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A single ticket sold in Georgia won an estimated $980 million Mega Millions jackpot, the eighth-largest jackpot in its history, the lottery announced Saturday.
The last time someone took home such a high prize was in December 2024, when a player from California took home a prize of $1.269 billion.
“After growing since late June, the Mega Millions jackpot was won for the fifth time this year on Friday evening. A single ticket sold in Georgia matched all six numbers from the November 14 drawing – white balls 1, 8, 11, 12 and 57, plus the gold Mega Ball 7 – to win an estimated $980 million ($452.2 million cash) prize,” the lottery said.
“It is by far the largest prize ever won in the month of November, and the eighth largest jackpot in the history of the game,” the lottery added, noting that “in the 40 drawings since the jackpot was last won of $348 million in Virginia on June 27 – the most drawings in a single jackpot run in the history of the game – there have been nearly 14.3 million winning tickets at all prize levels.”
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Numbers on Mega Millions lottery tickets will be selected by a buyer in Los Angeles, California on August 4, 2023. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images/Getty Images)
“With the new, greatly improved prize values, total non-jackpot prize wins amounted to almost $343.4 million,” it also said. “These include 21 second-tier prizes of $2 million or more (won in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Texas and Virginia).”
Mega Millions changed its format in April, raising ticket prices from $2 to $5 per game.
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Mega Millions lottery tickets are purchased at a liquor store where winning tickets were sold on December 27, 2024 in Hawthorne, California. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)
The prize change will accelerate the jackpots much faster and allow the lottery to increase the starting jackpot from $20 million to $50 million.
The record is still the Florida price in August 2023, at $1.602 billion.
A man holds Mega Millions tickets on July 29, 2022 in New York City. (John Smith/VIEWpress/Getty Images)
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“$980 million is the largest jackpot won since the Mega Millions game changed in April,” Joshua Johnston, chief executive of the Mega Millions Consortium, said in a statement.
