It’s the stuff of movies. A server pays a couple dollars for a Powerball lotto ticket and suddenly she’s a millionaire. Do you wish that could happen to you? Well, we’re not saying you’re going to be the next lotto winner. But we’d love to share a bit more about Powerball, its history and your odds of winning, read on! In this guide, we’ll talk about:

• The history of Powerball
• Past jackpots and earnings people have won from Powerball in the past
• Your odds of winning, and the best way to play Powerball to increase your odds

Again, we’re not promising that you’ll read this guide then instantly go on to win Powerball. But if you’re interested in learning more and increasing your odds, this is the guide for you! Here’s what you need to know about Powerball.

 

Powerball is a lotto that’s drawn in the United States. Every Saturday and Wednesday, millions of people (from around the world) check the drawing to see whether they, too can win big. Let’s face it – Powerball is what dreams are made of.

Everyone wants to take home the Big Prize – the jackpot that will change their life. Don’t you? Well, your odds aren’t wonderful. It’s estimated that your odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are one in 292,201,338.

And even at that, those odds assume that you’re not going to be splitting the jackpot with someone else. After all, your lucky numbers may be the same as someone else’s!

Powerball was launched in 1992 and is available to play in 44 states in the USA. It’s one of the most popular games in the country, with huge jackpots and frequent payouts. Let’s look at a few facts about Powerball before we begin to talk about the best ways to win!

1. The History of Powerball

Did you know that before Powerball was Powerball, it was called Lotto America? That’s right! There was another big jackpot game that was popular in the United States. Lotto America had 15 lotteries in a few select states, and the powers that be decided it was time to revamp the game.

Powerball took over in 1992 as a way to revitalize the game, and the first drawing was held on April 22, 1992 and yes, someone won the jackpot! A player from Indiana won $5.9 million during that first draw, making them the first official Powerball winner.

The first Powerball games were a little different than the lotto you see today. Players chose five numbers from 45, then another one Powerball number from a separate 45. There were about 15 districts that participated until the game was revamped yet again in 1997.

Over the course of the next few decades, Powerball changed a bit. More states were added to the lotteries and the number of numbers to select from expanded to 69. Jackpots grew, too, and the record Powerball jackpot won to date was $1.586 billion!

2. How to Play Powerball

If you’re excited about the possibility of pocketing a few billion dollars yourself, you can play Powerball on your own. If you live in the United States, this is really easy. There are 44 states and jurisdictions that sell Powerball tickets – you can literally walk into a gas station, hand the clerk $2 and be on your way to winning.

The actual gameplay is just as easy as buying a Powerball lotto ticket. Here’s what you do.

1. Find a retailer that sells Powerball tickets, then find the paper slip
2. Using your pencil, fill out five numbers between 1 and 69
3. Or, you can let the machine choose your numbers for you by choosing Quick Pick
4. Then, pick a Powerball number from 1 to 26
5. If you want, you can select Multidraw, which will play consecutive drawings in the future
6. That’s it!

Now, if you want you can actually take one more step. For an additional dollar, you can choose a multiplier.

When the jackpot is between $40 and $150 million, choose a multiplier to multiply your winnings be anywhere from 2 to 10 times. The only downside to this is that multipliers don’t multiply the jackpot, only the other prize levels.

That’s really all there is to it!

3. Where to Play Powerball

As we mentioned, Powerball can be played anywhere tickets are sold. You don’t have to be a United States citizen to play, either. If you’re from a state that doesn’t sell Powerball, or from a nation outside the United States, you can still play!

Just hop on over to one of the retailers that sells tickets, pick your numbers and wait for the drawing! You’ll see the Powerball numbers drawn at 10:59 PM on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Stay up late to watch the local news, then wait until the numbers are drawn to see if you’re a winner.

You can either visit the location where you bought your ticket to check the numbers, or you can watch the drawing live on tv. Here is a list of stations that covers the Powerball drawing.

4. How to Win at Powerball

Of course, if you’re interested in learning about Powerball and how to play, you’re most certainly interested in learning how to win at Powerball. Well, first let’s go through how the winning Powerball combinations work.

It’s really quite simple. If you match:

Remember that your earnings increase if you also play multipliers, with the exception of the jackpot – that will always stay the same.

So how do you pick your winning numbers? Well, there’s no tried and rue secret. If there were, this wouldn’t be such a fun and exciting game.

We recommend you don’t waste your money doing what some other sites say – they recommend you buy 39 Powerball tickets, each with one of the Powerball numbers selected. This guarantees you a three dollar win.

But, of course, at two dollars per ticket, you definitely won’t come out ahead.

Instead, just go with your gut. Choose numbers you love, like your kids’ birthdays or the date of your first dinner out with your sweetheart. There’s no one strategy to winning Powerball except luck.

5. The Powerball Drawing

You can see the Powerball lotto drawing televised on many television stations, but the drawing itself is held in Tallahassee, Florida. The room where the drawing is held is no joke, either! There’s an auditor and eight security cameras that keep tabs on a barcode that must match the code the auditor holds.

Then, there are “Muscle Agents” who are also on standby should anything go wrong. (Okay, so they’re called Muscle Agents but they’re actually Multistate Lottery Employees – MUSL – but it sounds pretty tough, doesn’t it?)

The equipment itself is checked, too. Two of the four Powerball machines are chosen at random, as are the lottery balls. Wearing gloves, handlers will x-ray and weigh the equipment. Why the gloves?

Well, because oil and moisture from workers’ hands can skew the results of Powerball. Yes, they take it that seriously!

So, as you can see, when there are billions of dollars at stake, the folks at Powerball take their jobs very seriously! All this preparation results in just a one minute broadcast, but potentially many changed lives.

6. Powerball Results

You can check the results of Powerball at the store where you bought your ticket, or you can watch the broadcast. There are other places you can go to look for Powerball results, too, even if you didn’t buy a ticket. Just curious who won the lotto? You can find that information online.

First, just look at your local newspaper! If the jackpot was won, it’ll be in there! Many people wish to remain obvious, for good reason, but you can find out where the jackpot was won and a little more information about the stories the winners have to share.

You can also look online at the Official Powerball Website. You can do this at any time of day – as soon as the site is updated, the results we be available to you.

Finally, you’re going to want to know if you, yourself have won in the Powerball lotto results. You can reference the information above and see how many matches you’ve made. Or, if you like, you can simply bring your slip into your local retailer.

They can scan the barcode and tell you instantly if you’re a winner. One very important thing you’ll need to know about winning Powerball is this: sign your ticket as soon as you get it in the store!

Once you’ve bought the ticket, anyone holding it can claim to be the winner if you don’t sign it. So put your signature on that ticket first thing so there can be no question.

7. Big Winners in Powerball

If you manage to win at the Powerball lotto, it’s going to be life changing. Sure, seven dollars may not pay your mortgage, but you may be prompted to play again and after all, they say “you can’t win if you don’t play,” right?

So even if you just win a few bucks, you’re going to feel really lucky. But what about those people who buy a two dollar ticket and walk away with millions? Here are some Powerball jackpot stories.

Bill Lawrence

Bill Lawrence is from Nevada County, Florida, and he won big in 2019. He and his sweetheart had just celebrated their 20^th anniversary of marriage and had a trip planned.

But when he won $150,000 on a Powerball lotto ticket, that trip changed for the better. His winning numbers were 23-37-32-58-03 and his Powerball number was 22. Good luck!

Lerynne West

Lerynne West is from Iowa, what some from the United States would call the middle of nowhere. Her winning Powerball lotto ticket was purchased from a little convenience store in a town with a population of just 830.

Ultimately, West won almost $344 million with the numbers 8-12-13-19-27 and the Powerball number 4. What we love most about this story is that West is giving a portion of her winnings to the non-profit the Callum Foundation, which is named for her son.

John and Lisa Robinson, Maureen Smith and David Kaltscmidt, Marvin and Mae Acosta

The biggest Powerball jackpot in history was split between three couples. The total was $1.586 billion dollars, but even split three ways, that’s a sum to die for!

Each ticket gave the winners the option to take home $533 million (before taxes) as an annuity, or a lump sum of $327.8. Which would you choose if you’d won this Powerball jackpot?

Mavis Wanczyk

Mavis Wanczyk quit her job almost immediately after winning the Powerball jackpot of $758.7 million. She actually got a lot of backlash for this because the number one rule for Powerball winners is to keep quiet about your winnings!

We’re not sure how broadcasting her winnings impacted her, or how much money family started asking for. We do know, though, that she made the news publicly within 24 hours of her winning.

8. Jackpots at Powerball

You may be wondering how likely you are to win the jackpots at Powerball. Well, first, as we mentioned, you can’t win if you don’t play! So buy those tickets if you’re in a location where they’re sold, then wait for the Saturday and Wednesday drawings.

Your odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are always the same: 1 in 292,201,338. But remember – it’s not just the Powerball jackpot that counts! You can win some huge prizes when you play, ranging from $4 to $1 million.

Those multipliers count, too, so be sure to play a multiplier if you feel lucky. You can choose to take your payment in one lump sum, which is subject to taxes. You can expect about 37% of your winnings to go to the United States government in one form or another.

You can also choose to take your payment as an annuity. You’re still subject to taxes, but your tax bracket will be different so you’ll probably only be paying about 25% in taxes.

The choice is yours which you choose, but there are two schools of thought:

• Some people say that choosing the lump sum allows you to invest the money and make it work for you, even if you’ll pay more in taxes.
• Some say that choosing the annuity is better because if you mess up and buy something less than intelligent with the money (and most people do) you always have another payment next year to help you recover.

9. Winning Powerball Numbers

There’s no way to accurately predict the winning Powerball numbers. That’s why the game is so exciting – you just don’t know who’s going to win. There are a few strategies people play by, though, and they seem to be pretty popular ones.

• Play the same numbers every time you buy a ticket – the odds of the same number being drawn twice seem to be low
• Play when the jackpot is high – for some reason, there seems to be a “big winner” when the jackpot is at its biggest. Perhaps because people aren’t limiting themselves to buying just one ticket.
• Choose numbers you’ll remember, like your kids’ birthdays, your anniversaries or others

There do seem to be some numbers that are drawn more often than others, though. Statistics show that 23, 28, 32, 61, 64 and 69 are drawn most frequently for the white balls. For the Powerball, the most common number is 24.

You can use that information how you like, but remember there are no guarantees in Powerball!

10. How Much Money Can You Win on Powerball Lotto?

If you’re thinking about playing Powerball, go for it! The risk is low – just two to three dollars. And the payout can be extremely high, even if you don’t win the jackpot. The Powerball multiplier makes your winnings even more, so don’t be afraid to play a multiplier!

People have won anywhere from $4 to billions of dollars on the Powerball lotto, so while we can’t tell you how much you’ll win, we can tell you that the winnings potential is insanely huge. So get your tickets and choose your numbers – you might be the next Powerball winner!