Make sure you secure your tickets! The combined jackpots for Powerball and Mega Millions have reached an impressive $1.9 billion.
These lottery prizes increased after no tickets matched all six numbers during the drawings on Friday and Saturday nights. The Mega Millions jackpot soared to $1.1 billion, while the Powerball jackpot climbed to $800 million. Previously, on Wednesday night, the prizes stood at $977 million and $750 million respectively.
The next Powerball drawing is scheduled for Monday. If there's a winner, it would mark the sixth-largest prize in the game's history, according to the company. The most recent Powerball jackpot, worth $842.4 million, was claimed on January 1st by a ticket holder in Michigan. Since then, there have been 35 consecutive drawings without a jackpot winner.
The highest Powerball jackpot on record stands at $2.04 billion, claimed by a ticket holder in California back in 2022.
The Mega Millions numbers will be drawn again on Monday night, potentially marking the fifth-largest prize in the game’s history. In the previous Mega Millions draw on December 8th, two tickets purchased in California shared the jackpot. According to a news release, Mega Millions is the only lottery game to have reached the billion-dollar threshold six times. To date, there have been five jackpots exceeding $1 billion: in South Carolina in 2018, Michigan in 2021, Illinois in 2022, and Maine and Florida in 2023.
The current record for the Mega Millions jackpot is $1.602 billion, claimed by a ticket sold in Florida last year.
The winner of a jackpot has the option to receive their prize either as a lump sum or through an annuity, distributed over 30 years in annual payments. The estimated lump sum payment stands at $384.8 million for Powerball and $525.8 million for Mega Millions, both figures calculated before taxes.
The odds of winning the jackpot are approximately 1 in 292.2 million for Powerball and 1 in 302.6 million for Mega Millions.
May luck be on the side of the best ticket!