USVI got here, what’s actually legal today, and why a territory that’s been talking about sports betting for years still hasn’t managed to launch it.

Gambling in the USVI Didn’t Start With Sports Betting

To understand where sports betting stands in the Virgin Islands, it helps to know how gambling got legalized there in the first place. The territory’s modern gambling framework traces back to the Virgin Islands Casino and Resort Control Act of 1995, passed specifically to stimulate the economy of St. Croix, the largest of the territory’s three main islands. That law created the Virgin Islands Casino Control Commission and opened the door to licensed land-based casinos, which is why properties like the Divi Carina Bay Casino & Resort in Christiansted have been operating legally since the late 1990s.

A few years later, the territory tried to get ahead of the curve on internet gambling. In 2001, lawmakers passed the Virgin Islands Internet Gaming and Internet Gambling Act, an ambitious attempt to position the USVI as a licensing hub for online gambling operators. It didn’t go smoothly. In 2004, the U.S. Department of Justice warned the territorial government that hosting internet gambling sites could run afoul of federal law, effectively freezing the industry before it ever got off the ground. The legal cloud didn’t fully clear until 2011, when the DOJ revised its interpretation of the federal Wire Act to say it applied specifically to sports betting rather than gambling generally, opening the door for other forms of intrastate online gaming. By 2013, the territory’s 2001 law was confirmed legal, and the USVI was technically open for online gaming business again — though in practice, very little commercial activity ever developed around it.

Sports betting has followed its own separate, slower track. When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the federal ban on sports wagering in 2018’s Murphy v. NCAA, it opened the door for all fifty states and U.S. territories to write their own sports betting laws. Most states moved quickly. The USVI did not. Lawmakers and casino industry stakeholders have periodically expressed interest in adding sports betting to the territory’s existing casino framework, reasoning that a licensed sportsbook could simply be layered onto casinos that already exist, but no bill has actually made it into law.

What’s Actually Legal in the USVI Today

As of 2026, the plain answer is that regulated sports betting does not exist in the US Virgin Islands, whether online or in person. There are no licensed retail sportsbooks anywhere in the territory, and there’s no USVI-based mobile betting app you can download. The Virgin Islands Casino Control Commission regulates land-based casino gaming under the 1995 Act, but that law simply doesn’t address sports wagering specifically, which leaves the activity in a kind of undefined space rather than clearly legal or clearly outlawed.

What residents and visitors can do legally is bet through offshore sportsbooks — platforms licensed in other jurisdictions outside U.S. regulation. Because there’s no territorial law explicitly criminalizing online sports betting through an offshore operator, and no local regulator with jurisdiction over sites based elsewhere, this has become the default option for anyone in the USVI who wants to bet on sports. These offshore books tend to be mobile-friendly, accept cryptocurrency for faster deposits and withdrawals, and don’t require any app download since they run through a mobile browser. It’s worth being clear-eyed about what this means, though: offshore sportsbooks aren’t licensed or regulated by the United States or the territory, so none of the consumer protections, dispute-resolution processes, or responsible-gambling requirements that come with a properly regulated market apply to them.

A handful of other gambling activities are similarly available in a legal gray zone or fully legal status:

• Land-based casino gaming — Fully legal and regulated. The territory’s licensed casinos, concentrated mostly on St. Croix, offer slot machines and table games under Casino Control Commission oversight.
• Daily fantasy sports — There’s no law explicitly banning DFS play, but there are also no USVI-based platforms, so residents rely on the same national DFS apps used across the mainland U.S., such as DraftKings and FanDuel.
• Horse and greyhound racing — Unlike many U.S. states, the USVI does not permit off-track betting or wagering on horse or dog racing in any form.
• Lottery — The territory participates in the Multi-State Lottery Association, making it one of the smaller members of that shared lottery system.

United States Virgin Islands – Where Can I Bet on Sports Today?

Why Hasn’t the USVI Legalized Sports Betting Yet?

Part of the answer is simply scale. The USVI has a small resident population, and a territorial legislature has less bandwidth and fewer competing commercial interests pushing hard for a comprehensive sports betting framework compared to a large state. Part of it is also historical baggage — the early 2000s clash with the Department of Justice over online gambling left a lasting impression on how cautiously the territory approaches new gaming legislation.

That said, there’s been renewed momentum recently. Officials from the Virgin Islands Casino Control Commission have held summits bringing together senators, international gaming consultants, and industry experts specifically to talk about modernizing the territory’s gambling laws, with sports betting and online gaming both on the table. Governor Albert Bryan Jr. and other officials have argued publicly that since residents are already gambling informally through offshore sites, the territory might as well build a regulated framework, license operators, collect tax revenue, and create jobs rather than simply watching that activity happen outside its control. As of the most recent public discussions, though, the process remains in the planning and public-engagement stage — proposed amendments still need to be finalized and formally sent to the Legislature before anything resembling a licensed USVI sportsbook could open.

The Bottom Line

The US Virgin Islands sits in an unusual position: a jurisdiction with decades of legal casino gaming experience and a two-decade-old online gambling law, yet still without any dedicated sports betting statute of its own. For now, anyone wanting to legally wager on sports while in the territory is relying on offshore sportsbooks rather than anything licensed by the USVI government. Given the renewed legislative interest and the obvious logic of pairing a sportsbook with casinos that already exist, the territory looks like a good candidate to eventually follow the same path so many U.S. states have taken since 2018. Whether that actually happens in the near term depends on the Legislature turning years of talk into an actual bill — something that, so far, hasn’t happened.

Must be 21+ for casino gambling in the US Virgin Islands. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.