The odds of winning the lottery vary widely depending on the game you play. For many popular lotteries, the odds of hitting the jackpot are extremely low and range roughly from about 1 in 8 million to as low as 1 in almost 623 million. For instance:

• EuroJackpot: 1 in 139,838,160
• Powerball: 1 in 292,201,338
• MegaMillions: 1 in 290,472,336
• Irish Lotto: 1 in 10,737,573
• SuperEnaLotto: 1 in 622,614,630
• Mini Lotto: 1 in 850,668

These odds mean winning the jackpot is a very rare event, comparable to highly unlikely scenarios such as flipping a coin 28 times in a row and getting heads each time. Buying more tickets slightly improves your odds, but they remain very long even then. For example, your odds of winning MegaMillions are about one in 300 million, making it about 300 times more likely to get struck by lightning than to win that lottery.