itch.io and UK age verification: what is blocked, why, and what developers can do

itch.io does not have age verification for UK visitors. When the UK’s Online Safety Act began requiring age checks for adult content on 25 July 2025, itch.io chose a different route: it blocked project pages with adult content for visitors from the UK. Its announcement said: “Affected pages will not be available for visitors from the UK.”

That decision is why UK players see “content unavailable” messages on itch.io, why some adult games can be reached while their developers’ pages cannot, and why developers whose games are not explicit sometimes find themselves restricted.

This page sets out what itch.io said, how it decides what to restrict, what UK players can still reach, how developers can check and appeal, and how this compares with Steam. It describes the position as it stood on 18 October 2026, based on itch.io’s announcements and the most recent reports we could find.

Key points

• itch.io has not added ID checks. It said so in July 2025.
• Adult project pages are blocked for UK visitors. This took effect around 25 July 2025.
• Restrictions are automatic. They follow the sensitive content setting and adult tags.
• Staff can override. Pages can be restricted manually as well.
• Purchases stay downloadable. itch.io said so “for now”.
• Creator pages were blocked too. Reports from August 2025 and January 2026 say so.
• Developers can appeal. The Geo Restrictions tab in the dashboard is the route.

Why itch.io blocked UK users

The Online Safety Act 2023 places duties on online services that UK users can reach. Its child safety duties, which took effect on 25 July 2025, require services that allow sexually explicit content to stop children seeing it. Ofcom, the regulator, says this must be done with “highly effective” age assurance, and it has listed the methods it considers capable of that, including facial age estimation, photo ID matching and credit card checks. Self-declaration, such as typing in a date of birth, is not one of them.

A service in that position has three choices. It can check ages to Ofcom’s standard, remove the content for everyone, or block the content for UK users. itch.io chose the third.

The announcement, Our update on the UK Online Safety Act, was posted by the site’s founder, leafo, on 27 July 2025. It said: “at this time, we are not adding any invasive age verification systems to itch.io.” It said itch.io was “exploring partnerships with third-party ‘digital ID’ providers”, and that affected pages would stay unavailable in the UK until it found a solution it was comfortable with.

It also stated a position on the law. itch.io said it would always comply with legal requirements but disagreed with the policy, which it believed harmed creative expression and the reach of independent creators.

What is restricted

The announcement described three kinds of restriction.

Project pages with adult content. These are the main target. A game, book or other project marked as adult is not shown to visitors from the UK.

Community pages. Comments and forums on a project may be restricted separately if they contain a disproportionate amount of unsuitable content. itch.io said these reviews are manual and that affected creators would be contacted.

Creator pages. These were not mentioned in the July announcement, but reporting since shows them blocked. In August 2025 TheGamer tested several adult creators’ profiles with a UK location and found them unavailable. Visitors saw a disclaimer saying that itch.io was “currently unable to provide this specific content or service to users in the UK”, and that it would continue to evaluate its offerings.

The same report found something less expected. Some of the creators’ individual works could still be viewed from the UK after manually entering an age. That is the source of the most common confusion: a player can sometimes reach an adult game through a direct link while the developer’s page is a dead end.

A forum post dated 2 January 2026 reported that UK users were still blocked from viewing profiles flagged as adult. It received no reply from staff before it was archived. We found no later announcement from itch.io changing the position.

How itch.io decides what to restrict

The restrictions are mostly automatic, and they are based on what developers have told itch.io about their own projects.

According to the July announcement, a project is restricted when:

1. its “Has sensitive content” setting is on, or
2. it carries one of a short list of adult tags, including “adult”, “erotic”, “hentai” and “sex”.

itch.io admitted the method is rough. “We understand automated tag-based restrictions are not accurate,” the announcement said, and it added that the tag list might be refined over time.

Two mechanisms correct it in each direction. Staff may apply a manual override if a page is covered by the Act but its tags do not show it. And developers can appeal if they think a restriction was applied wrongly.

The question about queer games

Soon after the restrictions took effect, some users said itch.io was blocking queer content in the UK. leafo answered in a forum post. He said: “Pages where the developer has added tags indicating adult content have automatically been marked for filtering”, and that queer and LGBT tags were not used to decide a project’s status.

He gave numbers. Of about 20,000 public projects carrying those tags, he estimated about 5,700 would be geo-restricted, because their developers had also tagged them as adult. Critics replied that much LGBT fiction contains adult content, so the effect falls heavily on queer creators even if the tags themselves are not used. Both points can be true.

What UK players can still reach

The last row matters most to existing customers. The announcement said previously purchased content remains downloadable through the library or the itch.io app. It reminded users that itch.io is DRM-free and recommended keeping local backups. A downloaded game file keeps working regardless of what happens to the page.

Some UK users report using VPNs to reach blocked pages. itch.io has not endorsed that, and it does not change what the law requires of the service.

What developers should do

The announcement gave developers a checklist, and it still applies.

1. Check the Geo Restrictions tab. It is in the Distribute section of the project dashboard. itch.io says it shows whether a project is restricted, why, and what that means.
2. Set the sensitive content flag honestly. Under-flagging adult content does not protect a page; staff can apply overrides, and it risks other enforcement.
3. Review your tags. If a project with no adult content carries an adult tag, the tag itself can trigger the restriction.
4. Appeal from the same tab if you believe a restriction is wrong.
5. Moderate community pages. A project’s forum or comments can be restricted separately.

For developers whose audience is partly British, the block has a cost that is easy to underestimate. A UK visitor who arrives from social media sees an unavailable page, not a purchase button. Linking UK players to a store that does verify ages is one response; we cover the options in where adult games can be sold in 2026.

How this compares with Steam

Steam took the opposite approach. Rather than block adult content for UK users, it asks them to prove their age with a credit card before showing mature content. We cover that in Steam age verification and adult games, and the problems it causes for people without a credit card in Steam age verification without a credit card.

The two approaches trade off differently.

• Steam’s check keeps adult content available to verified UK adults, at the cost of a payment-card requirement many adults cannot meet.
• itch.io’s block avoids collecting anything from users, at the cost of shutting out UK adults altogether.

The Online Safety Act is not the only pressure itch.io has faced. In July 2025, the same month, it deindexed adult content from its browse pages under pressure from payment processors. That is a separate issue; we cover it in the timeline of adult games removed from Steam and itch.io and itch.io payment method not available.

What is still unknown

• Whether itch.io will add a digital ID option. It said it was exploring partnerships in July 2025; we found no announcement since.
• How UK visitors are identified. The announcement does not say whether it uses location by IP address or something else.
• Why some works stay reachable. The pattern TheGamer found is not explained in itch.io’s announcement.
• The full tag list. The announcement named five tags and said the list might be refined.

How this page was put together

The account of itch.io’s policy comes from leafo’s announcement of 27 July 2025 and his forum post on how pages were selected, both read on 18 October 2026. The account of creator pages comes from TheGamer’s report of 26 August 2025 and an itch.io forum post of 2 January 2026. The legal background comes from the Online Safety Act and Ofcom’s guidance on age checks.

The studio has not tested itch.io’s restrictions from the UK, and nothing here is a first-hand account of a block or an appeal. Where a source used wording this site does not print, it has been paraphrased and the source is linked.

This page was written on 18 October 2026 and will be updated if itch.io changes its approach. To report an error, see the corrections standard.