General Rules That Apply to All Draw Games

1. It is the player's responsibility to check his or her ticket to make sure it represents the correct game, draw date, numbers requested and has a visible bar code or serial number.
2. Winning tickets must be claimed within 180 days of the last winning draw date on the ticket.
3. Purchased tickets are only valid for the dates shown on the ticket.
4. The ticket, not the playslip, is the only valid proof of your number selection, and it is the only valid receipt to claim a prize.
5. All tickets, transactions and winners are subject to the directives of the executive director of the Missouri Lottery, the rules and regulations of the Missouri Lottery and the Missouri Statutes, and tickets are only offered for sale in accordance with the same.
6. Upon purchasing a ticket, the player agrees to abide by the Missouri Statutes and all rules and regulations of the Missouri Lottery.
7. A ticket is a bearer instrument. It is recommended that the ticket be signed at the time of purchase.
8. The Missouri Lottery is not responsible for lost or stolen tickets. Tickets are void and will not be paid if determined stolen, unissued, illegible, mutilated, altered in whole or part, misregistered, defective, incomplete, printed or produced in error, multiply-printed, or if the ticket fails any of the Missouri Lottery's confidential validation tests. Liability for void tickets is limited to replacement of the ticket or refund of sales price.
9. Tickets may not be sold to or redeemed by minors under the age of 18.
10. The holder of a winning ticket may win in only one prize category per play board and shall be paid the prize in the highest category won.

Mega Millions Game Rules

A player must select five numbers between 1 and 70 and then select one number (the Mega Ball) between 1 and 24. The cost for one play is $5. A player may select each set in one of four ways: by verbally communicating the numbers to the retailer, by completing a paper playslip, by completing a digital playslip or by requesting a "Quick Pick." A Quick Pick is a computerized randomly-selected set of numbers available through the Draw Games terminal. Mega Millions is drawn twice a week – Tuesday and Friday – at approximately 9:59 p.m. The more numbers the player matches to those drawn, the more the player wins.

How to play Mega Millions using a paper playslip

1. The playslip has five play boards ("PLAY A" through "PLAY E") with two sections on each board. The top section of each board contains numbers 1 through 70, and the bottom section contains numbers 1 through 24. Select five numbers in the top section and one number (the Mega Ball) in the bottom section of each board. You may play 1, 2, 3, 4 or all 5 boards. Cost per board is $5.
2. Make your selections by placing a heavy mark in the top portion and one number (the Mega Ball) in the bottom section by placing a heavy mark in each circle, beginning with board "PLAY A." To have the terminal select the numbers randomly, mark the "QP" circle for "Quick Pick." If you make a mistake, mark the "VOID" circle on that board and select your numbers on the next board.
3. To play your numbers for more than one drawing at a time, mark the appropriate box on the playslip next to "MULTIDRAW." This will play only your selections in boards "PLAY A" through "PLAY E" for that number of drawings.
4. You can play Mega Millions for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 or 15 drawings.
5. Use only a blue or black pen or use a pencil for marking selections. The terminal will not accept red ink.

How to play Mega Millions using a digital playslip with the mobile app

1. Select how many drawings you'd like to play. You can play Mega Millions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10 or 15 drawings.
2. Select the numbers you want to play. First, select five white-ball numbers from 1 to 70; shake your phone or tap the Quick Pick button to have the app select your numbers for you. Next, select a Mega Ball number from 1 to 24; shake your phone or tap the Quick Pick button to have the app select your Mega Ball number for you.
3. Review your digital playslip, then tap "Save Digital Playslip." Present the QR code at retail to use your digital playslip.

How to play Mega Millions verbally

At the discretion of the retailer, Mega Millions may be played by making a verbal request for a ticket. The player must provide the clerk with all of the following information:

1. The dollar amount to be played;
2. The numbers to be played - either player-selected or "Quick Pick"
3. The number of draws to be played.

Mega Millions tickets CANNOT be canceled.

Jackpot winners have 60 days from the claiming date to declare whether they would like their payments in CASH (equal to approximately 50 percent of the estimated, advertised jackpot) or ANNUITY (the advertised jackpot amount paid in 30 graduated annuity payments).

The set prize amounts are based on an expected number of winners. In some cases, these prizes may be paid on a pari-mutuel basis, which will be lower than the published prize levels.

Prizes are approximately 50 percent of sales. Overall odds of winning a prize are 1 in 23.07 for each $5 Mega Millions play.

Selling Hours

All Draw Games are available for purchase from 5 a.m. to 2 a.m. (Club Keno until 1:52 a.m.) seven days a week at any Draw Games retailer, except during Draw Breaks.

Draw Breaks

The process of selecting winning numbers for each game is referred to as a "Drawing" or "Draw." A "Draw Break" is when sales are suspended for a particular game so that the wagers for that "Drawing" may be balanced and the winning numbers drawn. The draw breaks for each game are listed below:

Understanding Mega Millions Chances

No matter how many people play Mega Millions, the chances of winning never change. The chances of winning are based on the amount of number combinations, not the number of players. Quick Pick tickets are generated randomly by the terminal at the retailer, and there is no central computer that is controlling ticket generation.

Many people ask us to explain how their chances of winning are determined. So, let's start at the beginning!

The Mega Millions game is played by selecting five numbers out of 70 choices (the numbers from 1 to 70), and by selecting one extra number from 1 to 24 (that's the Mega Ball®). When it's time to draw the winning numbers, there are two machines tumbling the ball sets at the same time: one machine has the 70 white balls, and the other one has the 24 gold "Mega Balls®." So the Mega Millions game is holding two drawings at the same time; two independent events played simultaneously. Any chances of winning has to consider what happens to the number selections within one drum combined with the possibilities of what's happening in the other drum. That idea is really important to keep in mind. A winning set of numbers will be whatever five balls are selected out of the white-ball drum, plus the one ball selected from the gold-ball drum.

But the chances of winning look confusing because even at the smallest winning level (just getting the Mega Ball® right), many people think the chances of winning that should be 1 in 24 (one correct choice out of a drum of 24 balls, right?). But we're not just playing that one drum; in order to say you "only matched the Mega Ball®" that means you have to have missed all five of the white balls that were chosen in that other drum! The chances of doing that combined with your 1-in-24 shot of getting the Mega Ball® actually come out to being about 1 in 35.2. In other words, there is about one chance in 35 that you'd pick the winning Mega Ball® number and miss selecting any of the five winning white-ball numbers.

So when you hear a "chances of winning" calculation, it's describing the chance that you will have chosen the winning numbers, including the chances you chose numbers that didn't get drawn. Since there are several ways to win (from zero to all five of the white balls, with and without having the Mega Ball®), that means people who calculate the chances of winning have to figure each level of winning or not winning in each of the two drums.

For example, in order to win the big jackpot, a winner must have chosen all five white balls correctly, as well as the Mega Ball® number. To describe the chances of winning, you have to say what your possible chances are of choosing the winning balls against choosing any of the 65 non-winning balls in the one drum, combined with your chances of choosing the winning Mega Millions against choosing any of the 23 non-winning " Mega Balls®"in that drum. That's a lot of combinations - more than 290.4 million, in fact. But there's an easy formula that gets you there.

Where Do You Start?

Any calculation of chances for a Lottery game involves three basic elements:

• The total number of balls (numbers) you are choosing from, which is called the field or (f).
• The number of balls the player selects on his\her playslip, which is called the pick or (p).
• The number of correct matches between the player's picks and the numbers drawn out of the machine, which is called the match (m).

The mathematical formula looks like this:

Each part of that formula, which is in parentheses, is a "binomial coefficient," which is a calculation on how many ways there are to make different combinations. In our case, we're talking about how many combinations of lottery balls you could make with a set of 70 (or 24) balls. What that means is that for whatever numbers you have, the binomial can be rewritten as follows:

X! means "x factorial"; for example, 5! is 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1 = 120.

Mega Millions chances of winning the jackpot:

(5 of 5 plus the Mega Ball®)

Now we're ready to look at winning that jackpot!

To do that, we said you'd have to describe the chances of picking five numbers including 65 non-winning ones out of a total of 70. Then you combine that with the figure to describe your chances of picking one winning Mega Ball® number, including choosing 23 non-winning numbers. So using our binomials and factorials, it looks like this:

So, 70 x 69 x 68 x 67 x 66 = 1,452,361,680 and 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1 = 120; divide one by the other:

1,452,361,680 / 120 = 12,103,014 (chances of 12,103,014 to 1 of picking all 5 white balls out of 70)

And don't forget that now we have to combine the possibilities of choosing the Mega Ball®, which we know is one in 24. That formula works just like the one above:

So, (12,103,014 / 1) x (24/ 1) = 290,472,336.

Now, that's just one win scenario: the big jackpot. But you can also win eight other prizes ranging from $10 to $10 million.

(In order to win a prize, your Mega Ball® number must at least match the Mega Ball® number drawn, or you must match at least three of the five white-ball numbers drawn.)

When you combine the chances of all those levels and all those combinations, it comes out to roughly 1 in 23.

So each player has a 1-in-23 chance to win any of the prizes!

We hope this helps to better explain the chances of winning the Mega Millions jackpot.