Casinos in Ireland

There are a number of casinos in Ireland, and no prizes for guessing that Dublin has the most casinos. Clusters are also present in towns such as Cork and Galway, with a handful of other venues scattered across the country. You can find a map of casinos in Ireland, below along with information on games, opening times and dining options.

Note: Unlike our racecourse guides (we have them for both horses and dogs), you might notice that Northern Ireland has been excluded from the list. That’s simply because there are no casinos in NI.

Map of Irish Casinos

Full List of Casinos

An Overview of Casinos in Ireland

The island of Ireland is known for a wealth of different things, from whiskey and Guinness, through to luck and the colour green. What you might not be all that quick to associate the country with is gambling and, more specifically, visiting a casino. That is down to the fact that there are strict laws in Ireland when it comes to gambling, especially around the notion of land-based casinos. In fact, the current law in Ireland is such that casinos are, in and of themselves, illegal. That doesn’t mean that any visit to Ireland will be devoid of the ability to head to a land-based casino in order to place a bet or two. Instead, it’s all about joining a club.

That is thanks to the fact that there is something of a cunning way around the laws regarding casinos in Ireland, which says that they are only allowed to operate if they are members-only clubs. Gambling activities are legal in members-only clubs, which has resulted in around a dozen such venues opening across the Republic of Ireland. The majority of those are, somewhat unsurprisingly, located in Dublin, which is the country’s capital. Just because they are members-only venues doesn’t mean you should be shy about heading along to one, however. It is easy and quick to join, as well as being free in most of them.

The Gambling Control Bill

Things in Ireland are due to change. In 2013, the Gambling Control Bill was introduced with the aim of replacing previously outdated gambling laws. The only problem is that the Bill has to get parliamentary approval, which is a whole other issue.

In terms of casinos, the number of licences that can be issued for such a venue in Ireland is limited to 40. Each of the casinos that can open once the Bill passes is limited to having 15 tables and 25 gaming machines, whilst no provision has been made in order to allow for a so-called ‘SuperCasino’. That means Ireland becoming the Las Vegas of Europe is unlikely any time soon.

What the Casinos Are Like

When the Gambling Control Bill becomes law, the reality of casinos in Ireland is likely to change a touch. At the time of writing, however, the reality is that casinos on the Emerald Isle tend to be much smaller than a lot of their European counterparts. There is often a feeling of exclusivity in place too, in spite of the fact that membership is usually free and easy to obtain. Just because they are smaller, don’t think that that means that you won’t still be greeted with all of the games and enjoyment that you’ve come to expect from casinos the land over; roulette, blackjack and slot machines are just as commonplace as you want them to be.

Ned Kelly’s Sports Club and Casino in Dublin is arguably a quintessential example of Ireland’s casino offerings. It is more of a generic entertainment hub than the casinos you might be more used to spending time in in England, America and other locations. As well as roulette tables and digital slots, there are also pool and snooker tables on offer, as well as big screen TVs showing live sport if there’s anything good on. The same sort of thing can be said about the Sporting Emporium Casino, also in Dublin, which has a name that tells you everything that you need to know in terms of where the focus of things is aimed.

Card Rooms

One of the things that is even more prevalent in Ireland than casinos is the presence of card rooms. Sometimes these are attached to a casino, whilst other times they are a card room in their own right. That is because playing poker alongside other punters is very popular in Ireland, so there are numerous venues that are there to cater to just that level of popularity. If that is something that you’re interested in then you’re unlikely to have to look too far before you find somewhere that will cater to your card playing whims, with poker put pretty high on the list of priorities when it comes to what the card rooms will offer.

Even if a casino doesn’t have a card room, you are still likely to find yourself in a position whereby you will be able to play video poker, amongst other things. Again, that is down to the popularity of poker in a general sense, seeing Ireland’s various gambling locations offer the likes of Texas Hold’em and other varieties of the game regularly. It doesn’t really matter which of the major cities you find yourself in, options such as Timeout Casino and Card Club in Limerick are going to be available for you to turn to in order to get your poker fix. Look for the words ‘card room’ in a description and you can’t go too far wrong.

Ireland’s Closed Casinos

The passing of the Gaming and Lotteries (Amendment) Act in 2019 is likely to see more and more casinos close down around Ireland. In 2006, the Irish Times reported that as many as 20 clubs in Dublin feared being shut down as a result of a proposal put forward by Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell. Of course, we know now that that didn’t happen, but it is a sign of the kind of thing that is a constant threat to Ireland, dangling like the sword of Damocles over the heads of the casino operators. One such casino that did eventually shut down was Fitzwilliam Card Club in Dublin, resulting in 80 people losing their jobs.

The private members-only club in the centre of the city closed its doors for the final time on the 16th of December 2019, declaring that part of the Gaming and Lotteries (Amendment) Act effectively barred it from being allowed to operate. Within five years, reports began to emerge of fears in cities like Cork of casinos popping up all over the place, but in 2019 the fears of the casinos parent company, The Golden Horseshoe Ltd, were that the law was written in such a way that it would be impossible for the Fitzwilliam Card Club to continue to operate, with pleas put forward to the lawmakers sadly falling on deaf ears.