Powerball might have Mega Millions to thank for its latest $1 billion jackpot

By Chris Isidore, CNN

(CNN) — Whether or not anyone wins the billion-dollar Powerball jackpot on Saturday, at least one of the losers might already be known: Mega Millions.

Powerball tickets, priced at $2 apiece, are selling briskly, as lottery tickets tend to do around ten-figured advertised prizes. In contrast, the next Mega Millions jackpot on Tuesday is a comparatively paltry $70 million.

The two jackpots might differ by hundreds of millions – but the number that helps explain why is much smaller.

Three dollars. That’s how much Mega Millions hiked its ticket price in April, more than doubling from $2 to $5.

And it looks like lottery ticket buyers, at least, really care about that difference – especially in an economy where Americans, weary of the high cost of living, are holding onto every dollar.

Mega Millions tickets previously outpaced Powerball tickets in 2024; sales for the two were roughly equal the first three months of this year, even though Powerball has one more drawing per week.

But since Mega Millions’ 150% price hike in April, Powerball ticket sales have pulled way ahead. Mega Millions has sold 495 million tickets since the April 8th change, bringing in $2.5 billion in revenue. During the same period Powerball has sold just over 2 billion tickets, bringing in $4.1 billion, according to numbers compiled by lottery watchdog LottoReport.com using official reports.

Powerball sales are likely being helped as lottery players have been reluctant to shell out the extra few bucks, said Victor Matheson, professor of economics and an expert on the business of gambling at the College of Holy Cross.

Americans have been largely focused on value for dollar after prices have jumped on years of high inflation rates. Sales at Walmart, for example, have grown as more shoppers seek out its rock-bottom prices. Holiday shopping is costing more for less. And even when prices don’t look higher, you still might be getting less for your buck.

But Powerball’s current sales jump isn’t as simple as one product pricing itself out of the market, Matheson said.

The higher ticket sales turn into fatter jackpots – which then draw more ticket sales. Part of that is the shift in buying habits, part of it is bad luck for Mega Millions, which has not had as many long runs between big prizes that drives up the size of the jackpot.

Matheson said the games’ odds uggest that the Mega Millions should rack up big jackpots more often than Powerball, even with bargain-hunting lottery players. But so far, it hasn’t worked out that way.

“I will say that Mega Millions has gotten a little unlucky at the same time Powerball has gotten lucky,” said Matheson.

This weekend is the second time the Powerball top prize has reached $1 billion this year. Its top prize reached $1.8 billion in early September. That’s given it an edge on Mega Millions, which reached near $1 billion just once this year, when its top prize hit $980 million on November 14.

But even then when Mega Millions had a big prize advantage, it frequently sold fewer tickets than Powerball.

Mega Millions sold 23.5 million tickets in the days leading up to the $980 million drawing on November 14, according to LottoReport.com. Powerball sold slightly more tickets, 23.6 million, though its jackpot of $546 million was just more than half the size.

Mega Millions raised its price in the expectation that it would boast more frequent large jackpots and thus create greater sales.

“Jackpots are expected to grow faster and get to higher dollar amounts more frequently in the new game,” the consortium running the game said in April. The consortium did not respond to questions from CNN Friday about its sales since the ticket price increase.

But because Mega Millions brings in so much more on each ticket, even at a slower sales pace, its long-term odds are fine, Matheson said.

Much better, in fact, than the odds for Powerball ticket buyers this weekend.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2025 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.