Powerball Jackpot Rolled Over to $550 Million as Mega Millions and Powerball Jackpots Recently Top $1 Billion
By Space Coast Daily // January 12, 2021
Saturday night, when there was no winner, the Powerball jackpot rolled over to $550 million. Players are now given another opportunity to win half a billion dollars in prizes, the largest since March 2019. It’s the 10th highest reward in the history of the game when someone wins.
January 13 is the date the Powerball numbers are going to be drawn.
What are the winning chances? One in two hundred and ninety-two million. According to the lottery officials, only one out of every 25 plays will benefit something, even if it’s $4.
In March of 2019, Wisconsin claimed the last major Powerball jackpot at $768.4m.
And if you’re not winning Powerball, in a few days, you’ll have a different chance to win a jumbo jackpot. Nobody picked up all the winning numbers on Friday night, so the jackpot has for the fourth time in the game’s history reached 600 million dollars.
On September 15, the jackpot was last won. It happened in a Tuesday evening draw.
In January 2009, Powerball began with an estimated jackpot of 105 million dollars. On May 17, 2013, Mega Millions made the first draw, which had an unprecedented win of 190 million dollars.
The two national lottery games have carried giant prizes for almost two years, and only the second time the two jackpots have raised above 500 million dollars.
The estimated Grand Prize of Mega Millions is the 8th largest in U.S. history and the 12th largest jackpot. A $1.58 billion Powerball jackpot earned by 3 players in 2016 is still high compared to the new biggest payout. The only competition for such jackpot sizes could be from the biggest jackpot slots from online gambling sites prescribed by Gamblerguy.com.
On September 15, 2020, a single winner reportedly claimed a 120 million dollar payout. That was when the Mega Millions Jackpot in Wisconsin was last won. The game was also won five times last year, and the biggest payout was $414 million in June.
Since last spring, lottery awards had increased marginally when government officials decreased guaranteed minimum amounts and stopped offering concrete raises. This is due to the slowness of sales brought by the coronavirus.
On Monday, Carole Gentry, Maryland Lottery and Gaming’s spokesperson said the prizes are high now mostly because no one has won either jackpot for months now. But Gentry also stated that “it’s something enjoyable to focus on in the new year,” more people were purchasing tickets because prices were growing faster.
Despite how much fun games can be, people should know that they have an unbelievably slim chance of winning the major jackpot for Powerball. The odds are 1 in 292,2 million, while Mega Millions’ chances are even worse at one out of 302,5 million.
Lottery-promoted jackpots also have winners who are given an annuity option in which prizes are paid for 30 years. In effect, most of the winners chose the cash option, which now is valued at $451.8 million for Mega Millions and $411.4 million for Powerball.
In 45 states, including Washington, D.C., the United States Virgin Islands, and even Puerto Rico, Mega Millions and Powerball games are also open.
These are the ten highest Mega Millions jackpots ever purchased together with where they were bought:
■ 1.54 billion dollars — one South Carolina winning ticket (October 2018)
■ 656 million dollars — three Illinois, Kansas, and Maryland winning tickets (March 2012)
■ 648 million dollars — Two winning California and Georgia tickets, (December 2013)
■ 615 million dollars — unknown to winners (January 2021)
■ 543 million dollars—a California winning ticket (July 2018)
■ 536 million dollars—one Indiana winning ticket (July 2016)
■ 533 million dollars—a winning New Jersey ticket (March 2018)
■ 522 million dollars—a California winning ticket (June 2019)
■ 451 million dollars—a winning Florida ticket (January 2018)
■ 437 million dollars—one winning New York ticket (January 2019)
