How will Lotto Max changes impact your odds of winning a jackpot?

Avid lottery players may notice some changes. CTV’s Coton Wiens explains what’s new and how it changes your odds.

Regular Lotto Max players will notice some changes as there are new rules and a new price for the popular lottery.

The cost of a ticket increased from $5 to $6 on April 10, and each ticket now has four lines instead of three. When it comes to picking your lucky numbers, player will now get to choose from among 52 numbers, rather than the former 50.

A University of Waterloo professor said the odds of winning the jackpot haven’t really changed much, but the chance of winning a smaller prize has slightly improved.

“The main thing you’re probably going to notice is that you do have a slightly higher chance of winning prizes,” Michael Wallace, associate professor of Biostatistics, Statistics and Actuarial Science, said. “Mainly, that’s going to be those smaller prizes, like a free play or a $20 win. But your odds of winning any prize are going to increase slightly from about one-in-seven to, under the new rules, a little better than one-in-six.”

“When we think about this as statisticians, we think about what your expected return is. So, for every, say $100 you spend on tickets, how much money can you expect to get back in prizes? And if you spend more money, you’ll get more money back. No matter how much on average, you’re expected to get about 50 per cent of what you spend back in prizes. For every $100 you spend, the average player will get about $50 back.”

While Wallace believes OLG may see higher revenues from this change, he said consumers will find the game is mostly the same.

But the lure of a big win is what keeps people playing.

“Myself included,” Wallace said. “Even as a statistician, I know my odds are terrible. But you can’t really resist thinking about that ‘what if’ scenario. What if those numbers come up? If you’re someone who plays for the hope of winning the jackpot, well your odds haven’t really changed, you may want to reevaluate exactly how much you’re spending on the lottery, because that $1 increase per ticket, that can really add up if you’re playing once a week or even twice a week across the year. But otherwise, for most people, I think the game itself won’t be too different in how they play it, unless maybe one of those new numbers, 51 or 52, happens to be your lucky number,” Wallace said.

Wallace said if people compare the lottery to Tim Hortons’ Roll Up the Rim campaign, the odds of winning a free play with Lotto Max are about the same as winning a free coffee from Tim Hortons.

One of the very few strategic things Wallace said lottery players can do, is to avoid choosing common numbers.

“If two players pick the same set of numbers and they both win the jackpot, they’re going to be sharing that prize. So, the one thing you can do, and it’s not got a great chance of helping, but every little bit helps, is try and pick numbers that you think other people won’t pick,” Wallace said.

The next Lotto Max draw is on Tuesday night.