Ontario Self-Exclusion: BetGuard, OLG My PlayBreak and What Each Covers (2026)

BetGuard is Ontario's centralized self-exclusion service, run by iGaming Ontario, an agency of the Government of Ontario, and one registration opts a person out of every regulated online gambling website and app in the province, including OLG's. It is an online program: Ontario's casinos and Charitable Gaming Centres are handled by a separate OLG tool called My PlayBreak.

This guide is general information, current as of August 26, 2026. BetGuard's terms carry an effective date of May 14, 2026 and OLG's My PlayBreak page records a June 11, 2026 modification date, but program terms, durations and contact details can still change. Every program source linked below was read on August 26, 2026; open the official page again before you rely on it.

Two programs, two different jobs

Ontario's official gambling operators publish two voluntary self-exclusion programs with different scopes. BetGuard is run by iGaming Ontario and covers regulated online gambling across the province. My PlayBreak is run by the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation and covers OLG's own channels: its casinos, its Charitable Gaming Centres, and OLG.ca.

The two do not feed each other, and both operators say so in their own words. OLG tells anyone who wants province-wide online coverage that choosing BetGuard means being redirected to create a separate profile there. BetGuard's terms are the mirror image: registering in an operator's or OLG's own program does not register you with BetGuard, and registering with BetGuard does not enrol you in any other program. You may hold both. Neither one arrives because you completed the other.

• BetGuard, from iGaming Ontario — every regulated online gambling website and app in Ontario, including OLG's. Online only.
• My PlayBreak, from OLG — three separate break types: Ontario casinos, Charitable Gaming Centres, or OLG.ca. The casino and Charitable Gaming breaks also reach OLG.ca.
• BetGuard is free and voluntary, and it says registration can be completed only by the person for themselves. OLG describes My PlayBreak as voluntary.

What one BetGuard registration covers

BetGuard's terms describe a single registration process that self-excludes an eligible person from all regulated Operator Websites and OLG iGaming Websites offered in Ontario. Both of those defined terms are websites or apps. An Operator Website is how a company registered with the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario provides igaming under its operating agreement with iGaming Ontario; an OLG iGaming Website is how OLG provides igaming to players in the province.

In practice that is the whole regulated online market at once, including sites that have yet to open. BetGuard's FAQ puts it plainly: when you use BetGuard you opt out of all regulated online gambling websites and apps in Ontario, including any that may launch in the future. The FAQ then lists the operator brands currently covered — seventy-five of them when this guide was written, with OLG among them.

One structural fact is worth understanding before you rely on it. BetGuard maintains the registry and answers operator queries about registration status; it does not implement or enforce the block itself. Its terms state that operators and OLG are responsible for implementing self-exclusion measures on their own sites in accordance with applicable law. iGaming Ontario adds that it makes no warranties about those sites' compliance, and that it does not represent and cannot guarantee that BetGuard will prevent you from gambling. That is the operator's own framing, and it is the reason the later sections of this guide exist.

How to register for BetGuard

Registration happens online, by the person themselves, in one sitting; BetGuard says the setup takes less than five minutes. No existing gambling account is needed. The stated requirements are being 19 or older, a valid government photo ID, a permanent Canadian or U.S. address, a cellphone and an email address.

• Create your BetGuard account. Keep your phone nearby — a verification code confirms the number.
• Confirm your identity with one valid government photo ID. BetGuard lists a driver's licence, passport or passport card, permanent resident card or residency permit, Certificate of Indian Status, or a province or state photo card. It does not accept provincial health cards, and it says your ID is used to verify your information as part of registration and is neither stored nor shared.
• Verify with a facial scan, so use a device with a camera.
• Select how long you want to opt out.
• If you hold accounts with any operator or with OLG, log out of all of them and stay logged out before you complete registration. That one is in BetGuard's terms, not a suggestion.

Nobody can sign you up: BetGuard says opting out is a personal choice that can only be completed by the person for themselves, and it pairs government ID validation, facial recognition and multi-factor identification to keep it that way. If the process itself is the obstacle, an agent will walk you through it step by step — the BetGuard Contact Centre operates in English and French and verifies your identity before it can assist. Its numbers are in the support section below.

How long a term runs, and what happens when it ends

BetGuard's terms currently offer four choices: six months, one year, five years, or a customised term anywhere between six months and five years. You select the term during registration. You can extend at any time, and a renewal replaces and lengthens the original term — you cannot select a renewal shorter than the term you are already serving. Once registered, you cannot revoke, cancel, pause or reduce the term you chose.

A BetGuard term does not lapse on its own. When the term ends, if you do not renew, you remain in the BetGuard Registry for an additional seven-year Extended Protection Period. During those seven years you can renew, or you can complete Reinstatement. If you take no action at all by the end of the seven years, Reinstatement happens automatically and you are no longer centrally self-excluded.

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A term you chose is not the same as a term that ends. In Ontario, doing nothing keeps you registered — for seven more years.

During the Extended Protection Period, returning to play requires an action rather than merely reaching your chosen term date. You become eligible for Reinstatement once your term ends, and you have to complete that process to remove your centrally-self-excluded status before the seven-year period ends. BetGuard says a cooling-off period may sit between completing Reinstatement and being able to play again, without publishing a length, and that each operator and OLG may run a separate process of its own on top of it. If you take no action through the full seven years, Reinstatement occurs automatically. You can log in to BetGuard at any time to see your status and when your term ends.

OLG My PlayBreak: casinos, Charitable Gaming Centres, OLG.ca

My PlayBreak is OLG's own tool, and it is the one that reaches a physical room. OLG describes three break types, each with its own scope. A break from casinos means you will be unable to visit any Ontario Casino or play on OLG.ca for the duration. A break from Charitable Gaming Centres means you will be unable to visit any Charitable Gaming Centre in Ontario or play on OLG.ca. A break from OLG.ca means you will be unable to access your OLG.ca account. OLG adds that anyone registered for the casino or OLG.ca break will also be unable to log in to any OLG Internet Gaming website, and will receive no promotional or marketing communications during the break.

The registration route depends on which break you want. For casinos, call the OLG Support Centre, ask a staff member on-site, or speak to a Service Coordinator at a PlaySmart Centre. For Charitable Gaming, call the Support Centre or ask on-site staff. For OLG.ca, use the My PlayBreak tab under My Account, or call OLG Player Support. Casino and Charitable Gaming registrations include reviewing and agreeing to the terms, an optional check-in call from the Responsible Gambling Council, and having your photo taken; OLG states that during a casino registration your facial image is uploaded to a secure database and used for comparison against faces captured by designated facial-recognition cameras at casinos.

Durations differ by break type. Casino and Charitable Gaming Centre breaks run three months, six months, or one, two, three, four or five years. An OLG.ca break can be as short as one day or one week, then one, two, three or six months, then one to five years.

The ending is documented less precisely than BetGuard's. OLG states that anyone who registered after September 12, 2022 is enrolled in My PlayBreak and can return to play once the term has ended, unless they renew. The same page then presents a return-to-play chart whose casino row involves writing to a Casino Security Manager, introduced by a sentence about people who registered before that date. OLG does not make that boundary explicit, so confirm the return-to-play requirement for your own registration with OLG rather than assuming which cohort you are in. Renewal, by contrast, is prompted: before a casino or Charitable Gaming term ends, OLG says it sends an email or letter with a link to an online renewal form, and an OLG.ca break is renewed by calling Player Support.

What neither program covers

Both operators are direct about the edges, and the honest version is worth reading before you decide the job is finished.

• BetGuard is online only. OLG states it in one line: BetGuard does not cover land-based, in-person casinos.
• BetGuard is bounded to Ontario's regulated market — operators registered with the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario holding an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario, plus OLG's igaming site. Anything outside that regulated set sits outside the registration.
• My PlayBreak is bounded to OLG's own channels. No My PlayBreak option is described as reaching any other regulated Ontario igaming operator.
• Neither program enrols you in the other, in either direction.
• Neither is a device control, a payment control, or a control on another province's market.
• Neither operator claims prevention. iGaming Ontario's terms describe BetGuard as a tool to assist you in taking a break, say it is not a treatment for problem gambling, and say its effectiveness largely depends on you and your own conduct.

That last point is not a criticism of either program. It is the reason people layer. A registration acts at the operator; the categories it does not reach — a device you own, a payment method, another province's regulated market, an ordinary Tuesday night — belong to different tools, or to nobody.

The layers underneath

Self-exclusion is the operator layer, and in Ontario it is the right place to start: it is official, free, and reaches the whole regulated online market through one registration. The other layers are separate, and each does something the operator layer cannot.

• Device layer — software on a specific computer. Check what it supports, who holds the authority to change it, and what the supported way to turn it off is, before you install it.
• Payment layer — ask your own bank, card issuer or payment provider which control it offers, which accounts and payment types it covers, when it takes effect, and how it is reversed.
• People layer — tell someone you trust, if doing so is safe, and treat professional or peer support as its own line of help rather than a backstop.

GuardianBlock is the device layer, for personal, unmanaged Windows 11 Home and Pro x64 PCs, with browser policy and the GuardianBlock browser extension for Chrome, Edge and Firefox. It uses approval by a person rather than a password somebody else holds. Your keyholder — the accountability partner you chose — approves or denies each sensitive change from their own GuardianBlock account, with multi-factor authentication, so there is nothing for them to type on your computer and no reusable code to hand back. Turning protection off is a sequence rather than a setting: you request deactivation, your keyholder decides, a 24-hour cooling-off period runs during which nothing on the PC changes, and only then does a signed, single-use authorization issue for that one device. The full sequence is on the keyholder approval page.

How the operator layer and the device layer differ, and why one is never a substitute for another, is set out in self-exclusion and device blocking, side by side. What GuardianBlock does and does not promise is on the limitations page — read it before setup rather than after. And the version of this guide that covers the rest of the country is How to Block Gambling Sites in Canada.

Where to get support in Ontario

These services are separate from both self-exclusion programs and can be used on their own, whether or not you register for anything. Every program and support detail in the list below was checked on August 26, 2026.

• Support and referral — ConnexOntario connects people to mental health, addiction and gambling support services, free of charge: 1-866-531-2600, or text CONNEX to 247247, or live chat, 24/7. BetGuard and OLG both publish the same contact details on their own pages.
• Program help, not clinical support — the BetGuard Contact Centre answers questions about registration itself, in English or French: 416-479-0008 in the Greater Toronto Area, or 1-833-776-7171 toll-free within Canada and the U.S.
• OLG program help — the OLG Support Centre handles casino and Charitable Gaming breaks at 1-800-387-0098; OLG Player Support handles OLG.ca breaks at 1-855-978-7529, or by chat. Anyone registered for My PlayBreak can opt in to check-in calls from the Responsible Gambling Council.

Emergency help is different. If you or someone else is in immediate danger or needs urgent medical support, call 9-1-1. If you or someone you know is thinking about suicide, call or text 9-8-8; the Public Health Agency of Canada says it is available 24/7 across Canada. 9-8-8 is a suicide crisis service, not a gambling helpline.

If you take one thing from this guide, make it the ending. In Ontario the online program is a single registration that reaches the regulated online market, and reaching your chosen term date does not end the registration. BetGuard keeps you registered during the Extended Protection Period unless you renew or complete Reinstatement; if you take no action for the full seven years, Reinstatement occurs automatically.