Lottery Mega Millions Powerball Jackpot

The top prize for the Powerball lottery has now soared to $1 billion, with a cash option of $516.8 million, for the next drawing on Wednesday, July 19. The jackpot for Wednesday's drawing is the third largest in Powerball history.

In July, the Powerball jackpot hit $1.08 billion. A huge sum of money that's one of the highest payouts in lottery history, and something that probably wouldn't happen again anytime soon... but it did just a few weeks later.

DOWNLOAD 🔥 https://urluss.com/2y2MmI 🔥

This year has seen three lottery jackpots reach more than $1 billion. The first came in January with a $1.53 billion Mega Millions winner. Next, a $1.08 billion Powerball jackpot in July. The latest was a $1.63 billion Mega Million jackpot in August. All three have made it to the top 10 highest lottery jackpots in history.

The highest lottery jackpot came in November 2022 at $2.04 billion. It was the second jackpot over $1 billion that year. Before that the only other times a jackpot hit over a billion was in 2021, 2018 and 2016.

The Mega Millions jackpot for Tuesday's drawing stands at an estimated $654 million, with a cash option of $372.6 million. It's the second-largest jackpot in the game's history and fourth-biggest lottery jackpot ever in the United States. There hasn't been a Mega Millions jackpot winner since it reached $543 million in July.

A seven-week investigation by Camelot Group, the company that runs the UK's national lottery, convinced officials that their claim to the winning ticket was legitimate. But since there is a 30-day time limit on reporting lost tickets, the company was not required to pay up, and the jackpot became the largest unclaimed amount since the lottery began in 1994.

Mega Millions tickets can be purchased daily. The cut off time for ticket sales is 9:50 PM ET on the day of the draw. Drawings are held every Tuesday and Friday at 11:00 PM ET. You can go to www.megamillions.com to view the webcast of the official drawing.

The largest Powerball jackpot won in Colorado was $133 million in 2017. That jackpot, won by then 67-year-old Judy Finchum of Grand Junction, is also the largest Colorado lottery prize won to date. To date, no Colorado resident has won a Mega Millions jackpot since the state began selling tickets in 2010. No one has ever won both jackpots at the same time.

MEGA MILLIONS is played in 45 jurisdictions: 43 states plus Washington, D.C. and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Drawings are Tuesday and Friday evenings at 11:00 Eastern Time, 10:00 Central Time, 9:00 Mountain Time and 8:00 Pacific Time. Profits from every MEGA MILLIONS ticket sold remain in the state in which the ticket was sold. For more information, visit wvlottery.com or www.megamillions.com.

The jackpot for Tuesday night's Mega Millions drawing has surged to $1.1 billion, after no players claimed the top prize in Friday's drawing. It's the sixth time a U.S. lottery prize has reached 10 digits since 2016, when the first billion-dollar prize jackpot was announced.

Consider this: If nobody wins a given lottery draw, the jackpot money rolls over into the next draw, increasing the size of the pot. Make that lottery harder to win and you can almost guarantee higher jackpots on a regular basis, incentivizing even more people to buy lottery tickets.

The biggest change came in 2015, when the lottery added more number combinations to nearly halve the odds of hitting the jackpot. Before then, your odds of winning a Powerball lottery were around 1 in 175 million, Matheson says. Today, those odds are 1 in 292.2 million for Powerball, Mega Millions odds have also gotten longer in recent years.

Much of that expansion stems from MUSL's 2009 agreement with the consortium of states that operate the Mega Millions lottery. Previously, the two lotteries operated exclusively in separate states, and their agreement paved the way for bigger jackpots for both Powerball and Mega Millions.

A lottery's advertised jackpot size is based on the amount a winner would receive if they chose to be paid out in an annuity over the course of 30 years. Higher interest rates during a drawing means a higher total payout from that annuity fund, MUSL's website notes.

By contrast, a lottery's lump-sum cash option is directly fueled by ticket sales. The lump sum for the current Mega Millions jackpot is $568.7 million, which would result in an annuity fund that ultimately pays out $1.1 billion over three decades based on the current interest rates.

If someone wins the Powerball on Monday, it would go down as roughly the 14th-largest lottery jackpot awarded in U.S. history. It would also be the third-highest awarded this year, trailing the $754.6 million Powerball jackpot from Feb. 6 and the $1.35 billion Mega Millions jackpot awarded on Jan. 13.

In order to win the Powerball jackpot, the five numbers on a $2 ticket have to match the five numbers on white balls selected during the lottery drawing, as well as the red Powerball number drawn from a separate drum. The odds of winning are roughly 1 in 292 million, according to the AP.

The huge jackpot is a return to form for Powerball, which has been known along with Mega Millions for its record-breaking jackpots in recent years. But the Powerball lottery has experienced a slump, with nearly a year passing since its jackpot total climbed above $300 million.

Powerball sales reached nearly $5 billion last year for game tickets that are sold through more than 210,000 lottery terminals. Each ticket costs $2. The odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are one in 175 million.

Such big jackpots comes down to math and more difficult odds. In 2015, the Powerball lottery lengthened the odds of winning from 1 in 175.2 million to 1 in 292.2 million. Mega Millions followed two years later, lengthening the odds of winning the top prize from 1 in 258.9 million to 1 in 302.6 million. The largest lottery jackpots in the U.S. have come since those changes were made.

And if it seems like lottery jackpots topping $1 billion are more common nowadays, it's because they are. Since 2021, five prizes have topped $1 billion, not counting the latest game. The increased frequency is due to higher interest rates and worsened odds for winning a jackpot, which for Mega Millions is 1 in 302.6 million. ff782bc1db