I normally don’t consider myself a jealous person but that all goes out the window when we’re talking about stories concerning people who’ve won the lottery.

Back when I was in college, I won $50 on a $2 scratch-off and proceeded to eat and drink like a king—and by that I mean I bought two pizzas that would end up sustaining me for a week and consumed a 30 and a plastic handle of vodka in what was retroactively a problematic amount of time.

Get the complete list of CA Lottery Scratch Offs tickets with the best odds of winning. Also get prize info, payouts, remaining jackpots, stats and breakdowns.

1. One could assume that each of the states a, b and d were lotteries themselves, with a the best. Lottery and d the worst.
2. Picture the odds. Consider this: The odds of winning the jackpot in a game like Lotto 6/49 are approximately 1 in 14 million, similar to the odds of putting the name of everyone in Ontario in a hat - a very tall hat - and randomly pulling out your own.
3. New York (NY) Lottery General Information Since 1967, the New York Lottery has earned $29 billion to support education statewide, including $2.203 billion in fiscal year 2005-2006.

I’ve since come to terms with the fact that that’s probably going to be the pinnacle of my gambling career, and while I always pick up a couple of Powerball tickets when the jackpot joins the Tres Commas Club, I know there’s virtually no chance I’ll ever have the luck of the husband and wife who won millions within a few months of each other or the guy who won twice in five years.

However, there are plenty of people out there who subscribe to the “somebody’s gotta win” mentality, and if you count yourself among them, you might be interested in the question that brought you here.

Which States Have The Best Lottery Odds?

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As you probably know, not all lotteries are created equal but they largely follow the same rule: the lower the chance of winning, the higher the reward.

The nation’s two most popular lottery games are the aforementioned Powerball and its younger cousin Mega Millions, which both offer astronomically high odds: you have a 1 in 292,201,338 chance of winning the former and a 1 in 302,575,350 chance of taking home the latter’s jackpot

If you’re looking to deny the existence of the gambler’s fallacy, you might like to know Pennsylvania and Indiana sport a disproportionate number of winners on a national scale when it comes to Powerball while Georgia and New York are the “luckiest” states for Mega Millions.

With that said, if you’re hoping to increase your chances of winning from “virtually impossible” to “laughably improbable,” then state lotteries are the way to go. However, not all of them are created equal and there’s no real way to point to one specific game that outshines the rest.

With that said, I’ll do my best.

All but six states have their own lottery system in place—you might be shocked to know Utah is one of them (and unironically shocked that Nevada is also part of the club)—and if NBC is to be believed, Massachusetts is far and away the best state to play the lottery based on how much it pays out compared to the amount of money it generates.

However, it’s worth noting that data may be a bit flawed—in 2012, students at MIT figured out a way to cheat the system to the tune of $8 million and another couple managed to rake in $27 million over a ten-year span. If you take Massachusetts out of the running, then Arkansas takes the top spot followed by South Carolina, Minnesota, and Georgia (if you’re curious, West Virginia is the worst place to play).

If we’re being honest with each other, at the end of the day, the real answer to the question posed here is “Who the hell cares?” based on how slim your chances of winning are regardless of where you play.

With that said, I wish you the best of luck because you’re sure as hell going to need it.

What are the odds of a lottery win?

Best Odds Lottery Florida

The odds of winning in draw-based lottery games are based on two factors:
1. How many numbers must be matched
2. The size of the number pool

For example: For LOTTO 6/49, the odds of winning the jackpot are based on matching 6 numbers out of a number pool of 49 numbers.

The more numbers there are to match, and the more numbers in the overall pool of numbers, the greater the odds.

LOTTO MAX

Jackpot
$10 – $70 million
ODDS OF WINNING JACKPOT
1 in 33,294,800
Matching Numbers Require to Win Jackpot
7/7
Number Pool
50

LOTTO 649

Best Lottery Odds By State

Jackpot
$5 million – grows until it’s won
ODDS OF WINNING JACKPOT
1 in 13,983,816
Matching Numbers Require to Win Jackpot
6/6
Number Pool
49

DAILY GRAND

Jackpot
$1,000/day for life or $7 million lump sum
ODDS OF WINNING JACKPOT
1 in 13,348,188
Matching Numbers Require to Win Jackpot
5/5+Grand Number
Number Pool
49 +
Grand Number (7)

LOTTARIO

Jackpot
$250,000 – grows until it’s won
ODDS OF WINNING JACKPOT
1 in 4,072,530
Matching Numbers Require to Win Jackpot
6/6
Number Pool
45

Ontario 49

Jackpot
$2 million
ODDS OF WINNING JACKPOT
1 in 13,983,816
Matching Numbers Require to Win Jackpot
6/6
Number Pool
49

Encore

Jackpot
$1 million
ODDS OF WINNING JACKPOT
1 in 10,000,000
Matching Numbers Require to Win Jackpot
7/7 (Right to Left)
Number Pool
9

Picture the odds

Consider this: The odds of winning the jackpot in a game like Lotto 6/49 are approximately 1 in 14 million, similar to the odds of putting the name of everyone in Ontario in a hat - a very tall hat - and randomly pulling out your own.

That would be amazing, but when it comes to winning the lottery, it’s all about chance. There’s no system or skill to beat the odds.

Winning numbers are chosen randomly, and all that affects the odds is the total number of possible combinations as determined by the game mechanics – not the number of people playing.

Are the odds affected when a jackpot rolls over, such as in a progressive jackpot? No, odds don’t change – they’re based solely on the numbers that must be matched and the number of possible combinations for a given game.

In case you were wondering: OLG ensures that draws are completely fair and random. It’s regulated by the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario, and there are precautions to make sure the odds of winning can’t be changed by OLG employees or lottery retailers, in any way.

The odds of lotteries are different from raffles. With raffles, the odds change based on the number of players. With lotteries, the number of players makes no difference to the odds of winning.

For example: ONTARIO 49 and LOTTO 6/49 have the same odds of winning the jackpot, because for both games you must match 7 numbers from a pool of numbers ranging from 1-49, even though, historically, fewer people play ONTARIO 49.

Why are there more winners from cities?

Yes, it’s true there are more big-city winners, because there are more people in big cities to buy tickets. And the more tickets sold, the higher the chances that a winning ticket is in that batch.

So, the GTA will often yield more winners than sparsely populated Northern Ontario. But there are winners in smaller towns too, because winning numbers are picked completely at random.

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