About this site
A shortlist, not a shop window
Reel Shortlist exists because choosing a first online casino in Britain means wading through directories of two hundred near-identical entries. We keep five, review them properly, and date every claim.
Independent, and funded openly
This site is an independent comparison and review resource. It is not a casino, not a bookmaker, and not a regulator. No operator listed here owns any part of it, and it holds no connection to the UK Gambling Commission beyond citing the Commission's public register — the same register any reader can search.
The funding model is affiliate commission: when a visitor opens an operator's site through one of our links and registers, the operator may pay us. That payment comes from the operator's marketing budget, never from the player, and it never changes a verdict. Our affiliate disclosure and editorial policy describe the separation in detail; the short version is that the money and the words are handled as two different jobs.
Material on this site is produced by the site's own editorial desk. We publish no invented bylines, no stock-photo "team", and no testimonials — if you see a claim here, it is either checkable or it is clearly framed as our judgement.
What Reel Shortlist does not do
- No games. Nothing on this site can be played. We host no slots, no tables, no demos.
- No bets, no accounts. You cannot register, log in or wager here. Gambling happens on operators' sites under their licences, not ours.
- No money handling. We process no deposits, hold no player funds and are not a party to any transaction between you and an operator.
- No operator support. Problems with a casino account, a bonus or a game go to that operator — and, unresolved, to its ADR body. We can't intervene, though we do want to hear about the experience for our reviews.
What we do: compare five UKGC-licensed operators on twelve criteria, re-check the entries monthly, link every licence claim to the public register, and keep safer-gambling resources one click from every page. If that sounds narrow, it is — deliberately.
Questions about the site itself? The contact page explains what we can and cannot help with.