Powerball® Jackpot Reaches an Estimated $540 Million
Fast Facts for Reporting on Tonight’s Drawing
With another giant jackpot up for grabs, the California Lottery releases the below fast facts about tonight’s Powerball drawing. We have spokespeople available for on-camera or phone interviews as well.
- The Powerball sequence began at $20 million on Wednesday, October 6, 2021, and rolled 38 times so far to an advertised jackpot of $540 million for tonight’s draw.
- NOTE: The last time the Powerball jackpot was hit was from a winning ticket sold in Morro Bay, CA, when one winner hit every single number on a quick pick in the October 4, 2021 draw. That jackpot was $699.8 million – a record for California.
- California’s sales for this entire Powerball sequence total more than $145 million as of 1:30 PM today.
- The contribution to education from this entire Powerball sequence (the 38 draws plus the sales so far for tonight’s draw) is estimated to be more than $58 million.
- More than 71 million Powerball tickets have been sold in California so far for this rolling sequence.
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- Of these, more than 2.8 million have been winning tickets, with a total associated prize value of more than $22 million so far.
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- Players do not have to hit the jackpot to win big; just this past weekend, a winning ticket sold in Riverside County hit five of six numbers and is worth $1.2 million.
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- Throughout this entire sequence so far, there have been four separate draws in which winning tickets sold in California matched 5 of 6 (missing only the Powerball number) worth $5.7 million combined.
- Our retailer partners (locations where Lottery tickets are sold) have been winners in this Powerball sequence as well, earning an estimated $8.4 million combined so far for selling Powerball tickets, cashing the associated winning tickets, and receiving incentive bonuses for selling tickets worth $1 million or more.
Learn how to play Powerball in the video below (for California)
As jackpots rise, the California Lottery would like to remind players that gambling should be fun.
–Borrowing money to play,
–spending above a person’s budget, or
–using money intended for other purposes
can ultimately lead to significant problems for players and their families.
If a player recognizes that they have a gambling problem or if someone knows of someone who may have a problem, the Lottery recommends calling the California Problem Gambling Help Line at 1-800-GAMBLER.
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The California Lottery’s mission is to provide supplemental funding to California public schools, including kindergarten and grades 1-12, community colleges, the California State University, the University of California, and other California public educational entities. The funds the Lottery transferred to public education totaled more than $1.8 billion for fiscal year 2020-21, which amounted to a modest percentage of education’s overall budget. However, this funding is largely nondiscretionary, meaning schools can use this for important, yet unfunded instructional programs they would otherwise not afford. During the same period, the Lottery generated almost $8.4 billion in sales, more than 95% of which went back to the community in the form of prize payments, retailer commissions and bonuses, and contributions to education. The California Lottery urges its customers to play responsibly. Problem gambling resources are available to anyone at 1-800-GAMBLER.
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