The EuroMillions is going to look a little different today. For the first time in its history, the jackpot on offer has it an astounding high of €200-Million!
How did this come about? Well, it all started 10 months ago when the EuroMillions announced a few significant changes to its rules.
Up until February this year, the EuroMillions had a maximum jackpot total of €190-Million. The rules as of February 2020 were changed to increase this maximum by another €10-Million. To fund this, more of the sales were allocated to the EuroMillions Lottery Jackpot. Not only does this mean that there are now 3 SuperDraws per year (rather than 2), it was also the expectation that this would mean that the jackpot would grow more quickly and the maximum would be reached after fewer roll-overs.
However, despite the jackpot totals tending to grow more quickly, 2020 has seen a lot of very lucky players guessing the correct winning lottery numbers. After the amazing run on jackpots it has taken 10 months and the latest SuperDraw rolling over three times to get to this new exciting level. And this is where things get even more interesting.
There have been no changes to the rules for the 'Must Be Won' draws. Once the cap is reached, the jackpot stays there for a total of four more draws - so a total of five draws at the maximum amount. On the fifth draw, if there are no jackpot winners, the prize rolls down to the next available winning tier. While that ensures that the money in the prize pot is guaranteed to get allocated to lucky winners by draw number five, this isn't exactly new.
But here's the really cool change: every time the EuroMillions jackpot hits its cap, the next cap is raised by €10-Million. That means that once the dust has settled on the current maximum jackpot draws, the next time this happens the maximum will go up to €210-Million. And this will happen each time the cap is reached, up to a current maximum of €250-Million!
Now, given how long it has taken to get here from when the rule was first introduced, it may be some time before we hit the new potential maximum of €250-Million, but it will certainly be a wild ride getting there. And in the meanwhile, that €200-Million jackpot is waiting for the lucky lottery winner with the winning lottery ticket.
