Mega Millions (originally known as The Big Game in 1996 and renamed, temporarily, to The Big Game Mega Millions six years later) is an American multijurisdictional lottery game. The first drawing took place on September 6, 1996, with six participating states, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Massachusetts, and Virginia. After growth of the game in 1997, a Tuesday Drawing was added in February 1998. As of June 30, 2023, it is offered in 45 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The first (The Big Game) Mega Millions drawing was in 2002. The logo for all versions of the game following the retirement of The Big Game name featured a gold-colored ball with six stars to represent the game's initial membership, although some lotteries insert their respective logos in the ball.
Mega Millions is drawn at 11:00 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday and Friday evenings, including holidays.[6] It is administered by a consortium of its 12 original lotteries, the drawings are held at the studios of WSB-TV in Atlanta, Georgia, supervised by the Georgia Lottery. The hosts are John Crow, Carol Blackmon, and Adria Wofford.
Under the current version's regulations (which began April 5, 2025, with the first drawing planned for April 8) for Mega Millions, the minimum Mega Millions advertised jackpot is $50 million, paid in 30 graduated yearly installments, increasing 5% each year (unless the cash option is chosen). The jackpot increases when no top-prize winner results.
Reflecting common practice among American lotteries, the jackpot is advertised as a nominal value of annual installments. A cash-value option (the usual choice), when chosen by a jackpot winner, pays the approximate present value of the installments. Mega Millions' previous format began on October 28, 2017; its first drawing was three days later. In the current version of Mega Millions, five white balls are drawn from a pool of 70, and one gold-colored "MegaBall" is drawn from a separate pool of 24; a player must match all six numbers to win the jackpot.
Each game costs $5 (previously $2). Each game includes a multiplier known as the "Megaplier", where the base non-jackpot prize is multiplied by 2, 3, 4, 5 or 10. The Megaplier was made available to all Mega Millions jurisdictions in January 2011 as an add-on which cost an extra $1 per play; it began as an option available only in Texas. Several of the game's members offered an only-the-jackpot option, in which two plays cost $3. None of the lower-tier prizes are in play on such a wager.
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