How to improve odds of winning lottery

Okay, we all "want to win the lottery," but do you really, really want to win?

It takes a lot of determination (and money) but experts and former winners say there areways to improve your odds of winning the jackpot.

Remember: Playing the lottery is a form of gambling, so know your limit and play within it.

1. Buy extra tickets

Ok, we never said these tips would be that creative. It's totally obvious that buying extra tickets increases your chance of winning the lottery, but most frugal and right-thinking people will never buy more than one ticket.

The costs add up, but every guide to winning the lottery agrees buying extra tickets gives you an advantage, especially when it's combined with other tips and tricks.

2. Stick to your lucky numbers

There's a heated debate between lotto players about whether it's best to buy quick picks (where the computer chooses your numbers) or to select your lucky numbers. Our money is on choosing your own.

The thing about lucky numbers is they're your numbers, and you'll always remember to play because otherwise you could miss your chance.

To be fair, quick pick tickets make up the vast majority of lottery winners, but playing consistently is more important. Unless...

3. Don't play every week

Many dedicated lotto players actually avoid big, popular games like the Mega Millions and Powerball draws. Instead, they target unpopular games with low jackpots during their least popular times of the year, and load up on tickets for specific draws.

It takes a little research, but if there's a winner every time, your odds in one of these draws are way better than most big games.

4. Pick high numbers

This tip won't improve your odds of "winning the lottery" per se, but experts say it makes you less likely to split a big draw. The theory goes that people tend to pick numbers between 1 and 31, based on important dates in their lives.

Richard Lustig, who says he's won the lottery seven times, swears by his "number spreading technique," and included it in his book Learn How to Increase Your Chances of Winning the Lottery. Here's another one of Lustig's tips...

5. Don't buy consecutive numbers

Lustig offers his readers this bit of helpful math: if a lottery draw had 5 numbers, and they only go up to 55, the total of your five numbers should be between 104 and 175. The lotto expert says studies show that 70% of jackpot draws fall within that number "spread."

For he same reasons, Lustig warns to avoid picking multiple numbers from the same group of tens (for example: 21, 25 and 28), or numbers that end in the same digit.

6. Don't play in patterns

One last trusty tip from Lustig: if you like filling in your number card with an X, diagonal lines or other patterns, odds are other lotto players do too. Like picking low numbers, this only increases your chance of splitting a game-winning draw.

Read the full story on Shared.com.

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The Monday, November 7th 2022 jackpot is $1.9 billion for those winners that choose to receive an annuity, which will be paid out over 30 years. But nearly all winners choose to receive a one-time lump sum payment instead of waiting. The cash option for Monday’s drawing is worth $929.1 million.

All this assumes you are the only winner of the jackpot. Huge lottery prizes like this one attract a lot more players who buy a lot more tickets, and the top prize is often shared between multiple people who happened to pick the same numbers. Should that happen, the jackpot is divided equally by the number of winning tickets.

How to choose the right lottery numbers

A lot of people have a lucky number or a date they like to use when playing the lottery. But has that number historically shown up in drawings?

The Powerball lottery winner is chosen by randomly selecting five white balls with numbers on them out of a pool of 69 numbered balls, and then a red-colored “Powerball” out of a pool of 26.

According to U.S.A Mega, the five numbers that came up the most in Powerball drawings over the last seven years are 61 (drawn 78 times), 32 (77 times), 21 and 63 (both drawn 73 times), and 69 (72 times). The most common Powerball was 24 (drawn 45 times), followed by 18 (42 times), 4 (36 times), and 13 and 21 (both 34 times). The least commonly drawn numbers are 34 and 26 (both drawn 44 times) and the least common Powerball is 23 (22 times).

Of course, that’s just based on 803 drawings since October 7, 2015. Given a longer time period and a bigger data sample, every single number should be chosen the same number of times; the whole point of randomly selecting balls is to average out differences over time.

Still, you might be inclined to pick one of those numbers, or to choose another “lucky” option. But think twice before you do. If other people choose the same numbers as you, you’ll have to share the jackpot with them—and people are more likely to choose a “lucky” number like 7, or a number between 1 and 31 because it represents a birthday. Shying away from those numbers doesn’t improve your chances of winning the lottery, but it does give you a very slightly improved chance to take home the prize all by yourself. So statistically, it’s better to choose uncommon numbers.

Then again, if everyone picks unusual numbers for this very reason, those numbers are going to be more likely to be shared, so it’ll actually be better to chose a usual number. See how hard it is to hack this system?

The secret to winning the lottery is: Buy more tickets

Lottery is a game of chance and probability, so the best way to increase your odds of winning is to buy more tickets. If you have a 1 in 300 million chance of winning, buying a second ticket doubles your odds to 2 in 300 million, another to 3 in 300 million, and so on.

Of course, while you’re improving your odds, your chances of taking home a billion dollars are still infinitesimal. In order to improve your odds in a really substantial way, you’d have to spend a huge amount of money. Even if you spent a million dollars buying $2 Powerball tickets this Monday, the odds would still be overwhelmingly against you.

So play your lucky number, play an uncommon number, play your birth date, whatever. Buy one ticket or buy twenty. It doesn’t really matter.

States with the most lottery winners

There are 45 states that participate in the Powerball lottery, and it’s also available in Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. But every state has not had a jackpot winner.

Since the game started in 1992, players in only 43 of those 48 locations have won the Powerball jackpot, according to Jackpocket, a third party lottery app that allows users to buy tickets on their phone. Indiana has been the luckiest, with 39 jackpots won, followed by Missouri with 31, and Minnesota with 22. It would seem that being from one of these states means you have a higher probability of winning, right?

Wrong. All those people in those states were lucky, but not because they had a higher probability of winning. For one thing, some states entered the multi-state pool later than others: Mississippi, for example, only started selling Powerball tickets in January of 2020, so it’s no surprise that it’s never had a winner.

But more importantly: In all things lottery, you can’t escape math. People in populous states like New York, New Jersey and California win more often because they have more people playing. Your odds don’t change based on where you buy the ticket.

There is, however, one factor which might actually make it a good idea to play Powerball in one state versus another: Local rules about whether or not the winner can stay anonymous. In places like Illinois and Kansas, winners can request that the lottery board keep their identity secret. In states like New York, you can expect your name to be released to the media —meaning everyone in the world now knows you’re a multi-billionaire.

What time is the lottery drawing?

Wait, you still want to play? Powerball drawings are held every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday at 10:59 p.m. ET. Good luck!

Updated 11/8/22 to reflect the delayed drawing. 

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