28% to 40% GST on Online Gaming — What the Supreme Court Ruling Means for Businesses

For years, the online gaming industry argued that games involving skill — rummy, fantasy sports, certain card games — should be taxed at 18% on the platform's commission (the standard rate for a service), while the department maintained that real-money gaming, regardless of the skill involved, should be taxed at 28% on the full entry amount, treating it similarly to betting and gambling. This dispute produced conflicting High Court rulings and retrospective demand notices running into thousands of crores against major platforms.

The Supreme Court's ruling settled this in the department's favour going forward, confirming that GST on real-money online gaming applies on the full value of consideration (the amount deposited to play), not merely the platform's commission, effectively at a much higher effective tax burden than the industry had been structuring for. The rate itself has since moved further, to 40% for specified categories under the broader GST 2.0 rate rationalisation, reflecting a clear policy stance that real-money gaming should be taxed closer to betting than to an ordinary digital service.

For gaming businesses, the ruling's implications extend beyond gaming: it reinforces how the department and courts approach the underlying legal characterisation of a transaction over its commercial framing, which matters for many industries structuring transactions around GST-favourable categorisation. It also leaves open real questions for platforms about the retrospective demands issued before the ruling, which remain contested in many cases even after the prospective position was settled.

Businesses in gaming, betting-adjacent, or any sector where the GST rate depends on how a transaction is legally characterised should treat this ruling as a signal to review their own positions now, rather than waiting for a similar dispute to reach their doorstep. Our GST & Tax practice advises on GST classification disputes and represents clients where the department's characterisation of a transaction is being contested.