Powerball Jackpot Won Along With Nearly 100 Runner-Up Prizes
Thursday April 30th 2026Wednesday night's Powerball draw was one for the ages, as two players bagged the $143 million jackpot and a whopping 89 players matched all five main numbers to land $1 million each, including 27 Power Players who had their million doubled. That's $116 million in Match-5 prizes alone, almost as much as the jackpot!
But First, the Jackpot
The draw on April 29 had two jackpot winners, one in Indiana and the other in Kansas. These lucky players were the only ones to pick the numbers: 3-19-35-51-67 with 15 as their Powerball Number.
Indiana is by far the state with the most Powerball jackpot wins – their 40 jackpots (including jackpot shares) are followed by Missouri's 32 and Minnesota's 22, trailing behind. Indiana's lead is very impressive, given that it's only the 17th most populous US state. Kansas punches above its weight here too; there have been 13 Powerball jackpots won in Kansas, placing it 11th on the list (tied with New York), despite it being 35th most populous.
The Kansas winner has a year from the date of the draw in which to claim their prize, and when they do, they have the option to remain totally anonymous. The Indiana winner has just 180 days in which to claim their prize, but if they wish to remain anonymous, they'll need to complete the claims process via an LLC or a legal trust. Each player has the option to take their share of the $143 million jackpot as either a $32.6 million cash lump-sum or a $71.7 million annuity (before taxes).
What's With All The Winners?
The jackpot wins are tremendous, but the really interesting part of this draw is the disproportionate number of Match-5 winners. There were 89 tickets that matched all five main numbers, just missing the Powerball Number. For comparison, no players won in this tier for the past two draws, and the prize tier below (Match-4+PB) had just six winners despite the odds being much better! What gives?
Many Powerball fans are speculating that this could be a repeat of an episode in March 2005, when 110 tickets won the Match-5 prize for a single draw after playing numbers they'd found in their fortune cookies. While it's certainly possible, there's also a potential mathematical explanation.
Finding a Pattern
3-19-35-51-67. The numbers look random at a glance, but they actually follow a simple pattern: Each of the main numbers chosen is 16 apart from the next. 3 + 16 = 19, 19 + 16 = 35, and so on. 3 seems like an unusual number to start with here, but that might just be part of the pattern. 35 is the exact middle number in Powerball's main number pool of 1 to 69, so perhaps 35 was the start point rather than three.
Whichever pattern led to these wins, it looks like the Powerball Number of 15 wasn't a part of it. The Powerball Number pool is 1 to 26 – with 91 tickets successfully matching all the main numbers and assuming an even distribution of Powerball Number selections, we'd expect there to be 3 or 4 tickets that also matched the Powerball. As it happened though, only 2 tickets also matched the Powerball.
Systems at Play?
The high concentration of winners in Indiana and New Jersey, which saw 19 and 18 Match-5 winners respectively, suggests that some of these tickets may have been purchased by the same player or group of players as part of what's called a lottery 'wheeling system'.
Playing a lottery wheel, often referred to as a lottery system, involves buying multiple tickets with identical numbers except for one that's different each time. For example, a player could decide to play 3-19-35-51-67 as their main numbers on all their tickets, but change their Powerball Number each time.
The point of a lottery wheel is to spread your chosen numbers across multiple combinations, increasing the likelihood of securing winning outcomes (particularly lower-tier prizes) if some of your numbers are drawn. This could be what happened in Indiana and New Jersey, although it's too soon to be sure. Supposing this did happen, then it's also plausible that the Indiana jackpot winner also picked up a bunch of Match-5 prizes too!
Powerball Jackpot Reset
Now that the jackpot has been won, the grand prize has been reset to $20 million for Saturday's draw. As long as the jackpot remains under $150 million, the Power Play optional extra is a little more tempting than usual, since the 10x multiplier will be available. In many states, it's possible to play Powerball online. Check out our Tickets Page to see if yours is one of them, and get started if so!
Latest News