MegaMillons ( 5Tickets )
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Mega Millions® began on August 31, 1996 as the Big Game. The first drawing took place on September 6, 1996, with six states participating: Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan and Virginia.
After exciting growth of the game in 1997, a Tuesday drawing was added in February 1998. Players were given a larger choice of numbers and a "cash payout" option in January 1999. In May 1999, New Jersey became the seventh member state.
In May 2002, the multistate game was given the new name of "Mega Millions," New York and Ohio became member states, and the game matrix and prize amounts were changed to offer players more excitement.
In September 2002, Washington became the 10th member state, followed by Texas in December 2003. In June 2005, California became the 12th member, solidifying Mega Millions as the country's most widely played multistate jackpot game.
On January 31, 2010, 23 more state lotteries joined Mega Millions as a historic cross-selling agreement between Mega Millions and Powerball® went into effect. With additional lotteries joining since then, Mega Millions is now played in 47 jurisdictions: 45 states plus the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
On March 30, 2012, Mega Millions made history with the world’s largest prize in any jackpot game to that date: $656 million. The jackpot was split three ways, by winning tickets in Illinois, Kansas and Maryland. That lottery industry record stood for almost four years until it was eclipsed by a $1.586 billion Powerball jackpot in January 2016. Mega Millions joined the billion-dollar club on October 23, 2018, with a $1.537 billion prize. This was yet another milestone for Mega Millions, as the South Carolina win was the world’s largest lottery prize won on a single ticket. That single-ticket industry record stood for more than four years.
Second-Tier Prize Milestone
Mega Millions® became the first jackpot game to offer second-tier prizes of up to $5 million when it relaunched with a new matrix on October 19, 2013. In just over four years with a 5-of-75 plus 1-of-15 matrix, there were 571 Match 5 winners, including 65 that were worth more than the $1 million standard prize by including the optional Megaplier. Twenty-eight of those were $5 million winning tickets.
The game changed again about four years later, moving to a 5-of-70 plus 1-of-25 matrix on October 28, 2017, with a $2 ticket price. This led to better odds of winning the second-tier prize and an initial starting jackpot of $40 million, with the goal of more frequent larger jackpots. This version of Mega Millions weathered unexpectedly challenging times, through the Covid-19 pandemic and beyond. Yet during its more than seven-year run, this matrix produced a whopping seven jackpots of $1 billion or more, along with 1,181 Match 5 winning tickets (including 223 worth more than $1 million by including the optional Megaplier).
Mega Prizes at All Levels
On April 8, 2025, Mega Millions® entered a bold new era with a starting jackpot of $50 million, recognizing the excitement of larger jackpots and considerably enhanced lower-tier prizes. The matrix still has 70 white balls, but there are now 24 gold Mega Balls instead of 25, improving the odds of winning the jackpot. And replacing the optional Megaplier is a built-in multiplier, with prizes of 2X, 3X, 4X, 5X and 10X the base level on all eight non-jackpot prize tiers. Another popular feature is the removal of breakeven prizes – the lowest prize tier has a minimum prize of $10, double the new ticket price of $5.
Mega Millions is still the only game in the U.S. that offers a second-tier prize greater than $2 million – and now as high as $10 million! It is also the only game that has awarded seven jackpots exceeding $1 billion to individual ticket-holders in seven DIFFERENT jurisdictions across the country: Florida, South Carolina, New Jersey, Maine, Illinois, Michigan and California.
Top 10 Mega Millions Jackpots
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$ 1.602 Billion1 Winning Ticket FL 8/8/2023
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$ 1.537 Billion1 Winning Ticket SC 10/23/2018
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$ 1.348 Billion1 Winning Ticket ME 1/13/2023
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$ 1.337 Billion1 Winning Ticket IL 7/29/2022
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$ 1.269 Billion1 Winning Ticket CA 12/27/2024
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$ 1.128 Billion1 Winning Ticket NJ 3/26/2024
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$ 1.05 Billion1 Winning Ticket MI 1/22/2021
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$ 983 Million1 Winning Ticket GA 11/14/2025
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$ 810 Million1 Winning Ticket TX 9/10/2024
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$ 656 Million3 Winning Tickets IL/KS/MD 3/30/2012