A new push to ban smoking inside Las Vegas casinos started making the rounds this week, complete with the kind of headline-friendly statistic: 86% of casino patrons supposedly prefer smoke-free casinos.
There is just one fairly important problem.
Viral Push to Ban Smoking in Las Vegas Casinos Is Built on a Survey That Wasn’t Actually About Las Vegas
The survey being waved around as evidence of what casino customers want was not a Las Vegas visitor survey. It was not conducted by the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. It was not a random survey of people walking out of Bellagio, Caesars Palace or Wynn. And the publicly released results do not even tell us how many of the people surveyed were Las Vegas visitors.
Yet somehow that number has now morphed into an argument that Las Vegas itself is behind the times and needs to start banning smoking from casino floors.
That is a pretty big leap — a leap pushed by the same idiotic influencers who are pushing the “Vegas is Dead” campaign and seem to hate what made our city great!
They Hate the Sin City Image!
The latest version of the argument came from Vegas Uncomped, which published an article on September 14 titled, “Why Does Vegas Still Builds Casino Floors for Smokers?” The article opens by pointing out that 9.1% of American adults currently smoke cigarettes before declaring that “the number that matters more” is a survey of 2,136 casino patrons in which 86% said they were nonsmokers and 86% said they preferred smoke-free casinos.
Those numbers exist. What they actually prove is another question.
The 86% Survey Was Produced By People Campaigning for Smoke-Free Casinos
The survey was released in 2024 by so-called casino influencer Brian Christopher in partnership with the American Nonsmokers’ Rights Foundation. Their press release proudly announced that 86% of casino visitors preferred smoke-free casinos and that 86% were nonsmokers.
When advocacy research is being used to justify changing public policy in Las Vegas, readers deserve to know who conducted it and what it actually measured.
The publicly released survey information does not provide a Las Vegas-specific sample. It does not tell us how many respondents regularly gamble on the Strip. It does not provide a Nevada breakdown. It does not show us whether the respondents resemble the tens of millions of people who actually visit Las Vegas every year.
It is a survey of casino patrons being presented in a much broader public argument as if Las Vegas gamblers themselves voted 86% to 14%.
They didn’t.
There is another problem with the numbers. The 9.1% figure being used to show how supposedly tiny the smoking population has become measures current cigarette smoking among American adults. The CDC separately reports that 6.7% of American adults currently use electronic cigarettes. You cannot simply add those numbers because some people use both, but you also cannot compare a cigarettes-only national statistic with a casino survey whose tobacco category included cigarettes, cigars, e-cigarettes and vaping and pretend they are measuring exactly the same thing.
That is not a small distinction when your entire argument begins with the claim that almost nobody smokes anymore.
We Actually Have Research Conducted Inside Las Vegas Casinos
There has been research that actually went onto Nevada casino floors and counted gamblers.
A University of Nevada, Reno study published in the peer-reviewed journal Tobacco Control observed more than 14,000 gamblers in Las Vegas, Reno/Sparks and Lake Tahoe. Researchers estimated that 20.3% of Las Vegas gamblers were smokers at the time of the study.
The research is old. It was published in 2008, and cigarette smoking has declined substantially since then, so nobody should pretend that 20.3% represents the Las Vegas casino floor in 2026.
But there is an important difference between that research and the number now going viral: researchers actually went into Nevada casinos and observed gamblers.
The study also found that the smoking rate among Las Vegas gamblers was roughly comparable to the national smoking rate at the time. Interestingly, the researchers themselves argued that their findings weakened the casino industry’s claim that gamblers smoked at dramatically higher rates than everybody else.
But notice what the study did not establish: that the percentage of customers who smoke equals the percentage of gaming revenue produced by smokers.
Those are two completely different questions.
Smokers are worth more Revenue! Sorry, Sin City Haters, But SIN sells!
This is where the entire argument starts getting overly simplistic. Even if we accept the claim that only 14% of casino customers smoke, that number by itself tells us almost nothing about what those customers are worth to a casino. What percentage of slot handle comes from smokers? What percentage of table-game drop? How frequently do they gamble, how long do they stay at the machines or tables, and how much does the average smoking customer spend compared with a nonsmoker? Most importantly, what happens to that gambling time when the customer has to leave the casino floor every time he or she wants a cigarette?
Those are the numbers casino executives actually care about. Casinos don’t pay employees, taxes and electric bills based on the percentage of people who checked a box on an online survey saying they would prefer cleaner air. They care about gaming revenue, time on device, repeat visits and how changes to the casino environment affect customer behavior.
There is at least some research suggesting that distinction matters. The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis examined what happened after Illinois banned smoking on commercial casino floors in 2008. After attempting to account for economic conditions, existing trends, regulatory changes and seasonality, researchers estimated that the ban was associated with a 20% to 22% decline in casino revenue and about a 12% decline in casino admissions. They estimated the affected casinos lost more than $400 million in gaming revenue.
That does not mean Las Vegas would automatically experience a 20% revenue collapse if Nevada banned casino smoking tomorrow. Las Vegas is a very different market, and subsequent research looking at smoking restrictions has produced mixed results. But it absolutely raises a legitimate business question that cannot be dismissed simply by pointing out that smokers represent a minority of the population.
The St. Louis Fed analysis also cited previous research suggesting smokers gambled on more days and spent more money gambling than nonsmokers, describing smoking and gambling as what economists call complementary activities. That gets us much closer to the question casinos actually need answered. It isn’t simply how many gamblers smoke; it is how valuable those customers are and whether forcing them to repeatedly leave the gaming floor changes how long they gamble or how much money they spend.
An online poll asking people whether they prefer smoke-free air does not answer any of those questions.
In fact, the percentage of casino customers who smoke also tells us very little about their economic value. The 2008 Atlantic City Visitor Profile Study found smokers spent an average of $655 per visit gambling compared with $497 for nonsmokers, a 32% difference, while total trip spending was $981 versus $796. A later casino-industry analysis estimated smokers represented roughly 21% of Atlantic City casino visitors but generated between 26.1% and 31.3% of gaming revenue. The same analysis found slot-machine win per unit in smoking sections was reportedly 33% to 91% higher than in nonsmoking sections, and one operator reported table-game revenue 72% higher in its smoking section than from comparable games with the same rules and limits.
Park MGM Doesn’t Prove What People Keep Claiming It Proves
The other talking point constantly thrown around in this debate is Park MGM. The property became the Strip’s first completely smoke-free casino resort in 2020, and advocates routinely point to it as proof that eliminating smoking has no negative effect on casino business.
Maybe Park MGM is doing incredibly well as a smoke-free resort. It may have carved out exactly the right niche and attracted customers who specifically choose it because they don’t want to deal with cigarette smoke. The problem is that people outside MGM don’t actually have the property-level financial information necessary to prove the broader claim being made.
MGM Resorts reports Park MGM as part of its much larger Las Vegas Strip Resorts business, alongside Bellagio, Aria, Cosmopolitan, MGM Grand, Mandalay Bay, Luxor, New York-New York, Excalibur and other operations. MGM reported $8.44 billion in Las Vegas Strip resort revenue for 2025, but it does not break out Park MGM’s individual gaming revenue and profitability in a way that lets the public compare the property’s performance before and after the smoking change.
There is also an obvious question that rarely makes it into these viral discussions. Park MGM has been smoke-free since 2020, yet six years later MGM has not converted Bellagio, Aria, MGM Grand, Mandalay Bay, Luxor, New York-New York or Excalibur into completely smoke-free properties. Caesars has not converted its entire Las Vegas portfolio, and neither have Wynn, Venetian or Resorts World.
That doesn’t prove those casino companies are making the right decision, but it is hard to ignore the fact that these companies possess enormously more customer information than anyone conducting an online opinion poll. They know exactly how much their players gamble, how often they visit, where they stay, what games they play and how valuable different customer segments are.
If the business case really were as simple as “86% of casino customers want smoke-free casinos,” you would expect the companies sitting on all of that actual player data to be racing one another to capture that supposedly overwhelming demand. So far, they aren’t.
Nevada and California Made Very Different Choices
There is also a much larger cultural argument underneath this debate that gets ignored when everything is reduced to a couple of survey percentages. California and Nevada made very different choices about how government should regulate smoking inside adult-oriented businesses, and those differences reflect two very different approaches to regulation.
California became the first state in the country to prohibit smoking in nearly every workplace and indoor public space. Its statewide workplace restrictions took effect in 1995 and were later expanded to bars, taverns and gaming clubs in 1998. California regulators were so aggressive about the issue that the state became known as “America’s Non-Smoking Section.”
Nevada chose a different approach. The Nevada Clean Indoor Air Act prohibits smoking in restaurants, stores, movie theaters, government buildings and most workplaces, but state law specifically exempts casino gaming areas where minors are prohibited. At the same time, Nevada law allows individual casino operators to establish nonsmoking areas or make their entire property smoke-free if they believe that is what their customers want.
That gives the market room to serve different people. Park MGM can operate as a completely smoke-free casino. Another resort can allow smoking throughout much of its gaming floor, while another can expand nonsmoking sections and let customers choose where they want to play. Casino owners can decide what environment makes sense for their business, and customers can decide which casino deserves their money.
That is very different from the argument now being pushed by smoking-ban advocates. The issue isn’t whether smoke-free casinos should be allowed to exist, because they already do. The fight is about whether every casino in Nevada should eventually be forced into the same model regardless of what individual operators or their customers want.
Supporters of a statewide prohibition understandably focus on employee health and exposure to secondhand smoke. There is legitimate medical evidence behind those concerns, including research measuring substantially higher particulate levels inside Las Vegas casinos that permit smoking compared with smoke-free gaming environments. Nobody needs to pretend cigarette smoke is healthy in order to question whether a government mandate is the only possible answer.
That is where the larger Vegas culture argument enters the picture. Critics of a ban see another attempt to push Nevada toward the California model, where lawmakers and regulators increasingly decide what adults can and cannot do inside private businesses. You can acknowledge the health concerns surrounding secondhand smoke and still believe there is a separate question about who should ultimately make that decision.
The Never-Ending Attempt to Clean Up Sin City
Smoking is really only one part of a much bigger argument about what Las Vegas is supposed to become. For years there has been a steady push by the moral-left and religious right (along with the Californians who came here to escape the state) to clean up, sanitize and repackage a city whose entire international reputation was built on being a little less restrained than everywhere else.
People complain about the gambling. They complain about drinking, showgirls, marijuana, loud nightclubs, sexually suggestive advertising, the characters on Fremont Street, bachelor parties and just about every other piece of the culture that made Las Vegas different from a suburban entertainment district. Taken individually, people can make arguments for or against every one of those things. Taken together, however, you start seeing a larger question about whether Las Vegas is slowly being stripped of the very identity people traveled here to experience.
There has always been a moralistic element surrounding gambling and casino culture. Even the St. Louis Fed noted in its analysis of smoking bans that gambling’s reputation as a “sinful activity” tends to attract additional political scrutiny. The modern public-health argument adds another layer to that fight, with supporters viewing smoking restrictions as basic worker protection while critics see the continued sanitization of a city that became famous precisely because adults were allowed to make choices that might not be allowed back home.
That is a debate worth having honestly. What isn’t honest is pretending one side has already won because an advocacy survey managed to produce an 86% number.
There is another claim floating around that is even easier to deal with: the suggestion that the whole “Sin City” argument is outdated because nobody really calls Las Vegas that anymore. — that’s exactly what this so-called influencer is screaming in his X Feed. But the funny thing is, Vegas Uncomped may want to check its own website before making that argument. Its About page currently says the publication is for people who want “the real Sin City,” and the same publication has repeatedly used the nickname in its own headlines and articles.
Nevada’s official tourism website still uses the term as well, including a description of Fremont Street as the place “where Sin City all began.” The nickname obviously still exists, and apparently even some of the people arguing that nobody uses it anymore continue using it themselves.
Maybe Let Las Vegas Be Las Vegas
None of this requires pretending cigarette smoke is harmless. It isn’t, and trying to make that argument would only distract from the much stronger questions surrounding the proposed policy. The real issue is whether a national advocacy survey of 2,136 casino patrons, with no published Las Vegas-specific results, should suddenly be treated as proof that Las Vegas visitors overwhelmingly want the government to eliminate smoking from every casino floor in Nevada.
That survey is not an LVCVA visitor study, and it doesn’t tell us what percentage of Las Vegas gaming revenue comes from smokers. It doesn’t tell us how valuable those customers are, whether they gamble longer, whether they visit more frequently or what happens to gaming revenue when they repeatedly leave the floor to smoke. Those are pretty important pieces of information if you’re going to use an online poll to justify changing the rules for one of Nevada’s largest industries.
The good news is that Nevada already has a way to test the market. People who want a completely smoke-free Strip casino can stay and gamble at Park MGM. Other properties offer nonsmoking gaming areas, while traditional casino floors continue to permit smoking under existing Nevada law. Individual companies can make their own decisions, and customers can vote with their wallets.
That arrangement reflects something Las Vegas once understood better than almost anywhere else in America: not every place has to be designed for every person. Las Vegas became an international destination because it offered something different. It was louder, later, stranger, less judgmental and far more adult than the places tourists were leaving behind for the weekend.
There is a serious discussion to be had about secondhand smoke and the casino employees who work around it every day. There is also a serious discussion to be had about how far government should go in regulating adult businesses when smoke-free alternatives already exist and every casino operator in Nevada already has the ability to prohibit smoking voluntarily.
What we shouldn’t do is pretend that argument has already been settled by an 86% statistic pulled from a survey that wasn’t designed to tell us what Las Vegas visitors actually want. If we’re going to start rewriting the rules for Sin City, we should probably demand better evidence than that.
What’s next? Ban Drinking? Ban Gaming?
