CLEVELAND, Ohio — The Mega Millions lottery wants bigger jackpots and better odds of winning, but it’s going to cost more … over twice as much.
Mega Millions announced it will increase the price of a single play to $5 in April, up from $2, with the promise it will lead to faster-growing and larger jackpots. It also says tickets will have a built-in multiplier that could increase the prize to $10 million for matching five white balls without the Mega Ball.
There also will be no “break-even” prizes, meaning that a winning ticket will always be worth more than the $5 cost.
RELATED: Mega Millions numbers for Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024; jackpot $129 million
Joshua Johnston, lead director of the Mega Millions Consortium, tells the Los Angeles Times that the changes are meant to differentiate Mega Millions from other lottery games.
“Sales really start to ramp up around [jackpots of] $700 million, $800 million and they really go wild when they hit a billion dollars, so obviously there’s an appetite out there for those eye-popping jackpots,” Johnston tells The Times.
There have been six Mega Millions jackpots topping $1 billion. The most recent was a $1.13 billion jackpot won in March in Neptune Township, New Jersey. The prize still has not been claimed and will expire after one year, according to Mega Millions.
The current odds of winning a Mega Millions jackpot are 1 in 302.6 million. The news release did not say how the odds will be adjusted.
This is the first price increase since 2017 and only the second since Mega Millions launched in 2002.
Mega Millions tickets are sold in Ohio and 44 other states, as well as Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Drawings currently are held on Monday, Wednesday and Saturday nights.
