Poker in Croatia: the Act on Games of Chance, the tax position and online play

Croatia is a licensed market with an enforcement mechanism most people do not expect: the body that polices unauthorised online gambling is the tax authority. Games of chance are governed by the Act on Games of Chance, which the Croatian Tax Administration cites with its full amendment history — Official Gazette nos. 87/09, 35/13, 158/13, 41/14, 143/14 and 114/22 — and the Tax Administration itself holds the power to shut unlicensed online activity down.

That shapes the practical position for a Croatian poker player more than any single licensing rule does.

How Croatia polices unauthorised online gambling

Amendments to the General Tax Act that came into force on 1 January 2019 gave Croatia a tool it did not previously have. Under Article 44, paragraph 3, where an economic activity is provided over the internet while avoiding the requirements set by the special regulation governing that activity — and so gaining an unjustified tax advantage or causing damage that is hard to recover — the competent tax authority may issue an order banning further business operations.

The procedure is set out in detail in Articles 18 to 21 of the Ordinance on the Implementation of the General Tax Act, in force since 4 May 2019. The Tax Administration's own framing of the problem is that the law as it stood did not let the authorities apply in the digital world the measures they could apply in the physical one, and that the amendments were the normative fix for that gap.

For a player, the consequence is straightforward: enforcement in Croatia is aimed at operators, through orders that stop them trading, and an unlicensed site serving Croatian players is operating against a regime that can act on it.

The tax position on winnings

This is where Croatia repays reading the primary source rather than a summary. The Tax Administration's own schedule of taxes on winnings from games of chance is organised by category, and the categories are not treated alike. Under lottery games it lists a monthly fee for operating lottery games and a tax on winnings from lottery games. Under betting games it lists operating fees and a tax on winnings from betting games. Under casino games — the category poker falls into — it lists casino games and the operator's obligations, without a corresponding tax on the player's winnings.

The levy structure also includes a prescribed operator payment to the Croatian Red Cross, alongside fees for slot machine games, occasional one-time games of chance and award games.

We are describing what the schedule sets out, not giving a tax opinion, and tax treatment can turn on facts specific to you. If the answer matters to your own return, put the question to the Tax Administration rather than relying on this page or any other summary.

Live poker, and the Croatian players

Croatia's licensed casino sector is the home of its live poker, and Arena Casino is among the Croatian operators the Tax Administration links from its own casino-games pages. The Croatian money list, which we track separately, is the better guide to how deep the playing population actually runs — it is a stronger list than a country of under four million has any obligation to produce.

This page is general information, not legal or tax advice. It was written on 15 October 2026 from the Croatian Tax Administration's English-language pages on games of chance and on unauthorised online economic activity.