I’ve locked this topic temporarily to avoid off topic discussion happening here. If you have issues or concerns you can contact support or if you want to have a more public discourse then I recommend creating a topic in General Discussion.
The UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) has introduced new regulations that affect how we handle pages on itch.io that contain adult content and themes. As of July 25, 2025, the OSA requires platforms to implement age verification systems to prevent minors from accessing adult content. This means we have had to implement geographic restrictions on project pages with NSFW or adult content for UK users.
At this time, we are not adding any invasive age verification systems to itch.io. Instead, we are exploring partnerships with third-party “digital ID” providers that would allow us to comply with the law while keeping the experience as smooth as possible for everyone. Until we find and implement a solution for age verification we are comfortable with, affected pages will not be available for visitors from the UK.
To help you understand how these changes may affect your pages, we have added a “Geo Restrictions” tab to the Distribute section of your project’s dashboard. This page will show you whether your project is restricted in the UK, explain the reason for the restriction, and detail what that means for your project’s availability there.
We use the tags you’ve added to your project page automatically apply a restriction in the UK. This is based on a combination of the “Has sensitive content” setting and the use of specific tags: “porn,” “adult,” “hentai,” “erotic,” and “sex”. Please note that a staff member may apply an override if we find your page is covered by the OSA but your tags do not reflect this. We may refine this list of tags as we manually review pages to ensure we can get an accurate classification of pages.
We may also review the comments and forum posts on your page and restrict access to your community pages separately if they contain a disproportionate amount of content that is not suitable under OSA. We are doing these reviews manually so if you are affected we will contact you about it. You can help avoid any issues by being proactive about moderating your communities and reporting bad faith actors.
We understand automated tag-based restrictions are not accurate. As we host millions of pages, our goal was to identify the majority of content initially then work with creators to refine restrictions on the individual page level. If you believe your game was incorrectly restricted, you can submit an appeal through the “Geo Restrictions” tab in your dashboard. A staff member will review your request to ensure we are adhering to both our policies and legal requirements while respecting your creative work. We will be sending out a mass email to creators that have had this restriction automatically applied to their pages so that they may review the restriction.
Our Position on the OSA
While we will always comply with legal requirements, we disagree with this policy’s approach. We believe these restrictions harm creative expression and make it harder for independent creators to reach their audiences.
If you share our concerns about the Online Safety Act’s impact on digital creativity and free expression, we encourage you to:
- Connect with local advocacy groups working on digital rights issues
- Review and consider signing this petition opposing the OSA’s implementation: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/722903
- Contact your local representatives to express your concerns
What about content I have purchased?
If you have previously purchased content that is now restricted in the UK, you will still be able to access your downloadable files through your library or the itch.io app. While the project page itself may not be viewable from the UK, your purchase history and download access remain unaffected by these geographic restrictions for the time being.
As itch.io is a DRM-free platform, we have always recommended that users download and store local backups of their purchases. This ensures you can access your content regardless of any future changes to itch.io or external circumstances that might affect our ability to operate.