Again?! Powerball Jackpot Strikes In California For $44M, Just One Week After $214M Score

Mere days after Amazon Prime released a movie called Jackpot! about a dystopian future in which lottery winners in California are hunted by lottery losers, something that nearly defies belief happened with a real-life California lottery winner.

Just one week after Powerball crowned a $213.8 million grand prize winner in Pennsylvania, the 1-in-292.2-million chance hit again. This hasn’t happened in Powerball in more than three years. A ticket sold in California went six-for-six and scored the jackpot Monday night, earning its owner a prize of $44.3 million, or $21.9 million in lump-sum cash form.

That’s a paltry sum by Powerball jackpot standards, but, hey, a win is a win. (And it sure beats everyone else in California trying to murder you to claim your prize.)

The winning numbers Monday were 1, 2, 15, 23, 28, and a red Powerball of 10. A ticket sold at a Ralphs grocery store in Dana Point, California, a beach town about midway between Los Angeles and San Diego, perfectly paired all six numbers.

Inside the numbers

The $44.3 million win is the smallest for a Powerball jackpot since Jan. 30, 2021, when an anonymous player in New Jersey won for $33.2 million.

That was also the last time two Powerball grand prizes were won a week apart. Before that Jan. 30, 2021 score, on Jan. 23, 2021, the jackpot hit — also in New Jersey.

And it gets crazier. That Jan. 23, 2021 jackpot was only worth $23.2 million because it came only three days after another Powerball win, for $731.1 million in Maryland.

That’s right: In January 2021, the Powerball jackpot struck three times in a 10-day span.

Though this week’s win in California represents the shortest span between Powerball grand prize wins in three-plus years, there was a Mega Millions one-two punch in the interim that happened in faster succession. On April 14, 2023, Johnnie Taylor of Queens, New York, won Mega Millions for $483, and four days later, in the very next drawing, a group in Syracuse, New York, called Shadowknight LLC won Mega Millions for the minimum $20 million payout.

Monday’s win marks the seventh Powerball jackpot win of 2024, already surpassing the number of times players went six-for-six in 2023 (five times all year).

Since the second win of this year, on April 6 for a massive $1.326 billion, Powerball has not gone more than 40 days without a jackpot winner.

There was also one Match 5 winner Monday worth an even $1 million, sold at Hy-Vee Food Store in Omaha, Nebraska.

Will someone win a half-billion tonight?

While the Powerball jackpot resets (again) to $20 million for Wednesday’s drawing, Mega Millions is now worth about 25 times that amount.

For Tuesday night’s draw, the jackpot is estimated at $498 million (cash option: $245.3 million). Lottery estimates tend to run conservative, so it’s entirely possible the top prize will cross the $500 million mark in the final analysis.

Whereas Powerball has crowned seven winners this year, Mega Millions has only awarded two grand prizes, and is now on a streak of 21 games without a jackpot winner since a $552 million score in Illinois on June 4.

In the most recent drawing, last Friday, two players — one in California and one in New Jersey — won $1 million apiece, but nobody claimed the $464 million top prize. By Lottery Geeks’ estimates, approximately 21.96 million tickets were sold for that Friday game.

Tickets for either lottery cost $2, and in most states players have the option, for an extra $1, to play the Power Play or Megaplier prize multiplier.

Powerball and Mega Millions tickets are available in all states except Alabama, Alaska, Hawaii, Nevada, and Utah. Tickets for both draw games are also sold in Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands, while only Powerball is available in Puerto Rico.

All-time biggest jackpots

Here is a list of the all-time top 10 U.S. lottery jackpots:

1. $2.04 billion, Powerball, Nov. 7, 2022, won in California
2. $1.76 billion, Powerball, Oct. 11, 2023, won in California
3. $1.6 billion, Mega Millions, Aug. 8, 2023, won in Florida
4. $1.59 billion, Powerball, Jan. 13, 2016, won in California, Florida, and Tennessee
5. $1.54 billion, Mega Millions, Oct. 23, 2018, won in South Carolina
6. $1.35 billion, Mega Millions, Jan. 13, 2023, won in Maine
7. $1.34 billion, Mega Millions, July 29, 2022, won in Illinois
8. $1.33 billion, Powerball, April 6, 2024, won in Oregon
9. $1.13 billion, Mega Millions, March 26, 2024, won in New Jersey
10. $1.08 billion, Powerball, July 19, 2023, won in California

And here’s the all-time top 10 by lump-sum cash value:

1. $997.6 million, Powerball, Nov. 7, 2022, won in California
2. $983.5 million, Powerball, Jan. 13, 2016, won in California, Florida, and Tennessee
3. $877.8 million, Mega Millions, Oct. 23, 2018, won in South Carolina
4. $794.2 million, Mega Millions, Aug. 8, 2023, won in Florida
5. $780.5 million, Mega Millions, July 29, 2022, won in Illinois
6. $776.6 million, Mega Millions, Jan. 22, 2021, won in Michigan
7. $774.1 million, Powerball, Oct. 11, 2023, won in California
8. $723.5 million, Mega Millions, Jan. 13, 2023, won in Maine
9. $621 million, Powerball, April 6, 2024, won in Oregon
10. $558.1 million, Powerball, July 19, 2023, won in California