Mega Millions goes to $5 a play with a built-in multiplier, April 2025

In 2024 the US lotteries behind Mega Millions announced the game's biggest overhaul in years. The last draw under the old rules was on Friday 4 April 2025, the new tickets went on sale the next day, and the first new draw was on Tuesday 8 April.

The price of a play rose to $5, from the $2 it had cost since 2017. In return every play comes with a randomly assigned multiplier of 2x, 3x, 4x, 5x or 10x that boosts every prize except the jackpot. The optional Megaplier and the Just the Jackpot play were withdrawn, along with small prizes that only returned the stake.

Players still pick five numbers from 1 to 70, but the gold Mega Ball now comes from 1 to 24 rather than 25. That puts the jackpot odds at 1 in 290,472,336, against about 1 in 302.6 million before, and the odds of any prize at about 1 in 23.

The starting jackpot went up from $20 million to $50 million, and matching all five white balls pays $1 million before the multiplier, so between $2 million and $10 million (except in California, where non-jackpot prizes are pari-mutuel). The operators said they expected bigger jackpots more often; the cost of each play is now two and a half times what it was.

Sources

• Lottery USA: Mega Millions gets a mega makeover (October 2024) (lotteryusa.com)
• South Dakota Lottery: Mega Millions update (lottery.sd.gov)
• Mega Millions: How to play (megamillions.com)