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National Lottery vs prize competitions
The National Lottery and prize competition sites get mixed up constantly. They're different products with very different odds: a lottery jackpot is a long shot measured in tens or hundreds of millions, while a competition is usually a field of thousands. Here are the numbers side by side, and the places where a simple 'competitions are better' verdict falls short.
Last reviewed 3 Oct 2026 · Reviewed by Prize Scout editorial
The lottery odds, in one table
These are the jackpot odds for the three main National Lottery draw games. They're fixed by the game design (the number of possible combinations), so they never change with how many people play. Always confirm prices and prize tiers on the official game procedures pages: Lotto, Thunderball and Powerball.
| Game | Numbers | Ticket | Jackpot odds (per line) | Odds of any prize |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lotto | 6 from 59 | £2 | 1 in 22,528,738 per draw | about 1 in 4.9 |
| Thunderball | 5 from 39 + 1 from 14 | £1 | 1 in 8,060,598 | about 1 in 13 |
| Powerball | 5 from 69 + 1 from 26 | £4 | 1 in 292,201,338 | about 1 in 13 |
Thunderball and Powerball jackpot odds are simple combinatorics, so you can check them yourself: 5 from 39 multiplied by 14, and 5 from 69 multiplied by 26. Lotto is the number of ways to pick 6 from 59 (45,057,474), halved, because each line is entered into two rounds of the same draw and a match in either wins the jackpot. The official figure is 1 in 22,528,738 per draw.
"Any prize" includes the small ones, such as £1 for matching two Lotto numbers. It is not a chance at a life-changing amount.
What a £10 budget actually buys
Per-ticket odds hide the price difference, so compare the same budget, as we do across the live board. Jackpot chance for a £10 spend, counting only whole lines:
| Game | Lines for £10 | Jackpot chance |
|---|---|---|
| Lotto | 5 lines | about 1 in 4.5 million |
| Thunderball | 10 lines | about 1 in 806,000 |
| Powerball | 2 lines (£8) | about 1 in 146 million |
A £10 competition budget is a different kind of bet. Take a draw with a £2 ticket and 20,000 tickets available. £10 buys 5 tickets, so your maximum odds are 5 in 20,000, or 1 in 4,000. That example is illustrative, not a live listing, but it's typical of the order of magnitude: competition fields are thousands or tens of thousands of entries, not tens of millions. The live board shows real ones.
So are competitions a better bet?
On the chance of winning the top prize, yes, by a very wide margin. A competition's top prize can be thousands of times more likely than a lottery jackpot for the same spend.
But "better return" is a different claim, and it isn't automatically true.
- Average return per £1. Roughly half of every National Lottery pound is paid back as prizes, with the rest going to good causes, duty, running costs and retailers. A competition's equivalent is prize value divided by total ticket revenue if it sells out. A £30,000 car in a draw that takes £60,000 at full sell-out returns 50p per £1, which is the same ballpark. Some competitions are well below that, particularly where prize value is quoted at full retail price. You can work it out for any competition from its published ticket price, ticket count and prize value.
- Prize size. A lottery jackpot can change your life, and so can a big competition prize. Many competitions offer a car or a few thousand pounds, not tens of millions. Higher odds come with a smaller headline prize.
- Smaller prizes. The lottery pays out something to roughly 1 in 5 to 13 lines. Most competition tickets win nothing at all, because there is typically one winning ticket (or a handful) in the whole field.
- Not guaranteed. Whichever you choose, the expected outcome is that you lose the money you spend. Neither product is an investment. See our responsible entry page.
The accurate summary is that competitions give a far better chance at a good prize and a similar average return per £1, while the lottery gives far longer odds at a much bigger one, plus more frequent small wins.
They're not the same legally
The two are regulated differently, and the difference matters.
- The National Lottery is a licensed lottery run by Allwyn under a Gambling Commission licence. Players are covered by lottery regulation, and its prize draw, odds and prize fund are published by the operator.
- Prize competitions are a separate category, and the operator isn't running a licensed lottery. They have to follow the free-entry or skill-based rules that keep them outside lottery law. Those rules, and the player protections that go with them, vary a lot between operators. Our guides on free postal entry and how to compare competition sites cover what to check.
The practical point is that a competition's odds only mean something if the operator is transparent about ticket numbers and runs a documented draw. Check that before comparing odds.
Where Prize Scout fits
Prize Scout compares competitions, not lottery games, and doesn't sell tickets for either. The lottery figures on this page are here so the two aren't confused. For competition odds on the numbers that matter, ticket price, pool size and tickets sold, use the best-odds board and the methodology.