Wheelz Casino NZ Review

Our expert Wheelz Casino review for NZ players. Claim a $800 bonus, play 1,300+ pokies, and enjoy fast NZD payouts via Poli. Is David Hasselhoff’s casino legit?

Online casino

by Admin

4 months ago 257

Malta licensed, launched 2021 on its own group’s platform, around 1,300 games, native New Zealand dollar support, and a two-part welcome offer up to NZ$800 with 100 free spins.

The most important thing to know before checking anything else is that the company operating it changed name and licence in September 2025 — which is why two different licence numbers circulate for this casino.

The operator, and where to verify it

The operator changed in September 2025

Which matters, because searching the old company name may not find the current licence

Current operating company	Granturo Malta Ltd, Maltese company C107733.
Current licence	MGA/B2C/1079/2025, issued 10 September 2025 by the Malta Gaming Authority.
Previous operating company	Rootz Limited, Maltese company C83903, under MGA/B2C/599/2018 issued April 2019. Superseded, not withdrawn in disgrace — the group restructured and rebranded.
Registered address	Ewropa Business Centre, Level 3–701, Dun Karm Street, Birkirkara BKR 9034, Malta.
Group	Wildz Group, formerly Rootz. Founded 2018; Wildz launched 2019 on the group’s own platform, Wheelz in 2021.
Brands under the licence	Six: Wildz, Wheelz, Caxino, Spinz, Chipz and Tuplaus — all on one MGA licence, sharing the same regulatory obligations, fund segregation and compliance framework.
Other jurisdictions	A German licence from the Joint Gambling Authority of the Federal States, issued September 2022. Dispute resolution through eCOGRA and the MGA’s Player Support Unit.
New Zealand licence	None. No online casino holds one — the register does not exist yet.

This also explains why two different licence numbers circulate for this casino. Both were real: MGA/B2C/599/2018 belonged to Rootz Limited, MGA/B2C/1079/2025 belongs to Granturo Malta Ltd. One is simply superseded. If you check the register, search Granturo Malta Ltd — searching the old name will not give you the current position.

Wheelz is now operated by Granturo Malta Ltd, Maltese company C107733, under Malta Gaming Authority licence MGA/B2C/1079/2025, issued on 10 September 2025.

It was previously operated by Rootz Limited, Maltese company C83903, under MGA/B2C/599/2018. The group restructured and rebranded from Rootz to Wildz Group in 2025; the platform, the brands and the operational infrastructure are unchanged.

That resolves a genuine confusion. Two licence numbers circulate for this casino across review sites, and both are real — one simply belongs to the superseded entity. It is not a case of one source being wrong.

It also breaks the standard verification advice. The right instruction is to search the operating company on the regulator’s register rather than the brand, and that advice is correct. But searching Rootz Limited will not give you the current position. Search Granturo Malta Ltd.

To check it properly:

Scroll to the casino’s footer and read the operating company name and licence number as published today.
Go to the Malta Gaming Authority’s own site and open the licensee register — that is the only place a Maltese licence can be confirmed. Any other site showing you a licence status is showing you its own copy of the information.
Search the company name, not the brand. One company holds several brands under one licence.
Confirm the licence is active and that the brand you are about to use is listed under it.

What a Maltese licence does not cover is New Zealand. No online casino holds a New Zealand licence, because none has been issued. Malta’s oversight is real — Tier 1 regulation, segregated player funds, dispute resolution through eCOGRA and the MGA’s Player Support Unit — but a complaint from a New Zealand player goes to Malta rather than to the Department of Internal Affairs.

The group also holds a German licence from the Joint Gambling Authority of the Federal States, issued in September 2022.

The group

One company, six casinos — and the group aggregates

Not “may aggregate”. The operator says so itself.

The operator’s own wording on cashback

Its published company information states that VIP cashback is centralised across the group’s brands: cashback earned is bundled and displayed on every platform where you hold an account, and once claimed on one brand it is removed from your accounts on all the others.

That is the group treating your accounts as one account for the purpose that suits it. Assume the same logic applies to the terms that do not suit you, and check.

One welcome bonus per person	Group terms commonly restrict promotional offers to one per household or payment method across every brand. Claiming at a second casino in the family can void the bonus and everything won with it — discovered at the withdrawal, not at sign-up.
Withdrawal limits	Where a weekly or monthly cap is set at group level, six accounts give you one limit rather than six.
Self-exclusion	The most important of the three. Ask in writing whether excluding here excludes you at all six, and keep the answer.
Where to check	The general terms linked from the footer, and the bonus terms attached to the specific offer. Search both for “group”, “affiliated” and “related brands” — wherever those words sit beside a limit, the limit covers the whole family.

Do not register at two casinos in this family to collect two welcome offers. It is a contract question, not a legal one: if the terms permit one bonus per person and you take two, the operator can void both, keep the winnings and close the accounts.

One company runs six casinos on a single licence: Wildz, Wheelz, Caxino, Spinz, Chipz and Tuplaus. All six share the same regulatory obligations, the same fund segregation and the same compliance framework.

Three things follow. Group terms commonly allow one welcome offer per person across every brand — claiming at a second casino in the family can void both and close the accounts. Where a withdrawal cap is set at group level, six accounts give you one limit rather than six. And self-exclusion may or may not carry across, which is the one worth having in writing before you need it.

The bonus and the wheel

What the offer asks, and what the wheel is for

Two deposits at 35×, priced in turnover and in dollars

Deposit	Max bonus	Turnover at 35×	Expected cost
First — 100% match	NZ$300	NZ$10,500	about NZ$420
Second — 50% match	NZ$500	NZ$17,500	about NZ$700
Both, at maximum	NZ$800	NZ$28,000	about NZ$1,120

The full package costs more to clear than it is worth

NZ$28,000 of turnover at NZ$1 a spin is 28,000 spins — roughly 39 hours of continuous play at five seconds each, inside whatever expiry window applies. The expected cost on a game returning 96% is about NZ$1,120, against NZ$800 of bonus.

The smaller first deposit is the better of the two offers. A 100% match at 35× is a fair benchmark — better than the 60×-plus terms at the punishing end of the market, worse than the 20× a few competitors run.

The wheel is a retention mechanic

Every real-money wager earns spins on a prize wheel paying free spins, bonus cash and entry to a weekly pool distributed by wagering volume. It is well made and it is enjoyable.

It is also worth naming what it does: a reward that scales with volume is a reward for volume, and a weekly pool split by how much you wagered is a competition to wager more. None of it changes what the games return. The wheel is entertainment layered on a negative-expectation product, and it is enjoyable on those terms.

Two terms to confirm before opting in

The maximum bet permitted while wagering. Exceeding it once can void the bonus and everything won with it.

Whether the wagering applies to the bonus alone, and whether the bonus is sticky. This group’s structure is reported as bonus-only and non-sticky, which is genuinely better than the deposit-plus-bonus terms common elsewhere — a non-sticky bonus means your own money is played first, so a good early win can be withdrawn by forfeiting the remainder. Confirm it for this brand and this offer rather than assuming.

From 2027, licensed New Zealand operators face a bonus cap of the lesser of NZ$100 or 200% of the deposit — which puts every row above out of scope. Expected cost assumes a pokie returning 96% and describes a long-run average, not the outcome of any session.

The full package costs more to clear than it is worth. That is not unusual and it is not a trick; it is what a 35× multiple does across two tiers.

As multiples go, 35× is a fair benchmark — better than the 60×-plus terms at the punishing end of the market, worse than the 20× a few competitors run. Our low wagering guide covers how to price any offer.

A no-deposit offer has run seasonally at around 20 free spins, but it is not always active. Check the promotions page rather than a coupon site.

The games

Around 1,300 titles from NetEnt, Microgaming, Play’n GO, Pragmatic Play, Red Tiger and Evolution. The lobby filters by provider, volatility and feature type, which is more useful than most.

Published returns for the headline titles hold up: Book of Dead at 96.21%, Gates of Olympus at 96.50%, Gonzo’s Quest at 96%.

The exception is the progressive jackpot titles. Mega Moolah returns around 88% in its base game, well below a standard pokie, because a share of every wager funds the prize pool rather than being returned to players. It is a poor choice for clearing a wagering requirement, and progressives are frequently excluded from bonus play entirely. Our jackpot guide and online pokies guide cover the trade-off.

Live tables come from Evolution — the same product wherever you play it, so not a differentiator between casinos. Table limits run from low stakes up to four-figure maximums. Our live casino guide explains how those work.

Banking

New Zealand dollars are supported natively. E-wallets typically settle inside 24 hours; bank transfer and cards one to three business days.

Check the cashier for available methods before you register. Sources conflict on whether POLi is offered across this group’s brands, and the method list can differ between them. That is worth two minutes rather than an assumption.

On POLi, where it is available: it works by having you enter your internet banking username and password into a third party’s interface. Consumer NZ has warned this probably breaches your bank’s terms and conditions, and the major New Zealand banks have told customers not to share their login details. Regulated open banking went live here on 1 December 2025 and keeps the authorisation inside your own bank’s app. Our casino deposit methods page covers the alternatives.

Complete identity verification before requesting a withdrawal, not after. The documents are the same either way and it removes the delay behind most payout complaints.

No app, and none is needed. The browser version works properly, with the genuine advantage that you are not dependent on app store approvals or updates.

Where this sits in 2026

Online casino gambling is governed by the Online Casino Gambling Act 2026, in force since 1 May 2026. It is in force — not a bill before Parliament.

Regulations followed on 3 July. Expressions of interest opened on 17 July 2026 with a NZ$19,000 fee, followed by an auction and full applications, for up to fifteen licences. From 1 December 2026, operators that have not entered the process must stop serving New Zealanders, with penalties up to NZ$5 million; those that applied may continue until their application is decided or 1 July 2027. A public register is expected in 2027, alongside a bonus cap of the lesser of NZ$100 or 200% of the deposit.

Check the site still accepts New Zealand registrations before depositing. Several offshore groups have already closed to new New Zealand sign-ups while pursuing a domestic licence. Our New Zealand gambling laws guide sets out the timeline.

Getting help

Free, confidential support is available in New Zealand at any hour: the Gambling Helpline on 0800 654 655 or free text 8006, and PGF Services on 0800 664 262.

Our self-exclusion guide covers bank gambling blocks and device blocking software — both of which work across every casino at once, which matters particularly when one company runs six.

You must be 18 or older to gamble online in New Zealand.

Disclaimer

This page is published for information. It is not financial, legal or gambling advice, and nothing on it is a recommendation to gamble or an endorsement of any operator. You must be 18 or older to gamble online in New Zealand.

The corporate restructuring described is a change of operating entity and licence, not a regulatory action. No enforcement action against this operator was found on any register at the time of review.

Licensing, ownership, bonus terms, withdrawal limits, payment methods and country availability all change, sometimes within weeks, and this page covers a period in which both the operator and the New Zealand market are being restructured. Confirm the current position on the regulator’s own register and in the operator’s own terms and cashier before you deposit. Where sources conflict, this page says so rather than picking one. Expected-cost figures are long-run averages, not predictions of any session, and no bet described here has a positive expected return.

Gambling costs money over time by design. No bonus, prize wheel or cashback scheme changes that. Set a deposit limit before your first deposit rather than after a losing session. Free, confidential support is available in New Zealand 24 hours a day on 0800 654 655, or by free text to 8006.

Reference sources

Operator documents, licence registers, independent analysis, legislation and New Zealand support services. No link below goes to an operator’s cashier.

Malta Gaming Authority — licence verification — the regulator’s own register. Search the operating company name, not the brand.
Wheelz — company information — the operator’s own legal notice, and its statement that cashback is centralised across the group’s brands.
Wildz — company information — the registered address, company number and German licence reference for the same operator.
Granturo Malta Ltd — the current operating entity — the September 2025 restructuring, the new licence number and the six brands under it.
Rootz Ltd — the previous entity and licence — the legacy company number and licence, for anyone reconciling older references.
eCOGRA — testing agency and dispute resolution provider.
Wizard of Odds — progressive jackpot returns and odds — the base game return behind the jackpot titles.
GambleAware — how gambling product design affects play — relevant to reward wheels, streaks and volume-based prize pools.
DIA — online gambling licensing for providers — the three-stage process and the 1 December 2026 cut-off.
Senet — Online Casino Gambling Regulations 2026 — the inducement cap and the harm prevention requirements.
Consumer NZ — POLi payments and your banking security — why sharing internet banking credentials can breach your bank’s terms.
BetBlocker — free device blocking software, run by a registered charity.
Gambling Helpline Aotearoa New Zealand — free, confidential support, 24 hours a day.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who operates Wheelz?

Granturo Malta Ltd, Maltese company C107733, under MGA licence MGA/B2C/1079/2025 issued in September 2025. It was previously Rootz Limited under MGA/B2C/599/2018 — the group restructured and rebranded as Wildz Group.

Why do two different licence numbers appear for this casino?

Because both are real. MGA/B2C/599/2018 belonged to the previous entity and MGA/B2C/1079/2025 belongs to the current one. One is superseded rather than wrong.

Where do I verify the licence?

On the Malta Gaming Authority’s own register, searching the operating company name rather than the brand — and searching Granturo Malta Ltd, not Rootz, or you will not find the current licence.

How many sister casinos are there?

Six brands on one licence: Wildz, Wheelz, Caxino, Spinz, Chipz and Tuplaus.

Can I claim bonuses at the sister casinos too?

Probably not. Group terms commonly allow one welcome offer per person across all brands, and taking two can void both. The operator’s own material confirms cashback is centralised across the group, so treat the accounts as connected.

What is the wagering requirement?

35× the bonus. On the NZ$300 first-deposit bonus that is NZ$10,500 of turnover at an expected cost near NZ$420. Both deposits at maximum total NZ$28,000 and about NZ$1,120.

Is the bonus sticky?

The group’s structure is reported as bonus-only wagering with a non-sticky bonus, which is better than the deposit-plus-bonus terms common elsewhere. Confirm it for the specific offer before opting in.