Lottery in Maine 2024

The state lottery in Maine launched in 1974, after the voter referendum. First tickets were sold at USD 0.50 and the very first draw took place on June 27, 1974, for the game called “Play Me.” The first major winner was one Joseph Comeau who took home USD 150,000 in October of the same year winning the weekly “Play Me” draw.

The first of many Maine lottery winners to take home USD 1,000,000 or more was William Emhof, who won the jackpot in the Main Event Game in August of 1980. This was a truly huge amount of money at the time.

In 2004, after celebrating its 30th anniversary, Maine Lottery joined Powerball, adding another exciting draw to the overall offering. In July of 2009, the Tri-State Megabucks Plus draw was launched. In 2016, the lottery had a record year, contributing a total of USD 57 million to the state’s General Fund after generating USD 272 million in sales.

Maine actually offers a very good range of draw lottery games players from the state can participate in. While Maine lottery.com site doesn’t feature an option to buy draw tickets on the spot, it does provide all the required information on where these tickets can be bought, what their prices are, and what the current jackpot is for every particular draw.

There are several major draws that ME state lottery is a part of and offers players a chance to participate in. These are big regular draws that take place once or twice a week and often feature huge six and seven-figure USD amounts for the lucky jackpot winners.

Powerball is one of the most popular lotteries in the US, regularly featuring massive jackpot prizes. Players from Maine can purchase their tickets at the price of USD 2 per ticket and they can also use the Power Play option for an additional USD 1, which adds multipliers up to 10x for all wins under $150,000. Main State lottery Powerball draws take place every Wednesday and Saturday and the overall chance of a win is 1 in 24.9 (for any prize). The odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are 1 in 292 million.

Mega Millions is another huge draw that takes place two times a week. With the jackpot seedin at USD 40,000,000, players can expect huge prizes for the luckiest ones. Rules are quite similar to the ones of Powerball, although the overall odds of winning the jackpot are somewhat lower, at around 1 in 302 million. Maine lottery tickets for Mega Millions can be purchased daily and draws take place Tuesdays and Fridays.

Lotto America draws take place on the same day as Powerball, namely Wednesday and Saturday. Lotto America Maine offers a chance for big jackpots at the price of just USD 1 per ticket, which makes it even more appealing. While the jackpot starts at USD 2,000,000, it isn’t uncommon to see it reach the eight-figure territory. Odds of winning the main score with ME lotto are about 1 in 26 million.

Lucky for Life features an interesting concept, where the lucky winner stands to get USD 1,000 paid out every day for the rest of their lives. The second jackpot prize is USD 25,000 paid every year for life. The main jackpot is guaranteed for at least 20 years and the odds of winning are about 1 in 31 million. Lucky for Life draws take place twice a week, on Mondays and Thursdays.

Tri-State Megabucks Plus is open to players from the Tri-State area encompassing Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire. While tickets are more expensive than the ones for Maine Lotto America, sold at USD 2 apiece, players have 1 in 4.5 million odds of winning the main jackpot in this one, which is pretty good for a huge lottery. The jackpot for this one starts at UDS 1,000,000 and grows over time.

Gimme 5 is another Tri-State draw available to players in Maine. Draws take place three times a week, on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The main lottery jackpot for Gimme 5 is USD 100,000 and the odds of winning are 1 in 575,757.

Maine Lottery: Big Winning Opportunities

Clearly, there are many great draws and lotto Maine games players from the state can easily participate in. While there isn’t an exclusive lottery or lotto opened only to players from the state, there are several draws that are limited to the Tri-State area, where your odds of winning are always better as there are fewer tickets in play.

Players can participate in lottery Maine draws around the week as there is something happening almost every day. While winning a huge jackpot is always a long shot, with fairly small prices for these tickets and a shot at massive amounts, it is no surprise many players from Maine and across the US are drawn to give it a try.

Given that the odds will be stacked against you, it’s little surprise that many people will club together to buy as many tickets as possible when playing the Maine Lottery. Obviously any winnings will have to be split, but it can go a long way in boosting your chances of getting that elusive win.

In addition to these major draws, residents of Maine can also participate in a couple of smaller draws and have access to a number of scratch cards offering appealing instant wins to the lucky ones.

• Pick 3 draws take place two times a day and players can wager from USD 0.50 to USD 5 per ticket. The goal is to match your selected three numbers to the ones drawn by the lottery. The top prize is 500 times your bet, so the maximum jackpot is USD 2,500.
• Pick 4 is very similar to Pick 3 but, like the name suggests, players need to choose four instead of three numbers. Of course, with longer odds, prizes are also increased, so the maximum win is 5,000 times the stake, which sets the jackpot at USD 25,000.

There are also various scratch cards available for purchase throughout the state, ranging from just USD 1 a card all the way up to USD 25. Naturally, more expensive scratch cards also come with bigger potential wins.

• $50,000,000 Cash Blowout costs USD 25 a piece features a total prize pool of USD 50 million and gives players a chance to instantly win up to USD 1,000,000.
• $500,000 Payout scratch cards cost USD 20 a pop and, as the name suggests, offer the biggest single prize of USD 500,000. Overall odds of winning, when accounting for breakeven prizes, are 1 in 3.19.
• 50X The Cash cards also cost USD 20 a pop and offer the maximum single win of USD 500,000.

We saw some truly monumental prize winnings at the Maine State Lottery site. For example, the jackpot of Powerball at the time of writing was a frankly ridiculous amount of $290,000. Plus you could even win anywhere up to $100,000 just by playing some of those cheap and cheerful Gimme 5 games. All of which could be played from some seriously low stakes.

While Maine may still have some things to fix as far as their online offering is concerned, players from the state certainly have access to a great range of major lottery and lotto draws. You can use the subscription option to make sure you never miss out on a big drawing such as Powerball or Mega Millions as well, so there are some cool options. If you have hopes of winning big, check out the Maine State lottery site and go for it!