Over the next two nights, Canadians will have two stabs at becoming multi-millionaires as both Lotto Max and Lotto 6/49 have massive jackpots up for grabs.
On Tuesday night, the Lotto Max grand prize is worth $80 million while there will also be an estimated 29 Maxmillion prizes available, which are $1 million a piece as well.
Just 24 hours later, the Lotto 6/49 Gold Ball Jackpot stands at $40 million. The grand prize draw offers ticket buyers a shot at another $5 million prize.
LOTTO MAX
The odd of winning the Lotto Max jackpot sit at 1 in 33,294,800, according to the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) but it says that Ontarians have claimed nine of the 10 big jackpots in 2024.
Those nine jackpots account for $505 million and OLG says that a winning ticket sold in the Etobicoke area of Toronto in October worth $65 million remains unclaimed.
According to PlayNow, which is B.C.’s lottery corporation, the most commonly drawn numbers since the Lotto Max switched to 50 numbers are 7, 19, 22, 32, 28, 32,36 and 46.
That is a far cry from the numbers that people are selecting as the most common numbers played are 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 which was selected by an average of 45,057 for each draw over the last year.
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Second most common is 7, 14, 21, 28, 35, 42 and 49 which has seen on average selections followed by 2, 7, 19, 24, 28, 30 and 39 which was selected by an average of 14,366 per draw.
Those numbers come courtesy of the OLG website with OLG spokesperson making an interesting point about the take-home prize.
“The interesting thing about these combinations is … at any time there are about 45,000 people who play the combo 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 … so if that combination is drawn you may be splitting the jackpot with 45,000 others,” he noted.
Bitonti said that the reason they only list an estimated number of Maxmillion prizes is that the number may change at the very last minute.
“We find that the bulk of the ticket sales happen late in the afternoon and in the evening before the draw as people are coming home from work,” he said.
“Ticket sales have been very good since the jackpot hit $80 million. One great indicator of that is when more Maxmillions are drawn than are estimated.”
He noted that if sales go well on Tuesday prior to the draw, that number will increase.
“So, prior to Friday’s draw, there were an estimated 20 Maxmillions being offered, but when ticket sales closed and it was draw time, 21 sets Maxmillions numbers were drawn – one more than estimated,” he said in an email.
LOTTO 6/49
All eyes are on the giant Lotto Max jackpot on Tuesday but just 24 hours later, there will be two changes to become a multi-millionaire with a draw that potentially has better odds.
That is because according to Playnow, the odds of winning Lotto Max’s grand prize stand at 1 in 33,294,800 while the odds of winning the $5 million Lotto 6/49 grand prize are 1 in 13,983,816.
The Gold Ball is a different story however as that prize is dependent on the number of Gold Ball numbers issued for that draw and number of balls in the Gold Ball jackpot draw.
In a reverse to Lotto Max, the most commonly played numbers for Lotto 6/49 are 7, 14, 21, 28, 35 and 42 which sees an average of 42,214 per draw while 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 are the second most common numbers selected with an average of 33,397.
Coming in third is the numbers 7, 13, 19, 25, 31 and 37 with the combination having been selected on average 21,801 times per draw over the past year.
Again, people may want to mix it up a little more as if those numbers appear on draw night, they would be splitting the jackpot with thousands of others.
Perhaps they should consider turning to Playnow for their numbers as according to their website, the most common winning numbers drawn are 7, 31, 34, 40, 43 and 45.
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