For the full "is it safe, does it pay" verdict, read our 1Win review for South Africa. This page does one narrower job: it unpacks the actual licence 1Win runs on, number 8048/JAZ from Curaçao, and what that piece of paper does and does not do for a punter sitting in Joburg or Durban.
What is a Curaçao 8048/JAZ licence, exactly?
It is a gaming permit issued out of Curaçao, a small Dutch Caribbean island that has licensed online casinos since 1996. The "8048/JAZ" string is the master-licence reference that thousands of offshore casino sites have historically operated under. 1Win is one of them.
The operating company behind the brand is Bettonred Ltd. That is the name you will find in 1Win's footer alongside the licence details, and it is the legal entity your account contract sits with. Worth knowing, because if you ever raise a formal complaint, Bettonred Ltd, not "1Win" as a marketing name, is who you are dealing with.
Here is the honest framing.
A Curaçao licence is real regulation, but it has long been the lighter-touch end of the market compared with the likes of Malta or the UK. It confirms the operator is a registered, licensed gambling company. What it does not promise is the depth of player protection you would get from a tier-one European regulator. It certainly is not a South African licence.
How Curaçao's rules just changed
This is the part most licence pages miss, and it matters for 2026.
For decades Curaçao ran a master-licence system. A handful of master-licence holders sub-licensed to hundreds of casino brands, and oversight of those sub-licensees was thin. Critics, including several European regulators, spent years calling it a rubber stamp.
That model is being retired. Under the Curaçao Gaming Authority (CGA), set up through the island's new National Ordinance for Games of Chance, Curaçao has moved to direct licensing: operators now apply directly to the regulator itself, rather than hiding behind a master-licence reseller. On paper that is a meaningful upgrade in accountability, with stricter due-diligence, anti-money-laundering, plus player-protection requirements attached.
What does the shift mean for you as a player? In theory, an operator licensed under the new regime is easier to hold to account, because there is a named regulator with a public complaints route rather than a chain of shell licences. In practice the CGA is young, and I would not lean on it the way a British player leans on the UKGC. Treat the reform as a step in the right direction, not a finished job.
Checking a licence yourself in five minutes
You do not have to take my word, or 1Win's, for any of this. When a reader asks me how to sanity-check an offshore licence, I walk them through the same routine I use.
- Find the licence claim on the site. Scroll to the footer. A legitimate operator states its licence number and operating company there. 1Win lists Bettonred Ltd and its Curaçao credentials.
- Look for a clickable seal. Newer Curaçao licences carry a verification badge that links through to the regulator's own register. A seal that is just a static image, linking nowhere, is a soft warning sign.
- Cross-check the entity name. The company in the footer should match the company named in the terms and conditions and on the licence record. A mismatch is the classic tell of a cloned or fly-by-night site.
- Search the regulator's public database for the licence number or company. The CGA and its predecessor keep records you can query.
- Watch the URL. Copycat domains riding on a big brand's name are common in the casino space. Make sure you are on the real 1Win domain before you deposit a cent.
None of these steps is hard. Skipping them is how people end up on a mirror site that looks identical and pays out nothing.
Offshore licence versus a South African bookmaker licence
This is the comparison that actually decides how protected your money is. It is also where a Curaçao licence and a South African one part company hard.
Every legal online betting brand South Africans use holds a provincial bookmaker licence, not a national one. Betway is licensed by the Western Cape Gambling and Racing Board. Hollywoodbets holds a Mpumalanga Economic Regulator licence plus several other provincial boards. Those operators sit inside the South African regulatory perimeter, which means a local body can be phoned, emailed, even formally complained to. 1Win's Curaçao licence sits entirely outside that perimeter.
| Operator | Licensing body | Regulated inside South Africa? | Player recourse if a dispute goes wrong |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1Win (Bettonred Ltd) | Curaçao 8048/JAZ, moving to Curaçao Gaming Authority direct licence | No, offshore | Operator's own support first, then the Curaçao regulator |
| Betway | Western Cape Gambling and Racing Board (bookmaker) | Yes | The provincial board, a body you can approach locally |
| Hollywoodbets | Mpumalanga Economic Regulator, plus 5 other provincial boards | Yes | Multiple provincial boards |
| Supabets | SA provincial bookmaker licence | Yes | Its licensing provincial board |
| Sunbet | SA provincial bookmaker licence | Yes | Its licensing provincial board |
| Offshore casino (typical) | Curaçao / Anjouan / similar | No | Operator, then the offshore regulator, if one responds |
One nuance the table flattens: the locally licensed books offer casino-style slots under a fixed-odds betting workaround, and that interpretation is contested in the SA courts. So "regulated inside South Africa" applies cleanly to their sportsbooks; their slot products sit on shakier legal ground. 1Win, by contrast, is a straight offshore casino and makes no claim to a local licence at all.
What recourse do you have in practice?
Be realistic here. Because 1Win is not licensed by a provincial board, you cannot escalate a dispute to a South African regulator the way you could with Hollywoodbets.
Your first channel is 1Win's own support, which is chat-based. In my experience it is quick on everyday queries but slower once money is on the table. Keep every transaction reference, plus a screenshot. If that fails, the next rung is a complaint to the Curaçao regulator that issued the licence, using the entity name Bettonred Ltd and the 8048/JAZ reference. Third-party mediation sites that handle casino complaints are a further option, though they carry no legal force.
That is genuinely thinner protection than a locally licensed book gives you. It is the single biggest practical limit of the offshore model, and it is why, before I recommend any offshore operator, I test whether it pays out with my own money rather than trusting the licence alone.
Watch-outs with an offshore licence
None of these makes 1Win a bad actor. They are the practical trade-offs of playing on any Curaçao-licensed site, and you should go in knowing them.
- No local regulator to escalate to. A payout or bonus dispute stays between you and the operator, then Curaçao. That is a longer, less certain road than a provincial board.
- The reform is new. The Curaçao Gaming Authority's direct-licensing regime is a genuine improvement, but it is young and largely untested in real disputes.
- Mirror sites exist. Big offshore brands attract copycat domains. Verify the URL and the footer entity before depositing, every time.
- The licence covers the company, not the odds. A licence confirms 1Win is a registered gambling business. It says nothing about game fairness margins or bonus wagering terms, which you judge separately. The money side has its own write-up: how deposits and payouts behave.
How I checked this
I pulled the licence details straight off 1Win's live footer on a South African connection, confirmed the operating entity reads as Bettonred Ltd, then matched the licence number against the Curaçao regime as it stands in 2026. The reform details come from Curaçao's published National Ordinance plus the Curaçao Gaming Authority's own material, not from 1Win's marketing.
Two caveats. Licence suffixes and operating-entity registrations change, so re-check the footer yourself before you deposit. And the CGA transition is still rolling out, meaning the exact status of any single operator's direct licence can shift month to month. Where I could not confirm a competitor's figure, I have marked it as such above rather than guess.
Frequently asked questions
Is 1Win licensed?
Yes. 1Win holds a Curaçao gaming licence, number 8048/JAZ, with the platform operated by Bettonred Ltd. It is an offshore licence, not a South African provincial one, so the oversight sits in Curaçao rather than with a local board.
What is the 1Win Curaçao license and who verifies it?
It is a gaming permit from Curaçao, historically issued under the 8048/JAZ master-licence and now moving to direct licensing under the Curaçao Gaming Authority. You can verify it by checking 1Win's footer for the Bettonred Ltd entity and licence number, then cross-referencing the regulator's public register.
How do I do a 1Win license verification myself?
Scroll to the site footer for the licence number and operating company, look for a clickable regulator seal rather than a static image, confirm the entity name matches the terms and conditions, and search the Curaçao register for the licence. It takes about five minutes.
Is the 1Win licence the same as a South African one?
No. Betway and Hollywoodbets hold South African provincial bookmaker licences and are regulated inside the country. 1Win's Curaçao licence sits offshore, so you cannot escalate a dispute to a South African provincial board the way you could with a local operator.
What can I do if 1Win refuses a payout?
Start with 1Win's own support and keep every transaction reference. If that fails, complain to the Curaçao regulator using the Bettonred Ltd entity and the 8048/JAZ number. There is no South African regulator to escalate to, which is the main limit of an offshore licence.
Sources
- Curaçao Gaming Authority official site, where the public licence register lives. Search it for Bettonred Ltd or the 8048/JAZ reference and you can repeat the verification steps from this page in a couple of minutes.
- Gambling in South Africa background, the legal backdrop I relied on for the offshore-versus-local comparison, including why SA bookmaker permits are issued by provincial boards rather than one national regulator.
- National Gambling Board of South Africa, the umbrella body above those provincial boards. Its site is a quick way to confirm that no offshore casino, 1Win included, appears on any local licence list.
Anyone uneasy about their play can reach the South African Responsible Gambling Foundation free on 0800 006 008, whatever the hour.