9 Bold Predictions For US Lottery Industry In 2025

The year 2024 may be remembered as when the wider gambling industry started seriously paying attention to the sheer size of lottery revenue and potential for more— especially online lottery.

See: DraftKings buying Jackpocket for $750 million in February. Enough said, truly. 

(Though there is much more to say.)

With more focus on this sector of the gambling world than ever before, in an era of ever-increasing digitization, the lottery market is poised to make more waves in the upcoming year.

Here are nine bold predictions for the U.S. lottery industry in 2025.

Ripple effect from Texas decision on couriers

Florida made news recently when its lottery shut down operations of lottery courier TheLotter, which it deemed an unauthorized third-party retailer selling tickets illegally.

Texas will continue the discussion of courier legality at a state level.

Lottery couriers are currently allowed to operate in Texas, but there is a groundswell of opposition that will likely result in a decision this legislative session. A pair of bills in the House and Senate, both filed in November, would close a loophole in the current Texas Constitution and prohibit people from purchasing retail lottery tickets via an app or online.

Jackpot.com, TheLotter, and Lotto.com are among the most prominent couriers in Texas.

Lottery couriers are able to operate in states where online lottery purchases aren’t legal because, technically, a lottery purchase via courier is actually directing an agent to make an in-person purchase on your behalf.

Discussion of the legality of lottery couriers in a state as prominent as Texas will generate attention. There is no retail cannibalization argument — tickets purchased via lottery courier still happen at a retail vendor. But decisive action from Texas could motivate other hard-lined anti-gambling states to close loopholes and ban couriers, as well.

FanDuel will enter the lottery space

There is significant revenue potential in the lottery space. As iGaming momentum in the US stalls, major players are turning an eye toward clearly regulated opportunities, and lottery fits the bill.

And in 2025, we’ll see Flutter follow DraftKings’ lead and join the space as well.

There are a number of ways Flutter — FanDuel’s parent company — could do this. Acquiring a courier makes the most sense. Jackpot.com feels like a likely candidate, but Lotto.com could be one to watch. There’s a world in which Flutter could acquire a vendor like NeoPollard or Intralot, but this feels less likely.

Mega Millions price increase will boost Powerball jackpots

Mega Millions will raise its ticket price from $2 to $5 starting in April.

This will help both Mega Millions and Powerball.

Mega Millions jackpots are going to break records. The $3 increase will push off some casual buyers. But the amount who pull back will be offset by players enticed into playing when they see the new $2 billion-plus jackpots.

At the same time, many of those casual players who are turned off by the price increase will hop over to Powerball, which has maintained it is keeping its ticket price at $2. 

And there you have it. Higher jackpots for Mega Millions and Powerball.

iLottery will launch in new state before iGaming

There just isn’t a ton to get excited at present about on the online casino legalization front.

Ohio’s iGaming bill doesn’t seem poised for success. New Hampshire’s online casino hopes just took a significant hit with iGaming opponent Cordish Companies getting approved to operate a casino in the state. Wyoming is a dark horse, but nobody is going to salivate over that market size. And it appears online casinos will take a backseat to the downstate casino bidding process in New York for the time being.

But there are fewer hurdles in the online lottery landscape. A bill focused solely on online lottery — stripped of its iGaming elements — could see success in New York. There have been recent movements in Ohio and Maryland to launch iLotteries. That’s not even considering the fact that there have been actual online lottery launches recently in Connecticut and West Virginia, and Kansas and Massachusetts are coming next.

The last iGaming launch came in early 2024 in Rhode Island, and that was hardly a momentous occasion, with Bally’s owning a monopoly there.

New NFL lottery game will launch by 2025 season

The Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL) announced in May it had formed a partnership with the NFL to develop a national multi-state lottery draw game built around NFL themes. It will feature logos of all 32 NFL teams and use a tic-tac-toe grid format.

A couple dates have been floated for a potential launch — fall 2025 or 2026. A fall 2025 launch would make the game ready by NFL kickoff. 

Can you imagine the promo opportunities if this thing is set to go by Week 1?

The amount of money to be made with a quicker timeline makes it feel like a no-brainer that the powers that be will make sure this game — which, given the NFL’s popularity, should compete as one of the top national draw games outside Mega Millions and Powerball — is ready for a fall 2025 launch. Book it.

A courier will become an official partner of an NFL team

With the launch of a new official national NFL lottery game and the growing popularity of lottery courier sites, we’ll go out on a limb and say a lottery courier app will become “the official lottery courier partner of the” insert team name here.

We’re thinking Jackpocket or Jackpot.com. Heck, Jackpot.com is already the official lottery courier of 7-Eleven. Cincinnati Bengals star receiver Ja’Marr Chase is partnered with 7-Eleven. Would the Bengals be a prime candidate?

(Although the Ohio Lottery — which is pushing for a state online lottery — might not love that.)

Jackpot.com will grow fastest among couriers

Let’s stick with Jackpot.com and 7-Eleven.

One of the roadblocks for lottery couriers is the mass of adults that have no idea what a lottery courier is. Traditional media advertising closes some of that gap, but is costly.

If some of those adults head to 7-Eleven to buy lottery tickets and see promo material for Jackpot.com, informing them they can buy lottery tickets from 7-Eleven via Jackpot.com on their phones, that could generate new customers.

Currently, this 7-Eleven deal is for more than 600 7-Eleven and Speedway stores in Ohio and Massachusetts, where customers will get a free lottery ticket when they sign up for Jackpot.com. But it may soon expand to more states.

Jackpocket will still be No. 1 in 2024. But give us Jackpot.com, which just launched in Colorado as its eighth state, as the fastest-growing lottery courier in 2025.

NJ will back out of iLottery plans

The momentum in New Jersey to pull back from its plans to launch an iLottery is very real.

Initial plans were to launch the platform in fall 2024, but that obviously didn’t happen. Lawmakers introduced bills to stop that in an effort to protect the retail vendors who own a monopoly on lottery purchases in the state.

Last month, an Assembly committee unanimously moved forward A3759, which would halt the launch of an online lottery. It’s now with the Assembly State and Local Government Committee. 

As of now, it looks like the momentum favors those against an online lottery in New Jersey.

Lottery sweepstakes will become a thing

Sweepstakes operators are thriving offering sweepstakes casinos and sweepstakes sports betting. And while, yes, it actually makes sense to focus on iGaming and sports betting because most states don’t have legal real-money options for those, and yes, lottery couriers already kind of provide that alternative option for many states that don’t have state-run online lotteries, there is still room to make revenue offering sweepstakes lottery products.

So we’ll either see one of the established sweeps operators offer a lottery product in 2025, or we’ll see a crop of smaller lottery sweeps operators poke their heads out.