Cambodia Border Casinos

Main locations: Poipet, Sihanoukville and the border towns

Southeast Asia's border casinos are mostly a Cambodian story. The country's licensed casinos are concentrated in a handful of places, above all Poipet and Sihanoukville¹. Poipet sits directly opposite Aranyaprathet in Thailand, and its whole reason for existing is the border crossing: Thais walk or drive across, play, and go home the same day. Sihanoukville, on the coast, grew into a much larger casino city, drawing Chinese visitors in particular during the 2010s and retaining a big venue base even after China's travel and enforcement pressure cut the flow.

Beyond those two, the map is a string of border towns. Here is the practical picture:

The venues themselves range from full resorts to modest gaming halls. Queenco Casino, for example, offers Baccarat, Blackjack and Roulette plus slot machines⁵. Larger integrated resorts elsewhere in the region, such as Hoiana in central Vietnam, spread across Sicbo, Baccarat, Roulette, Pai Gow and poker variants⁶, and the pattern is similar at the bigger border properties: table games aimed at Asian players, with Baccarat dominating the floor. If you are new to the games themselves, our pages on baccarat rules, blackjack rules and sic bo rules cover how each one works.

Who uses them: foreign day-trippers and local players

The border casino business model is simple: put the casino where the customers are not allowed to have one.

• Thai players cross into Poipet because casinos are illegal in Thailand.
• Vietnamese players cross into Bavet and Ha Tien because Vietnam only recently and narrowly opened its own casinos to locals.
• Chinese visitors historically flew into Sihanoukville because gambling is illegal in mainland China.

The day-tripper is the core customer. In Poipet you can park on the Thai side, walk across, and be at a table within minutes. Thai players at offshore online sites often deposit and withdraw in their native THB⁴, and the same currency logic applies on the ground: border casinos take Thai baht, Vietnamese dong, US dollars and Chinese yuan, and many quote limits in more than one currency. Our page on buying and cashing chips explains how casino cages handle multiple currencies.

Foreigners are the guests these venues are built for. In Vietnam, gambling is straightforward and legal at any of the 9 licensed casinos for foreigners aged 21 and over with an original passport, and there is no entry fee⁷. The Grand Ho Tram, on Vietnam's southern coast, states its casino is available to both international and Vietnam-based foreign guests⁸. Corona Casino on Phu Quoc boasts over 100 Baccarat tables⁹. The same foreigners-only pattern repeats across the region, from Korea's foreigners-only casino floors to Singapore, where foreigners enter the casino free of charge while citizens and permanent residents pay an entry levy and use a separate lane marked "Singapore/PR"¹⁰.

Local players are the exception, not the rule. Vietnam ran a three-year pilot scheme allowing Vietnamese locals to gamble at two locations, the first in Van Don and the other on Phu Quoc¹², with financial eligibility checks attached; authorities have sought higher entry fees for locals to simplify verifying that eligibility¹³. Everywhere else in Vietnam, and everywhere in Cambodia, locals are excluded from the gaming floor.

Cambodian citizens are not allowed to play in the casinos

Cambodia's casinos are legally for foreigners and tourists only. Regulated gaming venues in the country allow foreigners and tourists to gamble, but Cambodian citizens are not permitted to play². The minimum age for legal casino gambling in Cambodia is 18².

In practice, this is enforced at the door rather than on the street. Ha Tien Vegas, for example, describes itself as a casino catering only to foreign passport holders and says it may request your passport and visa in line with Cambodia's gambling regulations¹⁴. If you are a Cambodian resident reading this, the practical point is simple: a foreign passport is what gets you in, and a Cambodian one does not.

The online side is closed too. Cambodia has no regulated online casinos, not only for residents but for anyone who finds themselves in Cambodia². Some Cambodians play on foreign-licensed sites anyway; this can constitute illegal gambling, though authorities rarely bother prosecuting locals for it². Enforcement of the Law on Suppression of Gambling has historically been uneven, and laws are not heavily enforced against players². The risk is low but not zero, and there is no local regulator to turn to if a site refuses to pay you.

Online gambling at casinos: the suspension and what it covers

The biggest change to hit this sector in years: Prime Minister Hun Manet announced that all online gambling operations at land-based casinos will be suspended starting early October 2026, in order to combat technology-based fraud. That includes the live dealer streaming studios that many Cambodian casinos had built, where dealers in casino studios beam games to players online. The regulator is preparing a new casino license renewal framework to strengthen the sector, and the shutdown of live dealer streaming was requested by the prime minister himself over risks linked to online gambling.

The background is the fraud crackdown. The inspection that found 72 of 195 licensed casinos involved in online fraud was presented to the cabinet by Senior Minister Chhay Sinarith, with Hun Manet calling it important progress. The next phase will scrutinize the remaining licensed casinos, with stronger inspection at casino sites and action against venues suspected of involvement in online scams and gambling. Authorities are also investigating around 30 subsidiaries of Prince Group, a firm identified by several jurisdictions as linked to scams.

What does this mean for a visitor? The physical casinos are not closing; the suspension targets the online operations attached to them. If you cross into Poipet or Bavet, the tables and slots should still be running. What is disappearing is the hybrid business, the streaming floors and online platforms, that had grown inside many casino buildings. It also means the number of venues will keep shrinking: Hun Manet has raised the capital requirement for operating a casino to up to $100 million, noting that in the past a small building could open a gambling area, and has called the current tally of more than 100 casinos excessive.

Bavet: nearly a dozen casinos on the Vietnamese border

Bavet is the purest example of a border casino town. Nearly a dozen casinos stand along the Vietnamese border crossing, all serving essentially the same customer: the Vietnamese day-tripper. Vietnam legalized brick-and-mortar casinos in pursuit of economic stabilization, but locals were banned from land-based casinos for over a decade before being allowed in, and even now access is limited to the two pilot locations with financial eligibility checks¹³.

So the demand spills across the border. Decree 03/2017/ND-CP allows foreigners and overseas Vietnamese situated abroad with a valid foreign passport to gamble at Vietnam's casinos¹⁵, and the same decree opened the door to the pilot scheme for locals¹². But for the ordinary Vietnamese resident who does not meet the pilot's financial conditions, or who lives closer to Svay Rieng than to Van Don, Bavet is the practical option. Most of Vietnam's licensed casinos mainly serve foreigners and overseas Vietnamese holding valid passports³, which leaves a large local audience with nowhere to play at home.

The venues in Bavet are modest compared with Sihanoukville or the integrated resorts of Singapore and Macau. Think gaming halls with Baccarat tables, slots and a restaurant, rather than shopping malls and theaters. Stakes tend to be lower than in the big-city casinos, which is part of the appeal for day-trippers. Our page on casino table minimums and maximum bets in Asia gives a sense of how limits vary between the region's gambling hubs and its border halls.

The same logic explains Ha Tien Vegas, a few hours south on the coast. It is located in Prek Chak, Kampot province, near the Cambodian-Vietnam international border, and is easily accessible for both local and international visitors¹⁶. It markets itself as an ideal destination for players from both countries¹⁷, and its game guides center on Baccarat, roulette and similar table staples¹⁸.

What a first visit is like

If you are crossing a border to play for the first time, here is what to expect.

Documents. Bring your passport. Every casino in Cambodia checks it, and Ha Tien Vegas says it may request your passport and visa under Cambodia's gambling regulations¹⁴. In Vietnam, foreigners need an original passport, must be 21 or older, and pay no entry fee⁷.

Dress. Casual at most border venues; shorts and sandals are generally fine, though our page on casino dress codes in Asia covers where stricter rules apply.

Money. Border casinos deal in multiple currencies, and the cage will exchange your baht, dong or yuan for chips. Thai-oriented venues price games in THB, Vietnamese-facing ones in dong or dollars. Tipping practice varies; see our guide to tipping dealers in Asian casinos.

Games. The Asian standard. Baccarat dominates, as it does across the region, with over 100 Baccarat tables at Corona Casino Phu Quoc alone⁹. Roulette, Blackjack, Sicbo and slots fill out the floor, as at Queenco⁵ and Hoiana⁶. Poker has a foothold too: Sands Poker Club markets itself as a poker house in Poipet¹⁹. If you want to compare the odds you are getting, our house edge comparison covers the main games.

Photography. Usually restricted on the floor, and phone use at tables is frowned on everywhere; our page on casino photography and phone rules has the details.

The legal risk when you go home

The border casino exists because gambling is restricted on one side of the border. That restriction follows you home.

For Chinese citizens, the risk is the most serious. As the Ministry of Public Security puts it, participating in cross-border gambling, whether committed inside or outside the border, is "a criminal and illegal act that public security organs will crack down on severely according to law"²⁰. Players caught up in cross-border gambling cases face administrative penalties of detention and fines under the Public Security Administration Punishments Law, and criminal liability if a crime is constituted, besides possible large property losses²¹. A Chinese national who crosses into a Cambodian or Myanmar border casino is, in the eyes of the authorities at home, participating in cross-border gambling.

For Thais, the position is different in kind. Gambling is illegal in Thailand, and the country is in the process of building a legal casino framework of its own; draft rules already contemplate an entry levy charged to foreigners, passport checks and facial recognition for identity verification at casino entrances²². Until that framework is live, a Thai who plays in Poipet has broken Thai law in spirit by crossing specifically to gamble, but the practical risk has historically been at the venue, not at home. Thailand does not prosecute returning day-trippers in any systematic way.

For Vietnamese, the calculus is about access rather than punishment. Vietnam's own casinos are open to foreigners and, narrowly, to locals at the two pilot locations¹². A Vietnamese resident crossing into Bavet to play is not tracked and prosecuted in the way Chinese cross-border gamblers are, but the activity sits outside Vietnam's legal framework, and the pilot scheme's financial eligibility rules exist precisely because the state treats local gambling as something to be managed.

For everyone, the online piece is the sharpest edge. Cambodia's suspension of online gambling at casinos removes one category of site, but unlicensed offshore operators are not bound by any of these rules, and no self-exclusion or regulator protection reaches them²³. If you gamble online from a country where it is illegal, you have no recourse when something goes wrong. Our country guides, including can I gamble in Cambodia?, can I gamble in Thailand?, can I gamble in Vietnam? and can I gamble in China?, set out each home country's position in full.