Genting Casino Birmingham Chinatown - Full Review

What This Place Actually Is

I spent a couple of weeks getting a feel for this place - walking the floor at different times and also checking the online side properly. The overall picture is fairly consistent. The casino is at 16/18 Hurst Street, Birmingham, B5 4BN, right in the middle of the Chinatown and Southside area. You are surrounded by restaurants, late-night bars and clubs. So most people drop in as part of a night out rather than making a special trip here and back.

On the gaming floor you get what you would normally see in a regulated UK casino. Slot machines line the main areas, roulette tables run through the evening, blackjack is there, plus jackpot machines next to the live tables. Live dealers start from 13:00. If you come in earlier, the electronic roulette and slots are already live, but the croupiers will not be at the tables yet.

There is a bar and a sit-down restaurant inside the venue. The kitchen usually works from around 18:00 until midnight, which more or less matches the crowd that drifts in from nearby bars and theatres. Several sports screens hang around the room as well. Some nightlife listings even file it under “sports bar”, and to be fair that is not totally wrong. On some nights it feels like a bar, casino and sports venue all running on top of each other.

The Opening Hours Situation Is Genuinely Confusing

This is the one area where I found the most friction while checking details. The official Genting UK page for this venue currently states opening hours as 11:00 to 06:00 every day. Older listings, plus the LinkedIn page linked to Genting Chinatown, still show 24/7 opening. One of the sources even spells out that it used to be a 24-hour casino before the hours were cut back.

Right now, I treat the main Genting site as the version that counts. So: casino doors 11:00 to 06:00, with live table games from 13:00 onward. The restaurant window is shorter, roughly 18:00 to midnight. The bar and sports screens seem to follow their own slightly flexible timetable and nobody really publishes this clearly anywhere.

If you are going to travel in just for this, it is worth taking two minutes to check. Either call +44 (0) 121 622 3313 or go straight to gentingcasinos.co.uk. The clash between old and current hours is real and people do get caught out by it.

The Online Side - Genting Live from Chinatown

Genting Casino Birmingham Chinatown is not only a physical building with tables and slots. It also doubles as a studio for Genting’s online live casino, which you access through gentingcasino.com. The live dealer games streamed from the Hurst Street floor appear in the Genting Live section for anyone registered with Genting Casino online. Sitting at home and playing on a table that sits in the same room you visited a week before feels quite neat.

Here is roughly how the sign-up and access flow works:

1. Head to gentingcasino.com and hit “JOIN”.
2. Put in your personal info - name, date of birth, address and so on.
3. Upload or provide valid photo ID so they can verify you. That is a UKGC requirement, not an optional extra.
4. After the checks clear, log in and go to the “Live Casino” area in the menu.
5. Inside that section you will see “Genting Live”. Those are tables streamed from UK floors, including the Chinatown Birmingham casino.
6. Pick the table you like - roulette and other live games show up depending on what is scheduled at that time.
7. Before you sit at a live table you need to deposit using one of the payment options in your account.
8. New players can also take the welcome bonus on their first deposit. When I checked, it was a 100% match up to £50.

It is worth stressing that the online and offline sides are tied together by brand, not by rules. The Chinatown building is licensed as a premises by Birmingham City Council and regulated by the UKGC under a land-based licence. The website runs on a different UKGC licence for remote gambling. They share some live video feeds and the Genting name, but the terms, promos and conditions belong to separate products.

Visiting in Person - What to Expect

Walk-ins are fine. This is not a private members’ club and you do not have to set up an account before turning up. At the door you will be asked for photo ID to show you are at least 18. A driving licence or passport usually does the job.

A few useful bits to know ahead of time:

1. The entrance is on Hurst Street, a short walk from The Arcadian in the Southside/Chinatown area.
2. The dress code is smart casual. Sportswear and very casual outfits are sometimes turned away.
3. Live table play starts at 13:00. Come earlier and you will be limited to slots and electronic terminals.
4. If you want a proper meal rather than bar snacks, the restaurant starts food service from around 18:00.
5. Sports screens are dotted around the main floor and you do not need a separate booking to watch.
6. The casino closes at 06:00, so if you arrive late at night it is worth keeping an eye on the clock.

Several local directories mention parking in the area, but there is no dedicated Genting Chinatown car park mentioned by the venue itself. Accessibility is flagged as available, though I could not find details on lifts, toilets or specific layouts, so if that is important for you it is better to ring them first and ask.

One thing I have noticed with any city-centre casino, including this one: the mood swings quite a lot. A quiet Tuesday afternoon around 14:00 feels almost like a different property compared to a packed Friday near midnight. It is the same room and tables, but the crowd and volume make it a different experience entirely.

The Operator - Genting Casinos UK

Genting Casino Birmingham Chinatown sits inside the Genting Casinos UK Limited network. The company is registered in the UK under number 01519689, with its main office at Genting Club Star City, Watson Road, Birmingham, B7 5SA.

Genting Casinos UK holds UKGC licence number 537, which covers several physical casinos up and down the country. In Birmingham alone, the same licence covers Genting Casino Edgbaston and the Genting International Casino at Resorts World Birmingham. These are all separate places with their own layouts and addresses. If you jump in a taxi, you need to be specific or you may end up at the wrong Genting property.

The Chinatown casino is the inner-city option in that group. It leans toward the late-night, after-dinner crowd rather than the big resort feel you get out at Resorts World. That difference matters if you are choosing where to spend your evening.

What Works and What Doesn’t

For anyone already in central Birmingham, the location really is straightforward. You can leave a restaurant in Chinatown and be at a roulette table a few minutes later. The gaming mix does what a casual player usually wants: slots, classic table games like roulette and blackjack, plus jackpot machines. The link between the live Genting tables online and the physical room is one of the more coherent bits of the offer. You can walk past a table one day and then find that exact game streamed in the Genting Live lobby online the next.

From a regulation angle it is all fairly robust. UKGC licence 537 shows up clearly on the Gambling Commission register, and Birmingham City Council lists the casino as an authorised premises. I did not see any major public enforcement stories or scam complaints attached to this site while I was looking.

There are, however, a few weak spots. The opening hours tangle is genuinely annoying - old 24/7 listings are still all over the place, while the real hours are 11:00 to 06:00. Turn up at 07:00 using an outdated directory and you just meet locked doors. The food window is short as well. If you want a sit-down meal in the restaurant, turning up after midnight is likely too late.

The way the venue tries to wear several hats at once - casino, bar, sports viewing, sometimes even appearing in nightclub-style lists - can also change the vibe. On a busy weekend night the bar area and sports coverage can dominate the feel of the place. At that point the pure gambling side starts to feel slightly secondary. That may suit some people, but it is worth knowing in advance.

Overall, I would call Genting Casino Birmingham Chinatown a straightforward, regulated, city-centre casino with a genuine online extension bolted on. It does not pretend to be a luxury destination, and it is not trying to. For a late session in Birmingham or for playing Genting Live tables from home that are actually based in a real local venue, it basically does what it says it will do.