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Tonight’s Mega Millions jackpot was the largest in Mega Millions’ history, reaching an estimated $667 million. Do we know yet if anyone won the Mega Millions jackpot? As of 12:45 a.m. Eastern, we have learned that NO ONE won tonight’s Mega Millions jackpot. The next one is estimated to be a record-breaking $868 million. It will be the largest jackpot in Mega Millions’ history and the second-largest in lottery history, only behind the Powerball billion-dollar jackpot. Some people did win smaller amounts tonight, but no one matched all the numbers to walk away with the big jackpot.
It typically takes about two hours from the time of the drawing to process all the tickets and find out if someone won. The drawing was at 11 p.m. Eastern and the results often are not announced until around 1 a.m. Eastern. We found out the results around 12:45 a.m. Eastern.
The winning numbers for tonight are 3 – 45 – 49 – 61 – 69 and a Megaball of 9, and a Megaplier of 5x.
Typically once it’s known whether or not someone won, MegaMillions updates its website to either restart the jackpot at $40 million or to increase the estimated jackpot for the next drawing on Friday if no one won. Sometimes it takes much longer to get an answer than a couple hours after the drawing, however. With the big jackpot in March 2018 that was about $521 million (and we’ve now surpassed that amount,) we actually didn’t find out if anyone won until the next morning. But that was highly unusual.
Even when a winner is eventually announced, it could still take a while before we find out their identity (if ever.) The time they have to claim their prize varies by the state. In New Jersey, players have a year to claim their prize from the date of the drawing.
And there’s always a chance a winner might stay anonymous, thanks to a recent Powerball jackpot winner in New Hampshire. Although New Hampshire rules allow people who win games like Powerball to take up to a one year to claim their prize, New Hampshire law also requires the winner’s name, town, and amount won be available for public information. The winner was able to file a lawsuit and stay anonymous while claiming the winnings through an anonymous trust, even though they had originally signed their winning ticket with their name. Although that court’s ruling isn’t binding in other states, it means that there’s at least a chance that a winner might file a similar lawsuit and win for future jackpots.
Since Mega Millions changed the jackpot rules in October 2017, we can expect a better chance that the jackpots will get bigger and bigger and break more records over time. The largest jackpots in history were: #1) $656 million in March 2012; #2.) $648 million in December 2013; #3.) $536 million in July 2016; and #4.) $522 million in July 2018, and #5.) $521 million in March 2018. This means that today’s jackpot isn’t in the top five, but it’s getting closer.
The odds of winning Mega Millions are 1 in 302.6 million, which are actually less than the odds of winning the Powerball, which is 1 in 292.2 million.
In order to win the jackpot, you’d need to match all five white balls and the yellow Mega ball.
Did you win something tonight? Let us know in the comments below.