Texas Lottery EV
Every Texas lottery game is a losing bet on average. This terminal compares Powerball, Mega Millions, Lotto Texas, and Texas Two Step by their after-tax expected value for each $1 spent — for a Texas resident with 0% state income tax and a modeled 37% federal deduction on large prizes — and surfaces the one that loses the least. For entertainment purposes only.
Today’s Games
New to expected value? Read what these numbers mean.
Expected Value History & Projection
Understanding the Numbers
What “expected value” means
Expected value (EV) is the average result of a bet if you could play it millions of times. For a $1 lottery ticket, it adds up every possible outcome — the jackpot, each smaller prize, and the most common outcome of all, winning nothing — with each one weighted by its odds. The figure on every card above is the expected value of $1 played: −55¢ per $1 means that, averaged over all outcomes, you lose 55 cents of every dollar you spend on that game. Wins and losses are both already in that number — there is nothing left to subtract.
Why the games are almost always negative
Lotteries pay out less than they take in, so on an ordinary day every game’s expected value sits below zero, and what changes is how far below zero each game sits. The exception: when nobody hits the jackpot for a long stretch, the prize can accumulate until a game’s expected value briefly climbs above breakeven — you can spot those runs in the history chart where a line crosses the 0¢ mark. Even then, the odds of any single ticket winning are as long as ever; a positive average is carried almost entirely by one enormous, enormously unlikely prize. This terminal doesn’t find you a winning ticket; it finds the game that loses the least right now, so if you’re playing for fun anyway, you can pick the least-bad option.
Why the numbers change from draw to draw
When nobody wins, the jackpot rolls over and grows, which pushes expected value up. Working against that: bigger jackpots sell more tickets, so the chance of splitting the top prize rises, and taxes take a larger share of big prizes. The values here are computed after tax for a Texas resident, on the jackpot cash amount used by the model rather than an annuity’s advertised total. For cash-only Texas Two Step, the advertised jackpot and modeled cash amount are the same — which is why the figures move with every draw.
How to read the terminal
Each card in Today’s Games shows a game’s expected value per $1 for the next draw, and the banner highlights today’s least negative game. Expand a card’s breakdown for the prize-tier math behind the number, and compare the base ticket against its add-on where one exists. In the history chart, solid lines are past draws, dashed lines are the projection if no one wins the jackpot, and the 0¢ line is breakeven — the closer a line runs to it, the less that game loses.
Assumptions
Methodology, Sources & Verification
Every number here is either read from a cited source or computed from cited inputs. Official feeds and rules, tax sources, third-party data, and modeled assumptions are identified separately below — along with when each input was last checked — so a source that falls out of date is easy to spot rather than hidden in a single blanket date.
- Live jackpot & cash values auto-updated every draw
-
The advertised jackpot and its cash value are read live from the official draw feeds after every drawing; the expected-value figures recompute from them. Texas Two Step is cash-only, so its advertised jackpot is also the cash amount used by the model. The date of the results in play is shown on the terminal itself. These are the only figures that move between draws.
- Game rules — odds & prize tiers verified 2026-08-01
-
Every game’s odds, prize amounts, and add-on (Power Play / Extra!) behavior are taken from the official rules on the dates above and re-checked automatically against the published pages; the terminal flags a caution if they stop matching. Texas Two Step’s non-jackpot amounts are the Texas Lottery’s published pari-mutuel estimates, so actual payouts can differ. Sources:
- Powerball — Powerball — official prize chart & odds
- Mega Millions — Mega Millions — official How to Play
- Lotto Texas — Texas Lottery — Lotto Texas game rules
- Texas Two Step — Texas Lottery — Texas Two Step game page
- Texas Two Step — Texas Lottery — Texas Two Step official brochure
- Texas Two Step — Texas Lottery — Texas Two Step winning numbers
- Texas Two Step — Texas Lottery — Texas Two Step estimated jackpot calculation
- Federal tax tables & state treatment federal verified 2026-07-12 · state verified 2026-07-20
-
2026 federal ordinary-income brackets, capital-gains brackets, and standard deduction (IRS Rev. Proc. 2025-32). Texas levies no individual income tax (0% state treatment). Bracket thresholds and the standard deduction drift forward at your inflation assumption between refreshes. Sources:
- Ticket-sales & jackpot-split model calibrated 2026-08-01
-
Ticket-sales & jackpot-split model, calibrated from historical draw sales. It estimates how many tickets a draw sells — which sets the chance a jackpot is split and powers the no-winner projection line. It is a model, not an official figure, and is recalibrated periodically against historical sales. Its linked historical-sales inputs are third-party LottoReport data, not official lottery publications. Sources:
- Powerball — LottoReport — Powerball sales history
- Mega Millions — LottoReport — Mega Millions sales history
- Lotto Texas — LottoReport — Lotto Texas sales history
- Texas Two Step — LottoReport — Texas Two Step sales history
Official validation sources:
- Texas Two Step — Texas Lottery — Texas Two Step draw sales and jackpot history
Disclaimer
| TIER | PRIZE | AFTER TAX | ODDS | What this prize tier contributes to the ticket’s average payout: its after-tax prize multiplied by the odds of hitting it. |
|---|