By Todd Northrop
What a week for Mega Millions multi-state lottery players!
The lotteries have raised the official Mega Millions jackpot estimate for the second time in as many days to a knee-weakening $355 million for tonight's drawing.
That's a $25 million increase just from yesterday.
Likewise, the lump-sum cash option of tonight's jackpot is now $224.2 million — an increase of $15.9 million from yesterday's estimate.
And there's no telling how high the jackpot will become by the time the drawing kicks off at 11:00 pm Eastern Time.
Lotteries are typically conservative when estimating jackpots, to ensure that the actual jackpot amount is not less than the estimate. Often the jackpot is much higher than the estimate by the time all ticket sales are accounted for.
Lottery players seeking to check the winning numbers Tuesday night are urged to use USA Mega (www.usamega.com). State lottery Web sites are normally brought to a standstill during busy periods, while USA Mega normally remains responsive.
Mega Millions drawing results will be posted immediately after the 11:00 pm drawing at USA Mega. The number of winners and new jackpot will be announced after all participating Mega Millions states have reported their data, which normally occurs within a couple of hours after the drawing.
Players are advised not to wait until the last minute to buy their lottery tickets. Sale typically remain open until around 10:45 pm Eastern Time on Tuesday, although players should check with a lottery retailer in their state for the exact sales cutoff time.
If the jackpot is not won on Tuesday, players will almost certainly see the world's first $400+ million lottery jackpot Friday.
The odds of winning the jackpot are approximately 1 in 176 million. The odds of winning any of the Mega Millions prizes are approximately 1 in 40.
Mega Millions features nine different prize levels, ranging from $2 all the way up to the jackpot. Players can win even if they just match one number — the Mega Ball number.
Most states also offer the Megaplier option for an extra dollar per ticket purchased. The Megaplier multiplies any non-jackpot prizes won by 2, 3, or 4 times, depending on the Megaplier number drawn that evening.
Players who purchase the Megaplier and win second prize will automatically have their prize increased by 4x to $1 million.
i wolud buy more, but its not going to make a difference. I already spent a lot on the previous drawings contributing to this. I currently have $21 worth.
Oh my goodness, what a jackpot. I could fix that transmission in my old trk
To those considering multiple ticket purchases, I have posted a very in-depth explanation of how you can calculate your odds: https://www.lotterypost.com/news/225630/1903831
Oh my God! What am I gonna do with all this money?
How awesome is this?? I can't believe it keeps going up and up!
I would probably have a heart attack if I won tonight.
Pennsylvania needs the first Mega Millions Jackpot for the State tonite ..........
........... I will be happy to accept the very large EFT into my bank account!
The odds are big .......... and I am small ............ but somebody's gunna win very big eventually!
$233,000,000 is the cash world record, we are 9 million away in cash form breaking the record
145,600,000 atfer full max fed rate of 35%, check mega for your state tax's thro
wow what am going to do with that much money, am not the sharing type, but really, wtf am i do to with it other then buy more stocks that pay dividends , guest i just have to buy 100m worth of stocks Rofl, maybe spend 10m to 20m rebuying More lottery tickets and games in tennesseee
i can see the headlines, winner travels across nation playing millions per month on the diff state lottery's, why, cease he can write off the Losers thats Same Tax year agiant hes Win, LOL
aka i may of won 145m atfer tax's, but i spent 10 to 20m to do it, LOL am to greedy
and if it rolls, Ha, the irs will be crying in joy as they steal their first 100m in pure tax's form 1 jackpot
Holy hell, with so many tickets being sold,
am having my doubts it can avoid us all and roll anymore, if it does, let the party happen!, jackpot fever is already rocketing!
f it, i get 20 more LOL
their be at lest 35 to maybe 40ish 5-0 2nd place winners, and sense their only about 46 mega numbers, i hope it lands on the few mega numbers NOT yet matched with a ticket, the odds favor the players wining it by sheer force of numbers like shotgun spread, this jackpot about out of luck
if it does not roll, someone form here better win LOL
p.s loved your odd post todd, glad to see math of odds detailed
What???!!!???!!! It's been all of about 3 minutes so far... They haven't raised it more that 355, yet??
ok, NOW i am going to go out and buy more than one ticket ------> (JK)
it only takes one...
WOW
all i could afford was $4 in QP and that was after finding every last bit of change i could, a win like this would be nice
good luck everyone
DREAMS DO COME TRUE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I pray that God watches over the winner. Good luck everyone!
One of the first things I'll do if I win:
Because you know the media is gonna be all over the winner(s).
Would be real nice to retire.
times two .........
bought my $3 ....... personally this would prove the most interesting drawing since Jack
lord help the poor sucker that gets that lucky tonite
<snip> u buddy pennsylvania sucks. cali in the house la#1 i won so stop playing
phooey on california .... still waiting on it to fall off into the pacific
hearsetrax: lord help the poor sucker that gets that lucky tonite
lol i know what you mean their, if 1 person wins, and they go public, their doomed with everyone asking for money, DOOMED!
and hope they watch their back, lawsuits form thin air will must likly appear, people are that stupid and sad and evil all in one
and god forbid its a single male, their be so many "gold diggers" it be sad to see it happen
hopful they at lest buy some body guards to stand in the way of people asking for money,
you need to go thro hes staff before you can meet with him LOL
if anything yells hides behind lawyers and a trust name, its winning this kind of amount by your self, let the poor lawyer be the front man vs a army of media dogs
it also be intresting to watch all the state lotto sites, DROP offline like crazy tonite, am sure todd getting ready for coming war of site hits lol
maybe we should start a thread called, mega millions draw kills x number of lottery sites, post them here
we can like keep count of how many go down right atfer the draw LOL
buk all of you stop playing i have already won im taking 26payments because im 18... cali in the house la#1 bye.....
And you would be able to pay for the best medical care!
Thank you for your prayer. I really appreciate it.
Yahoo! I love it..... I went to buy another $5 worth of tickets at my favorite store and was nicely suprised to see it had gone up to $355 Million! Oh the wonderfull things I could do with a jackpot of this size........I would wish everyone Good Luck but it won't help this Jackpot has my name written all over it!! LOL!!
i say if anyone on here wins it they give 10k to everyone in this thread...i will if i win.
check will be in the mail in a few weeks
i hope no one wins because i want to see a new record. i would love to have the new record or a piece of it. please no winners and lets go for a record.
Would definitely be cool to see it hit $500 Mill which I am sure it will if this one rolls...But I will be more than hapy to take the $355 =)
I hope somebody wins the Mega Millions Jackpot in this draw.
No way in hell it's not getting hit tonight, especially with how many tickets are apparently being bought.
my god, its all over all major news websites local
this one thing catched my eye:
after a conference call between lottery directors, Mega Millions officials decided at about 11:40 a.m. to bump up the prize to $355 million, based on the brisk sales.
so now the diff lottery directors are having conference calls over how big this thing is
, i love to hear that conference
#1 director like: dude sells are out of control, we need to rasie it again
#2 director: omfg ever time we up the amount, even more sales happen,
#3 director: i know #2, its like we could say its any number and we get the sales to support it
#1 director: if it rolls, we could be looking at half a billion plus jackpot
everyone on conference call breaks out with sound of laughter
conference ends. lol
I'll take a million dollars, thank you!
It still amuses me how Powerball jacked up their odds yet MM is still the one coming close to a record breaking jackpot.
now you are talking. 500 million would be nice. i have my fingers crossed that it will get past this drawing. if not may i get a piece of the drawing. i would love the big prize but i will take a 3 dollar win. hahahahah.
I got a note from a lottery today indicating that if nobody wins tonight, the Friday jackpot will be $480 million, with a cash option of $303.2 million.
Remember it doesn't matter if the jackpot is a billion dollars, your still 350 times more likely to get hit by lightning than hit the jackpot.
I would like very much to win tonight, however, if I don't and the jackpot hits this new high, this $480Mil will inevitably be raised to probably about $580Mil by the drawing.
Wow. That would be about $237Mil in the bank after those annoying taxes. Holy cow!!
Sounds like cross selling and adding a bunch more states selling the game without a matrix change didn't effect the potential size of the jackpots.
WOW!!!! this is so CRAZY!!!!!
This new member needs to go elsewhere ............ this is a friendly site!
I would love to win so that this superior person can be angry & what ever else ..............!
I like this idea.
here is my plan
current meg jackpot
355000000 divided by
29 =
---------------
12241379.3103448 * yearly installments (could be wrong on the years)
12241379.3103448 - federal and state taxes
35 %
---------------
7956896.55172412 *
7956896.55172412 - amount my wife and I share
85 %
---------------
1193534.48275862 * yearly amount for me to be stupid
1193534.48275862 x
29 =
---------------
34612500 * stupid amount for me for 29 years
I buy the tickets all the time but I want some of my own money and not have my wife say that is a waste. So if she leaves me I am still keeping my 15% every year. A million dollars a year is a nice amount for me. Let me end with I love my wife dearly and she would deserve the 85% for putting up with me and vice versa.
todd you are the man for getting us this info,
no doubt thats a understatement of it really be by draw time LOL
they should just market it as 500m to start and the sales will support it, news media"half a billion dollar jackpot" will makes the sales go Wild
but 300m plus in cash, holy beep thats a lot of cash
the irs will be laughing at the winnersno doubt, it be pure highway robbery
man i never wanted to see a jackpot roll like i do now, even thro the odds are agiant it at this point, i want my half a billion jackpot darn it
I admit it, I have bought more tickets than I normally do. Usually I spend about $5 if it's over $100 million.
This time, well, I figure we've bought around $40 worth. That's about the most we've ever spent, but considering the jackpot, this is the right time to be doing it.
I just hope I'm supporting my own win!
Last drawing had $121,000,0000 in sales. The jackpot increase was $42,000,000. This increase is $113,000,000.
Extrapolating, that would indicate sales for this drawing of over $240,000,000. The odds are 1 in 176,000,000. More than likely, the jackpot will be won.
I am going to re-retire!