Powerball jackpot at $461 million: Buy your entries today

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Powerball jackpot at $461 million: Buy your entries today
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Another drawing, another Powerball jackpot increase! Monday’s drawing yielded no jackpot winners. That means the Powerball jackpot has increased to $461 million—the road to half a billion continues.

Want to take your chance at the massive jackpot? You can sign up and buy Powerball tickets from the Michigan Lottery today. No need to visit a retail location; the Great Lakes State allows online lottery purchases.

First time? No problem; we’ve got you covered. The Powerball game at the Michigan Lottery is very easy. Playing online makes it more convenient than ever.

To start, sign up for a Michigan lottery account. This will require you to fill out some personal details, such as your name, date of birth, address, and phone number. You’ll also need to provide identification such as a driver’s license and social security number to prove you’re of a legal age to play the lottery.

Next, get the app or visit the desktop site and find the Powerball page. Playing is simple. Select five white ball numbers between 1 and 69, then pick a single red Powerball between 1 and 26. These six selections constitute a “line,” which is a single entry into the next drawing. Each line costs $2.

For an extra $1 per line, you can add Power Play to your ticket, which can multiply non-jackpot winnings by up to 5x.

Once you’ve picked your numbers and purchased your entries, all that’s left is to check if you’ve won after the drawing ends. Drawings occur every Monday, Wednesday, and Saturday at 11 p.m. ET. Tickets are sold until 15 minutes prior to the drawing.

Once the drawing is over, you’ll naturally want to see if you’ve won! There are numerous ways to do so.

Alternatively, you can visit your account on the MI lottery desktop site or app and automatically check whether your tickets have won.

As a third option, you can visit the Michigan Lottery website’s “Number Tools” page and plug in your numbers or enter a date range to see winning numbers from that period.

Powerball jackpot winners have two redemption options: cash payment or annuity.

The cash payment option comes in a lump-sum amount. This amount is usually equivalent to about half of the advertised jackpot, but you’ll get it in one fell swoop.

The annuitized jackpot payments are doled out over the course of 30 years, with each payment increasing by about 5% annually.

Shared jackpots are possible when playing the Powerball. This happens when two or more players match six numbers and win the jackpot prize. The last time this happened was in 2016 when three players split the $1.586 billion.

The Michigan Lottery plays host to more than 300 games, and Powerball is just one of them. There are plenty of other games to choose from.

Mega Millions is a fan favorite. In many ways, it’s a sibling game to Powerball. It has the same structure, but players pick from 1 to 70 for white ball numbers and 1 to 25 for a Gold Mega Ball. The Mega Millions regularly rivals Powerball in terms of jackpot amounts.

Keno is another popular game type. The Michigan Lottery offers eight different variants of Keno, including a handful of online options and one retail-only option with a top prize of $250,000. DraftKings Casino Michigan also offers three keno games for online players

Instant games make up the brunt of Michigan’s lottery game library, with 318 different games. These have various play styles. Some look a lot like slots, with one entry being the equivalent of one spin. Others have different mechanics. If you’re unsure what to play, you can take advantage of the demo option and try games for free to get a feel for them before playing for real money.

Powerball and other lottery games should be fun. It’s important to view it as a form of entertainment and not a viable pathway to making money. At the end of the day, lottery games are gambling, and you should treat them as such. This is why we always encourage you to play responsibly.

Should you or someone you love need help, we recommend finding a resource or organization that focuses on responsible gambling, such as the National Council on Problem Gambling.

Sidelines Group provides MLive with original sports betting, lottery and casino content including odds, analysis, predictions and reviews to educate bettors. Please bet responsibly.

If you have a gambling problem and are located in Michigan, call 1-800-GAMBLER or 1-800-270-7117 or you can visit the Michigan Gaming Control Board’s website at https://www.michigan.gov/mgcb.