F5 Poker. Everything Poker. Always Refreshing.

Pennsylvania lawmakers have filed a bill that would make loss limits compulsory for every online gambling account, rather than leaving players to choose whether to activate protections. House Bill 2879 would require daily and monthly loss limits, set lower caps for people aged 21 to 25, and default accounts to no more than two hours of play in a 24-hour period.

Reps. Tarik Khan and Jamie Flick filed the measure Oct. 21, and it was referred that day to the House Gaming Oversight Committee. The proposal would also limit players to two deposits per day and require an affordability check before an operator accepted more than $5,000 in deposits over 180 days.

The bill would prohibit microbets, VIP and loyalty programs, autoplay features, sign-up and deposit bonuses, and AI-based promotional targeting tied to a player’s losses or problem-gambling risk. It would also restrict advertising aimed at minors and young adults.

For the bill, a microbet would mean a live wager on the outcome of a single play during a game. Its VIP-program restriction would target schemes that provide a player host or reward greater play, deposits or losses.

HB 2879 would amend Title 35, create a restricted account within the Compulsive and Problem Gambling Treatment Fund, and establish an Online Problem Gambling Public Health Task Force. It would impose a 0.75% assessment on online-gaming and sports-betting revenue for prevention, treatment and research overseen by the Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs.

The measure has nine Democratic sponsors and one Republican sponsor, according to the LegiScan tally cited by USPoker. Khan and Flick announced their wider legislative package on June 3, describing it as modeled on bipartisan bills in Pennsylvania and Colorado. The Pennsylvania Problem Gambling Caucus also launched when the bill was introduced; its six members include Khan, Flick, Reps. Danilo Burgos and Ben Sanchez, and Sens. Nick Miller and Joe Picozzi.

The proposal follows a 126-page Joint State Government Commission study released July 13. The study grew out of House Resolution 60 of 2025, which passed the House 189-14 and directed the commission to examine sports betting and interactive gambling, including ways to reduce problem gambling, gambling debt and children’s exposure to gambling advertising.

The commission said lawmakers could ban in-game microbets and restrict VIP programs. It also recommended that players be required to establish limits on losses and duration before playing, instead of merely having the option to set limits. Khan’s office cited findings that 5.7% of online sports bettors accounted for 80% of gambling spending, while the bill text cited a sportsbook where 0.5% of customers, all linked to its VIP program, produced more than 70% of earnings in 2019 and 2020.

HB 2879 would go further than the Pennsylvania Gaming Control Board’s pending Regulation #125-258, which would offer daily, weekly and monthly limits on deposits, number of deposits and total spending for interactive accounts but would let players decide whether to set them. The Independent Regulatory Review Commission’s docket says the board has not yet submitted a final version of that regulation, which updates compulsive and problem-gaming requirements for interactive accounts and self-excluded people.

The reporting on card funding is not fully consistent. RG.org described HB 2879 as barring direct or indirect use of credit cards to fund wagers, while CDC Gaming said that restriction was contained in separate HB 2875. CDC Gaming also identified HB 2874 as a separate measure intended to strengthen protection for people on Pennsylvania’s self-exclusion list.

The bill would arrive in a large regulated market. Pennsylvania legalized online casinos in 2017 and was described by the Associated Press as the largest online-gambling market in the United States. The state recorded $6.7 billion in gambling revenue in 2025, including $602 million from sports wagers, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer.