Powerball Jackpot Climbs To $685M After Winner-Less Christmas Drawing

ACROSS AMERICA — The Powerball jackpot climbed to $685 million this week after Santa Claus failed to deliver the winning numbers during a Monday night Christmas drawing.

The next drawing, scheduled for Wednesday night, would feature a jackpot with a lump-sum option for about $345 million. Ticket sale cut-off times typically occur one to two hours before the scheduled draw time of 10:59 p.m. Eastern Time.

This is the fourth Powerball jackpot to exceed half a billion dollars in 2023. The Powerball jackpot was last won Oct. 11 when a ticket in California won $1.77 billion. That represented the second-largest Powerball jackpot ever won. The world record for a Powerball jackpot also happened in California, when someone scored the $2.04 billion jackpot in November 2022.

The last Christmas winner was a decade ago when a ticket in Missouri matched all five numbers for a grand prize of nearly $72 million, lottery officials said. Just three Powerball jackpots have ever been won on Christmas.

Powerball tickets are $2 per play. Tickets are sold in 45 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Drawings are broadcast live every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday from the Florida Lottery draw studio in Tallahassee. Powerball drawings are also livestreamed on Powerball.com.

The odds of winning a prize are 1 in 24.9. The odds of winning the jackpot are 1 in 292.2 million.