1xCasino Sister Sites

Who actually owns the brand, which casinos share its licence rather than just its software, and how to verify any of them against a regulator's own register before a single New Zealand dollar goes in.

✓ Ownership traced ✓ Licence checker below ✓ NZ$ accounts only ✓ 1 Dec 2026 explained
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By Emma Williams, Payments & licensing editor Published Updated Checked

Why New Zealanders Go Looking for Alternatives

"Sister sites" is one of those phrases that means something quite specific and gets used for something much vaguer. Properly, a sister site is a casino run by the same company under the same licence — same terms, same payment processing, same verification team, usually the same support scripts with a different logo on top. Loosely, people use it to mean "a casino that looks and feels like this one", which normally just means it runs on the same white-label software.

The distinction matters more than it sounds. If a brand is a true sister site, then a dispute, a frozen account or a verification problem at one is likely to play out identically at the other, because the same team handles both. If it only shares the platform, the interface will feel familiar but the operator, the licence, the payout policy and the person reading your complaint are all different.

Most people arrive at this question for one of four reasons: a payment method has stopped working, the welcome offer has already been used, they want a different mix of game suppliers, or — increasingly through 2026 — they want to know which brands intend to apply for a New Zealand licence before the December deadline. That last one is new, and it is the only one that will still matter next year.

Who Owns 1xCasino

1xCasino belongs to the family of brands built around 1xBet, operated through 1xCorp N.V. and licensed in Curaçao. That is the operator you are actually contracting with when you register, and it is the entity named in the terms and conditions — worth reading, because the operating company on the paperwork is frequently not the name on the front door.

The group's structure is not unusual for offshore gambling. A licensed operating company sits at the centre, several consumer-facing brands sit on top of it, and a wider network of partner and franchise sites uses the same software under separate ownership. From the outside these three layers look alike. From the inside, only the middle layer shares your account terms.

For a New Zealand player the practical consequence is simple. Your counterparty is a Curaçao-licensed company, your dispute route runs through the Curaçao regulator, and no New Zealand agency currently has jurisdiction over the transaction. The Department of Internal Affairs regulates gambling in New Zealand — Lotto NZ and TAB NZ are the only operators permitted to offer online gambling from here — and until the new licensing regime bites, offshore casinos sit outside that perimeter.

1xCasino sister sites card comparing operator, licence and New Zealand status

Same operator, reported relative, or unrelated and domestic — three different things

Operating company

1xCorp N.V.

Named in the terms; the entity you contract with.

Licence

Curaçao

Issued and supervised by the Curaçao Gaming Authority.

NZ licence

None yet exists

DIA regime opens under the 2026 Act; no register is live.

Rules That Apply Across the Whole Group

These carry over from brand to brand within the group. Learn them once and they save you a surprise on every other site in it.

One account per person, per brand

Duplicate detection matches on name, date of birth, address, device fingerprint and card. Two accounts on one brand is a forfeiture; the same offer claimed across several brands from one household tends to freeze all of them at once.

Verification does not transfer

Verified on one brand does not mean verified on the next. You upload the same driver licence and the same address document again, and the NZ$4,000 lifetime threshold restarts per brand.

Wagering terms are near-identical

35x on the deposit-match bonus, 60x on free-spin winnings, maximum bet capped while a bonus is live. The numbers move a little between brands; the structure does not.

Same payment rails, same first-withdrawal rule

The deposit method must be refunded first. Paysafecard is deposit-only everywhere in the group. Limits and timings match the ones on our payments page closely.

Self-exclusion is per brand

This is the important one. Excluding yourself from one site does not exclude you from its sisters. If you are using self-exclusion as a control, apply it everywhere and pair it with a bank-level gambling block, which does cover all of them at once.

One dispute route

Complaints escalate to the same licensing authority regardless of which brand you were playing on. Moving to a sister site after a dispute rarely gets you a different answer.

True Sister Sites: Same Operator, Same Licence

These are the brands that sit under the same operating company and licence as 1xCasino. Register on one and everything you learned about verification, wagering and payouts on the other carries across almost unchanged.

1xBet Casino

Same operator

The flagship of the group and the largest of the brands by some distance. Sportsbook-led, with the casino built alongside it, which means a much wider betting site offering wrapped around a very similar game lobby. Same Curaçao licence, same operating company, same payment rails. If you want more sport and the same casino, this is the straightforward move.

1xBet Casino regional editions

Same operator

The group runs country-specific front ends with local currency and local payment menus. They are the same product underneath — the difference is which deposit methods appear and which promotions are shown. A New Zealand player is served the NZ$ menu described on our minimum deposit page regardless of which regional door you come in through.

Melbet

Widely reported as related

Repeatedly reported across the industry as sharing origins and infrastructure with the 1xBet group, and the family resemblance in interface, terms wording and promotion structure is hard to miss. The corporate link is not something either brand advertises, so treat it as a strong pattern rather than a confirmed fact — and check the licence number in the footer yourself using the tool below.

Corporate relationships in offshore gambling are deliberately hard to trace and change without announcement. Everything above is stated as of 1 September 2026; verify the licence in the footer of any site before depositing.

Same Platform, Different Operator

A far larger set of casinos will feel like 1xCasino without being related to it at all. The offshore market is built on a handful of white-label platforms, so the same lobby layout, the same supplier grid and the same cashier flow turn up under dozens of unconnected brands. Players recognise the furniture and assume common ownership. It is usually not there.

How to tell the difference in thirty seconds: scroll to the footer and read the operating company name and licence number, not the brand. Two sites with the same operating company are sisters. Two sites with different operating companies and an identical interface simply bought the same software. The second kind can be perfectly good, but nothing you know about the first kind's payout behaviour transfers to it.

The tell that most reliably separates them is the terms and conditions. Genuine sister sites share whole paragraphs verbatim, right down to punctuation, because the legal text is written once and reused. Platform-only relatives have their own wording under a familiar-looking interface.

A quick heuristic: open the terms on both sites and search for an unusual phrase from one in the other. If it appears word for word, you are looking at sister sites. If the clause exists but is written differently, you are looking at two customers of the same software vendor.

Licence Checker

Pick a brand to see which regulator supervises it, where its public register lives, and what its New Zealand status is. Everything here points you at a regulator's own site — never trust a licence badge that is only an image.

New Zealand status

Supervising regulator

Where to verify

The checker points at regulators' own registers. It does not store or transmit anything you select.

Five Options Side by Side

Brand Relationship Regulator NZ$ accounts Best for
1xCasinoThe site in questionCuraçaoYesPokies-first players wanting fast e-wallet payouts
1xBet CasinoSame operatorCuraçaoYesAnyone who also bets on sport
MelbetReported as relatedCuraçaoYesA second welcome offer, with duplicate rules in mind
TAB NZUnrelated, domesticDIA, New ZealandYesEnforceable NZ consumer protection; racing and sport, not pokies
Lotto NZUnrelated, domesticDIA, New ZealandYesLow-frequency play with money staying in the community

The two domestic entries are included deliberately. They are not sister sites; they are the only online gambling operators actually licensed in New Zealand today.

What Changed Since Last Year

Item Was (2025) Now (2026)
NZ legal positionOffshore play unregulated, no licensing pathOnline Casino Gambling Act 2026 in force
Licence applicationsNot possibleEOI opened July 2026, applications close October
Licences availableNoneUp to 15, allocated by auction
Unlicensed operatorsFree to advertise offshoreMust cease serving NZ from 1 Dec 2026
Curaçao licensingMaster/sub-licence systemDirect licensing with a public register

When Looking for a Sister Site Is the Wrong Move

You self-excluded and are looking for a way around it

Self-exclusion does not carry across brands, which makes a sister site the path of least resistance at exactly the wrong moment. If that is why you are reading this page, stop and put a bank-level gambling block on your cards instead — that one does cover every site at once. Free, confidential support is available on 0800 654 655, any hour.

Your account was closed after a dispute

The same compliance team reviews the sister brands, so opening an account elsewhere in the group usually ends the same way — often with the new balance frozen too. Escalate through the regulator instead.

You want a second welcome bonus from one household

Duplicate detection reads device fingerprints and payment instruments, not just names. Two people at one address with two genuinely separate accounts and cards is fine; the same person twice is not, and the outcome is forfeiture on both.

You wanted a New Zealand-regulated casino

No sister site can give you that, because it does not exist yet for anyone. If enforceable New Zealand consumer protection is the requirement, the honest answer today is TAB NZ or Lotto NZ — different products, but genuinely regulated from here.

Sister Site Questions

What are 1xCasino sister sites?
A sister site is a casino run by the same company under the same licence, so it shares terms, payment processing, verification and support. 1xCasino sits in the group built around the 1xBet brand, operated through 1xCorp N.V. under a Curaçao licence. Brands that only share the software platform are a different thing and are listed separately on this page.
Does 1xCasino have a New Zealand licence?
No, and neither does any other online casino at the time of writing. New Zealand has never issued online casino licences to private operators. The Department of Internal Affairs opened expressions of interest for the first fifteen licences in July 2026 under the Online Casino Gambling Act 2026, with applications closing in October and a 1 December 2026 cut-off for unlicensed operators.
Are 1xCasino sister sites safe to use from New Zealand?
They carry the same offshore licence and the same protections as 1xCasino itself, which means the regulator is Curaçao rather than a New Zealand body. Disputes go to the licensing authority, not to the DIA, and New Zealand consumer law offers you very little practical leverage against an offshore operator.
Why do players look for 1xCasino alternatives?
The three most common reasons are a country or payment restriction, a bonus that has already been claimed once and cannot be claimed again, and a preference for a different game supplier mix. A fourth reason is becoming more common in 2026: players want to know which brands intend to apply for a New Zealand licence and which do not.
Do sister sites share the same account and bonus?
No. Each brand needs its own registration and its own verification, and each welcome offer can be claimed once per brand. What is shared is the back-office: the same payment processors, the same verification documents requirement, the same support scripts and often the same terms wording, almost word for word.
Can I claim the welcome bonus on every sister site?
Usually once per brand per person, but group-wide duplicate detection is real. Operators match on name, date of birth, address, device fingerprint and payment instrument. Claiming the same offer across several brands from one household is the fastest way to have all of the accounts frozen at once.
How do I check a casino licence from New Zealand?
Find the licence number in the site footer, then look it up in the issuing regulator's own public register rather than trusting the badge on the page. The Curacao Gaming Authority and the Malta Gaming Authority both publish searchable registers. A footer badge that is an image rather than a link to a register entry is worth nothing.
What happens to these brands on 1 December 2026?
Under the Online Casino Gambling Act 2026 an operator without a New Zealand licence or an approved exemption must stop offering online casino gambling to New Zealand residents from that date, with geoblocking and fines up to NZ$5 million as enforcement. Whether individual offshore brands comply, exit quietly or contest it is not yet clear, which is a good reason not to leave a large balance sitting in any of them.

Check the Licence, Then Decide

Whichever brand you land on, read the operating company in the footer and look the number up in the regulator's own register first.

18+. Gamble responsibly. Free, confidential help at gamblinghelpline.co.nz or 0800 654 655.