Lotto 6/49 Details

[Prizes | Odds & Payouts | Jackpot Probabilities | Ticket Price Doubling]

Prizes

Forty-five percent of LOTTO 6/49 draw sales are dedicated to the Prize Fund. The total amount of $10 prizes are paid from the Prize Fund. The balance remaining comprises the Pool's Fund and is allocated (parimutuel) between the 4/6 (23%), 5/6 (12%), 5/6+B (15%) and 6/6 (50%) prize categories as indicated in the table below. Any amount not won in the 6/6 or "5/6 + Bonus" prize categories is added to the 6/6 jackpot prize for the next draw.

Odds and Payouts

Number of Matches	Odds / $1 Wager (1:)	Unique Combinations	Pool's Fund %	Average Payout (variable)	Total Payout	Payout %
6/6*	13,983,816.0	1	50%	~$1,912,258.60	$2 million minimum	~14.30%
5/6 + Bonus*	2,330,636.0	6	15%	~$95,612.90	~$573,677.40	~4.10%
5/6*	55,491.33	252	12%	~$1,821.20	~$458,942.40	~3.28%
4/6*	1,032.40	13,545	23%	~$64.90	~$879,070.50	~6.29%
3/6	56.66 (1.77%)	246,820	$10 fixed	$10 fixed	$2,468,200	17.65%

Total Winners	53.66 (1.86%)	260,624		$24.48	$6,379,890.30	45.62%
2/6 + Bonus	81.21 (1.2%)	172,200
2/6	8.33 (12.0%)	1,678,950
1/6	2.42 (41.3%)	5,775,588
0/6	2.29 (43.6%)	6,096,454

Total	1 (100%)	13,983,816

Any prize (From June 2004, 2+B wins $5; $2/ticket)	64.62	432,824

*If there is more than one winning ticket, the prize in that category will be shared.

A winning set of numbers entitles a winner to a prize in only one of the above prize categories. LOTTO 6/49 is a national game, available across Canada. winning tickets may only be redeemed in the province where they were purchased. Other 6/49-type lotteries will have similar odds as above, e.g., Ontario 49, Western 649, BC/49, Quebec 49 and Atlantic 6/49.

Ever since the price doubled to $2 per ticket, it now takes $27,967,632 to buy every possible combination. There was a one in 53.66 chance of winning a prize, or 1.86%. The average prize won was $24.48.

The payout percentage is supposed to be 45%, but the actual payout can be slightly higher at 45.62% because the jackpot has been guaranteed to be a minimum of $2 million since around July 12, 2000. So despite the average jackpot being calculated as $1,912,258.60, the jackpot is set higher at $2 milion.

The jackpot rollovers are guaranteed at $5 million, then $10 million. Since only 13.67% (average) of sales is allocated to the jackpot, the calculated jackpot is usually less than the guarantee, so the actual payout when the jackpot is won can be much more than 45%.

A whopping 17.65% of sales is allocated to the $10 prize category, which is surprisingly more than the percentage allocated to the jackpot.

Jackpot Probabilities

Roughly 4% of jackpots rollover to $12 million or more. Twelve percent of jackpots are for $10 million, 29% for $5 million, and 54% of draws are for the minimum $2 million jackpot.

P(x) is the probability of x number of winners of the jackpot. For the initial draws, the probability that the $2 million jackpot will rollover is approximately 46%, assuming 11 million tickets are sold. There is a 36% probability that there will be exactly one winning ticket. There is a 14% chance that there will be two winners, and a 4% chance of three winners. The probability of four or more winners is less than 1%. The expected payout is 41%, i.e., for every dollar you spend, you can expect to get back 41˘.

Jackpot	$2 Million	$5 Million		$10 Million	$12 Million
Percentage of Draws	54.46%	29.39%		12.28%	3.86%
P(0)	45.54%	36.79%	35.45%	23.93%	18.63%
P(1)	35.82%	36.79%	36.76%	34.22%	31.30%
P(2)	14.09%	18.39%	19.06%	24.47%	26.30%
P(3)	3.69%	6.13%	6.59%	11.67%	14.73%
P(4)	0.73%	1.53%	1.71%	4.17%	6.19%
P(5)	0.11%	0.31%	0.35%	1.19%	2.08%
P(6)	0.01%	0.05%	0.06%	0.28%	0.58%
Expected Payout	41.22%	53.92%	44.0%	69.35%	72.85%
Estimated Number of Tickets	11 million	13,983,816	14.5 million	20 million	23.5 million

In the case of the number of tickets sold being equal to the odds (13,983,816), there is an equal probability of zero and one winner of the jackpot. If the jackpot is $5 million, the expected payout is 54%.

Ticket Price Will Double!

Beware that the lottery corporations (ILC) plan to double the price of a Lotto 6/49 ticket after the May 29, 2004 draw. Read Lottery Players Vent Fury. Contrary to the ILC's claims that the odds of winning will improve, the odds per $1 wager will actually worsen from 1:53.66 to 1:64.62, as you can see from the above table. For every dollar you spend, there will only be a 1 in 65 chance of winning a prize, which is much worse than Lotto Super 7's 1:12 odds.

While it currently costs less than $14 million to buy every possible combination, it will cost $27,967,632 after the price increase!

Results in Lottery Buddy Ž are unofficial.

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