It's a common spelling in fantasy video games and books, but it feels kind of performative.

These same games will have voice actors pronounce "ye" as it's written, unaware that the y is a typographic substitute for Þ. "ye olde" is pronounced "the old". But likewise, there's some VAs that clearly only ever read a word, like in the newer God of War games where a character mangles "prescient".

Same had to actually look it up and at least Merriam-Webster lists the word as “chiefly British spellings of JAIL, JAILER”. Which at least hints that the dictionary writers thought it is less common out side of Britain.

It's the traditional spelling. You'll see it in the British Isles, and on some old buildings here in Canada.

Though it does exist, 'gaol' very infrequently used in the UK too.

Obviously, you haven't visited any colonial American sites. It used to be the normal spelling.

I've also seen the spelling used in old westerns, which I just so happened to be reading in jail.

Non-native speaker here and I learned the word gaol from some fantasy literature only a couple years back.