There's been a phenomenal growth in the number of online gambling websites over the last couple of years and now even the national lottery site is getting in on the act. So, how do you choose which is the best online gambling website for the games you want to play, or for the bets you want to make? Well, there are too many to recommend so let's just look at the generic types.

The most important thing to bear in mind about playing online gambling websites is that you shouldn't do it unless you can afford to lose. A lot of the games can be highly entertaining, and as well as making big wins you could find yourself making even bigger losses just as quickly. Also, always look for the Play Safe logo and make sure the sites you are playing are run by reputable companies. So, that's the health warnings out of the way, now let's look at what sort of games you can play online:

Instant win games or scratchcards
Many sites offer instant win games, the equivalent of scratchcards but the scratching is done by the computer, these usually start from '1 a go, but on some sites you can choose a higher stake. Like all gambling sites you will have to register, including details of a payment methodusually credit or debit cardand confirm that you are over 18 before being allowed to play.

Sports games
Ranging from pools type betting right up to 'live' betting there are a plethora of sites out there offering sports betting. With pools type betting you select a number of games in advance and predict whether they will end in a home win, away win, scoreless or score draw. Other sites allow you to bet on specific sporting events, even while they are in progress when you can bet on a huge range of things happening as well as the outcome of the game!

Lottery games
As well as the national lotteries online gambling websites can run their own lotteries. The main difference being that the odds of winning a reasonable prize (such as '5'1000) are higher on a website's lottery game, that's because the top prizes tend to be smaller, typically up to '1million. A lot of these games use the results from other lotteries such as the Florida Daily play as a basis of their games and you get to be more specific with your choices than the national lottery; try them out, you'll get the idea!

Online Bingo & combination sites
There are also a lot of sites offering online bingowhere you play either against other people online or against the computer. In reality, most of the best gambling online websites offer a combination of several of the above categories and only by visiting them yourself and playing trial gamesno cash involved, either to play or paid outto see which you think is the best online gambling website.