Lottery

Two players won the UK Lotto jackpot on Saturday 18 May, but the lottery limelight was well and truly stolen by the Powerball game in the USA, which saw its biggest ever jackpot landed by a single ticket. Saturday’s Powerball jackpot was worth $590.5 million, beating the previous record of $587.5 million, and the winning ticket was sold in the state of Florida. Whilst we applaud that fantastic success, we would also like to congratulate the two players who shared a jackpot worth £3,753,310 in our own Lotto game.

Winning any lottery jackpot is a once-in-a-lifetime achievement for most people, so winning a double rollover jackpot in a game that doesn’t often see double rollovers is something very special indeed. Two players did precisely that last night by matching all six of the main numbers in the midweek Lotto draw. Rollovers in each of the two preceding draws had helped to give the midweek jackpot a final value of £8,379,678, so each of the lucky Lotto winners can now claim an equal share worth £4,189,839.

It is becoming increasingly common for draw-based lottery games to offer an additional ‘raffle’ element that creates a guaranteed winner regardless of what happens in the main draw. The Millionaire Raffle is the best known example, giving one UK player a prize of £1 million every time a EuroMillions game takes place. The Lotto game will also be introducing a raffle in autumn 2013, and that will create at least 50 winners of £20,000 each in every Lotto draw. With raffle games becoming more widespread, it makes sense to take a look at some lottery raffle strategies that might help you to win big.