Fascinating study reveals states where lottery players are most likely to win  Mega Millions or Powerball jackpots

Passionate lottery players may consider moving to Delaware if they want a chance to win the jackpot.

A new study by Lottery Geeks found that the First State has the highest proportion of lottery winners of any US state.

The findings come as Wednesday’s Powerball Jackpot drawing soared to $865 million, while $1.1. Tonight the drawing will take place for one billion Mega Millions prizes: the eighth largest prize in United States history.

Lottery Geeks analyzed the number of Powerball and Mega Millions winners in every US state and compared it to their overall population. The study did not evaluate whether those states had a higher number of lottery players since that data is not available.

Delaware has been home to 10 Powerball winners out of a population of 989,948. This means that the state has 10.10 winners per million inhabitants.

However, it has had no Mega Millions winners, reducing its overall lottery winning ratio to 5.05 per million.

Next was New Hampshire, which has 11 Powerball winners out of a population of 1,377,529, or eight winners per million people. In third place was Rhode Island, which has a winning rate of 7.29 winners per million inhabitants.

Indiana came in fourth and has the most champions overall, with 39. This means that residents of the state, which has a population of 1,097,379, have a 5.75 in a million chance of winning the jackpot .

Completing the top ten: Missouri, Nebraska, West Virginia, Kansas, Minnesota and Kentucky.

The study also looked at which states had hosted a Mega Millions winner.

Their results showed that Indiana and Missouri each counted two, while Kansas, Minnesota, Rhode Island and New Hampshire had one.

The data was obtained from lottery data, while the population figures were tracked from the US census.

Both the Mega Millions and Powerball games have endured a long jackpot drought, allowing overall winnings to snowball.

No one has won the Mega Millions prize since December 8, 2023, meaning there have been 30 consecutive drawings without a winner.

Meanwhile, the Powerball prize has not been won since New Year’s Day even though 36 drawings have been held since then.

For both games, the long jackpot drought is no coincidence. The games have high odds specifically to create big prizes that will generate a lot of interest and sales.

For Mega Millions, the odds are 1 in 302.6 million and for Powerball they are 1 in 292.2 million.

The $1.1 billion Mega Millions prize goes to a single winner who chooses to be paid through an annuity over 30 years. A winner who opts for a cash payment would receive $525.8 million.

Those winnings would be subject to federal taxes, and some states also tax lottery winnings.

Mega Millions is played in 45 states, plus Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Powerball is also played in those states, as well as Washington, D.C., the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico.