Someone in Illinois just won $1 billion in Powerball — and we may never know who
By Avni Trivedi, Karina Tsui, CNN
(CNN) — A winning ticket for Wednesday night’s $1.04 billion Powerball drawing was sold in Illinois, marking the largest grand prize since last year, according to the lottery.
The winning numbers were 4, 26, 66, 67, 69, and red Powerball 9, with a Power Play multiplier of 2.
The ticket was purchased at a Hy-Vee gas station in Quincy, roughly 100 miles west of Springfield in western Illinois.
Store manager Jon Marshall began receiving phone calls and text messages early Thursday morning as word spread about the winning ticket.
“I’ve been up since 3 a.m.,” Marshall told CNN affiliate WGEM. “(They are) asking me if I’m working today. I’m here working, so definitely not the winner.”
The Hy-Vee gas station will receive a $500,000 cash bonus for selling the jackpot-winning ticket, according to the Illinois Lottery.
The winner, who has not been identified and can remain anonymous in Illinois, can choose to receive an annuitized prize of $1.04 billion paid in 30 graduated payments over 29 years, or a lump sum payment estimated at $450.5 million. Both figures are before taxes.
The winner has one year from the date of the drawing to claim the prize, the lottery said.
“This is an exciting day for Illinois,” Harold Mays, director of the Illinois Lottery, said in a statement. “We’re thrilled for the winner and the retailer that sold the winning ticket.”
One lucky ticket sold in Massachusetts matched five of the six numbers with the Power Play multiplier, winning $2 million, while five tickets sold across four states – Arizona, California, Florida and North Carolina – won $1 million each, the lottery said.
Wednesday’s drawing was the first billion-dollar Powerball jackpot since a player in Arkansas took home $1.8 billion on Christmas Eve last year.
It was also the first time someone won the grand prize in more than three months, since two players in Florida and Texas split a $20 million prize on May 2.
Wednesday’s game was the 44th consecutive drawing in the current jackpot run, and the prize ranked as the eighth-largest in Powerball history, according to the Multi-State Lottery Association, which administers the game.
The jackpot now resets at $20 million for Saturday’s drawing.
The odds of winning a Powerball jackpot are approximately 1 in 292.2 million. For perspective, a person has a better chance of being struck by lightning in a given year — a 1 in 1.22 million chance — according to the National Weather Service. The odds of being killed by a shark over a lifetime are roughly 1 in 4.3 million, according to the International Shark Attack File.
The size of the latest jackpot is no anomaly. Powerball and Mega Millions jackpots have grown larger over the past several years, driven by game redesigns that lengthened the odds of winning, more frequent drawings and an expanded player pool.
Three winners in Florida, California and Tennessee became the first to claim a jackpot over $1 billion when they split a $1.586 billion Powerball prize in 2016.
The largest Powerball prize on record – $2.04 billion – was won in California in 2022, and last year’s $1.8 billion Arkansas jackpot ranks second.
Some states, including Florida, Texas and Tennessee, do not tax lottery winnings. Most Powerball and other major lottery winners choose the lump sum over annuity payments.
Powerball tickets are sold in 45 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands and the United Kingdom. Drawings are held every Monday, Wednesday and Saturday at 10:59 p.m. ET.
This story has been updated with additional information.
CNN’s Kara Devlin contributed to this report.
Correction: A previous version of this story misidentified the region of Illinois where Quincy is located.
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