California Lottery Jackpots

Players who choose the right numbers and bag the California Lottery jackpot have the option to take a one-off lump sum payment or 26 annuity payments which increase in value year upon year, after they have won. This has changed recently. Previously players would have to choose whether or not they were to receive a lump sum or the annuity payments when they bought their tickets. The California Lottery jackpots you see advertised are for the annuity payments value; if you choose to receive a lump sum you will receive roughly 50-60% of the advertised jackpot.

The biggest SuperLotto Plus jackpot was won way back in 2002 when three lucky California lottery winners shared the $193 million eleven-time rollover jackpot. The biggest single winner of the SuperLotto Plus is Alcario Castellano who won a $141 million jackpot and instantly became the biggest of all California numbers winners, a record which still remains over nine years later. The biggest lottery haul for any of the California lottery winners was when TV newsroom employee, Jacki Cisneros and her husband, Gilbert matched all five main lottery numbers plus the Mega Ball to scoop the enormous MegaMillions $266 million jackpot in May 2010.

The minimum prize on the California Lottery is $7 million so that is the least jackpot amount you will win if your California numbers come up and while the lottery jackpot rarely gets as high as the record $193 million, California Lottery rollovers are common and the jackpots can get very high. If you buy lottery tickets online then you can check those California results on these pages every Wednesday and Saturday evening to see if you are a California Lottery winner.

Although the California Lottery was originally launched in the late 1980s, the current number matrix was not brought into the California Lottery until the year 2000 and since then the California numbers have thrown up many bumper winners. It was just two years after the new California numbers variant that the California Lottery produced a record winner, a $193 million prize shared between three lottery ticket holders.

California started participating in the multi-state Powerball game in April of 2013. The first big winner was Carlo Mitchell who won $213 million along with his wife when they played the numbers 3-23-31-34-47 and Powerball 13 in October of that year.