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Legitimate Lotteries - Are Your Winnings Real? Check This List of Legal Lotteries
Lottery and Sweepstakes Laws and Regulations
This is, by far, the most complete list of legal lottery names available. This is a global list of legitimate lotteries, covering the United States (and state lotteries), the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand, and many other countries. While there may be a legitimate lottery out there that we haven't yet heard of (or validated), it is a safe bet that if the lottery isn't on this list, it is very likely a scam.
Remember these tips for avoiding scam lotteries:
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You cannot win a legitimate lottery if you have not entered it.
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In almost all cases you must purchase a ticket to enter a legal lottery.
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You never have to pay to collect winnings from a legitimate lottery. You pay taxes AFTER you you receive the winnings. Other fees would be simply deducted from the winnings.
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If you hold a real, legal winning lottery ticket, you must notify the lottery
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None of these lotteries will contact you to say you won; not by phone, fax, mail or email.
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It is illegal under U.S. federal law to play ANY foreign lottery from the United States.
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Since scammers simply invent new names for their fake email scam (the email is the scam, not any persons or companies named in the email)s, it is more accurate to say that if you do not see the lottery on this list, it is probably a scam.
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Finally, even if you do see the name on this list, look at number 6 - any email FROM one of these lotteries, must be a scam.
If you operate (or know of) a legitimate lottery that we do not have on this list, use this form to tell us about it. Before we add it to the list, we will independently confirm the information with the governing agency in their country.
List of real, legal, legitimate Lotteries
- United States
- Australia
- Barbados
- Canada
- Ireland
- New Zealand
- United Kingdom
Official United States of America Lotteries Web Sites
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NOTICE: The United States Federal Government only operates the Visa "lottery" listed below, which provides visas, not money or winnings. There is NO Green Card lottery nor any other type of lottery.
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It is illegal for US residents to play foreign lotteries from the United states
- US Citizenship and Immigration Service Diversity Visa Lottery Program - you must apply through the State Department to enroll in this lottery. This lottery is for Visa applications to the United States only.
Shared games (multi-state)
- Mega Millions - Mega Millions (formerly The Big Game) is a multi-state USD$1 lottery game in the United States. Twelve U.S. states currently license Mega Millions as the monopoly provider of multi-state lotteries. As of 2006, Mega Millions features jackpots of at least $12 million, payable in 26 annual payments or a reduced lump sum cash payout.
- Lotto South - Lotto South was a multi-state lottery game in Georgia, Kentucky, and Virginia. It resulted form the merger of the three states' main games - Lotto Georgia, Lotto Kentucky, and Lotto Virginia - into one in September 2001. In January 2006, it was announced that Lotto South would be retired and replaced by a new game called Win For Life[1]. Lotto South's final drawing took place on February 25.
- Powerball - Powerball is an American lottery operated by the Multi-State Lottery Association (MUSL), a consortium of lottery commissions in 29 states, the District of Columbia, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Powerball is licensed as the monopoly provider of multistate lotteries in these jurisdictions.
- Tri-State Lottery - The Tri-State Lottery was the first multi-jurisdictional lottery formed in the United States. The participating states are Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont. Games offered by the Tri-State Lottery include Tri-State Megabucks, Tri-State Pick 3 and Pick 4, and Tri-State Triple Play.
Lotteries operated by individual states in the United States
Notice that not all states currently have lotteries. Those that do have a lottery always have their own website. Click on the blue, underlined name of the state to see their lottery's website.
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You cannot purchase a ticket to a State Lottery on the Internet. You are never notified if you win. You must check your ticket against winning numbers.
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The individual American States listed below operate lotteries that require the purchase of a ticket at either a store or a ticket machine in that state.
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ALL LOTTERIES must be licensed and registered with their respective Gaming or Lottery Commission in their State!
1 Alabama - no State Lottery 2 Alaska - no State Lottery 3 Arizona 4 Arkansas - no State Lottery 5 California 6 Colorado 7 Connecticut 8 Delaware 9 Florida 10 Georgia 11 Hawaii - no State Lottery 12 Idaho 13 Illinois 14 Indiana 15 Iowa 16 Kansas 17 Kentucky 18 Louisiana 19 Maine 20 Maryland 21 Massachusetts 22 Michigan 23 Minnesota 24 Mississippi - no State Lottery (they do have casinos - but no playing or gambling is allowed online!) 25 Missouri 26 Montana 27 Nebraska 28 Nevada - the Nevada State Constitution does not permit lotteries. Gambling is legal in certain cities (eg. Las Vegas) in person only. 29 New Hampshire 30 New Jersey 31 New Mexico 32 New York 33 North Carolina - no State Lottery 34 North Dakota 35 Ohio 36 Oklahoma - no State Lottery 37 Oregon 38 Pennsylvania 39 Rhode Island 40 South Carolina 41 South Dakota 42 Tennessee 43 Texas 44 Utah - no State Lottery 45 Vermont 46 Virginia 47 Washington State 48 West Virginia 49 Wisconsin 50 Wyoming - no State Lottery
Australia
Lotteries in Australia include various lotto related products licensed by Australian lottery companies, comprising mainly of state government-owned corporations - New South Wales Lotteries, Golden Casket, South Australian Lotteries and Lotterywest - plus one private-sector company, Tattersalls, which operates in the states not covered by the state-owned operators. Although the organisations are predominantly state-based, Australia has a number of national lottery games. These games are typically administered by one of the above companies, and syndicated through the Australian Lotto Bloc.
- Online casinos: essentially banned in Australia. This page has a good summary of the online gambling laws.
Barbados
The Barbados lottery is the national lottery in the country of Barbados. It is owned by the Barbados Olympic Association. The games the company have are:
* Lotto,
* Double Draw,
* Nuffcash,
* Sscratch,
* PowerPlay and
* Bingo.
The results are aired nightly on the television and printed in the daily newspapers of Barbados. For each game you must buy a a ticket. When the results are shown after the draw everyone must check their ticket to see if their ticket matches the results. The person holding that matching ticket wins.
Canada
There are legitimate lotteries in Canada, but they work similarly to lotteries in the United States: individual provinces sell their own tickets:
- Atlantic Lottery Corporation - is owned jointly by the four Atlantic provincial governments: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador. ALC's headquarters are located in Moncton, New Brunswick.
- British Columbia Lottery Corporation
- Loto-Qu�bec
- Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation
- Western Canada Lottery Corporation
France
- La Fran�aise des
Jeux -
126, rue Gallieni, FR-92643 Boulogne-Billancourt Cedex.
Phone: +33 1 411 03500. Fax: +33 1 411 03745
Email: jrobert@lfdj.com
Germany
- Baden-W�rttemberg
- Bavaria
- Berlin
- Brandenburg
- Bremen
- Hamburg
- Hessen
- Lower Saxony
- North Rhine-Westphalia
- Rhineland-Palatinate
- Saarland
- Saxony-Anhalt
- Schleswig-Holstein
- Th�ringen
Ireland
- An Post National Lottery Company - An Post National Lottery Company (Irish Comhlacht Chrannchur N�isi�nta An Post) is the company which has the licence of "the National Lottery" (Irish: "an Crannchur N�isi�nta") of the Republic of Ireland. The company was founded by its parent company An Post under a licence issued by the Minister for Finance under the National Lottery Act, 1986. The running of the lottery games, is handled by a contractor, GTECH Ireland, a wholly owned subsidiary of GTECH Corp, listed on New York Stock Exchange as GTK.
Japan
- Japan Lottery Association -
4-9 Hirakawa-cho, 2-chome, Chiyoda-ku, 102 Tokyo.
Phone: +81 3 326 185 40, Fax: +81 3 323 429 03
E-mail: yume@takarakuji.nippon-net.ne.jp
New Zealand
- You can visit the official new Zealand lottery website here.
Spain
- El Gordo de la Primitiva
- El Gordo de Navidad.
The Spanish Ministry of the Treasury has advised us that legitimate lottery tickets can only be purchased from authorized ticket sellers in Spain. Let us repeat that: The El Gordo lotteries are only open to Spanish residents - you CANNOT win if you are not IN Spain.
The official agency that oversees lotteries in Spain (see this link for a warning about scams in Spanish: Loterias y Apuestas del Estado) has information on this fraud on its website. Click on the link on the left hand side called "Otros Avisos" for the warning about these lotteries and information on how to contact this agency. The information is available in Spanish and English.
United Kingdom
These are the only legal lotteries in Britain:
