The role of gambling in the student cost of living crisis

Overdrafts, Klarna and student loans have quietly become a part of everyday life at university. There is always something that has a cost. Rent. Food. Travel. Socialising. And it keeps rising. Food prices outpace maintenance loans. Rent takes most of what you have before you have even arrived. Nights out, needed to fit in and find friendships, can cost the same as a fortnight of groceries. The money comes in and goes straight back out again. There is little room to breathe.

For many students, gambling is becoming more attractive than ever, and the reasons why are not hard to understand.

When money feels tight, gambling does not always feel like a risk. Instead, it feels like an option. A solution even. It stops being entertainment and becomes tied to something heavier, the pressure to keep your head above water. And that pressure does not exist in a vacuum. Advertising makes gambling feel normal, even aspirational. Influencers promote betting apps, free-to-play games quietly mirror real gambling mechanics, and offers are dressed up as fun rather than risk.

The line between entertainment and gambling has been deliberately blurred. When money feels limited, the idea of making more, and making more quickly, looks appealing. That feeling is reinforced socially too. Peer pressure creeps in through group chats, casual bets with friends, the sense that everyone else is winning. Nobody talks about their losses. And when you are already stretched thin, that can be all it takes.

It is rarely about chasing huge, life-changing wins. It is smaller than that. Quieter. Covering rent. Paying for food. Being able to say yes to plans instead of no. In that context, a small bet does not feel reckless. It feels manageable. Even rational.

Financial stress and mental health are deeply connected, and gambling can exploit that space in a way that feels, at first, like relief. A moment where you feel like you are doing something about the problem rather than being trapped inside it. But that feeling does not last, and it does not resolve anything. It just delays it, often at a cost.

Prices fluctuate. Expectations stretch. What used to feel affordable for previous generations now feels like a distant dream. The ground keeps shifting. And when everything feels uncertain, turning to something as unpredictable as gambling does not feel completely out of place. It just feels logical. Because gambling has been woven into everyday life in a way previous generations never experienced. Marketed constantly, embedded in sport, entertainment and social media, normalised to the point where it barely registers as a risk.

The dangers are rarely front and centre. What is visible are the wins, the promotions, the suggestion that this is just another everyday activity. Students are navigating this landscape already under financial and social pressure, often without the support to recognise how those external forces are shaping their choices. That is not a personal failing. It is by design.

What’s worse is that the pressure is never steady. It just builds and tightens its grip. At the start of term, it’s deposits, rent, course materials, high costs all at once. Then mid-term comes and the money starts to run low, but nothing else slows down. Social pressures creep in, Freshers, holidays, big events, and the expectation to keep up does not ease. My own summer ball is £85 a ticket. By the end of term, finances are stretched thin, waiting for the next maintenance loan that will slip through just as easily as the next rent instalment falls due.

And all the while, the marketing does not stop. The promotions keep coming, the normalised noise of betting and quick wins sitting quietly in the background, ready to catch you at your most vulnerable.

So it is little wonder that in those moments, gambling can feel like a way out. A quick fix. A bridge across the gap. Not a risk, but a solution.