You too can enter the US Mega Millions from Ireland

The Mega Millions is one of the biggest lottery draws in the world. People from all over the planet - not just the United States of America, where Mega Millions is based - can bet on this lottery.

To enter the Mega Millions draw, you need to select five numbers from a pool of 1 to 70 and an additional bonus number from 1 to 25. It's that simple. If you match all of them correctly, you win the jackpot - and this draw has served up some really, really big main prizes in the past.

The Mega Millions draws happen on Tuesdays and Fridays in the US. Because of time zone differences, this means they take place in the early hours of Wednesday and Saturday mornings in the UK. The draw is twice a week, which isn’t as frequent as its thrice-weekly US Powerball counterpart, but certainly more often than those draws that happen only once per week.

As recently as mid-2022, one ticket won the second-biggest Mega Millions jackpot ever. Several rollovers had seen the main prize grow to gigantic proportions until it was eventually won. All five regular numbers - 13, 36, 45, 57 and 67 - and the Mega Ball 14 - were guessed correctly. That's right, the winner even included the number 13, which is considered unlucky by some.

For those who want to bet on the Mega Millions from Ireland, this can be a great alternative to local draws. A lottery with such global status and appeal provides the opportunity to win really big sums, which in turn can be converted from dollars to euros. The chances of winning the jackpot in the Mega Millions are somewhere around one in 302 million. By comparison, the US Powerball is approximately one in 290 million in the same category and the EuroMillions one in 140 million.

It's important to note, much like other lotteries around the world, Mega Millions offers lower-tier prizes below the jackpot. There is plenty to be won by getting, say, four regular numbers right - or three and the Mega Ball. On occasion, Mega Millions prizes are won but go unclaimed and expire by the deadline because people didn't bother to look whether they might have matched, maybe, even two digits correctly. 

One can enter the Mega Millions with a manual selection of numbers or opt for the quick pick function and have numbers randomly generate for them. There is no winning formula. Some have won with their own selections. Others have triumphed with random picks. People who use their own numbers, though, are an interesting study in human affinity for landmarks and anniversaries.

If a birthday is on the fourth day of November, for instance, a number selection could be 4 to represent the day of the month and 11 the month in the year. This could be taken a step further. Perhaps the lottery entrant was born in 1968. There, the digits 19 and 68 could be included. To some this might some contrived. To others, this probably sounds like a plausible approach.

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