Lotto HotPicks Odds and Prizes
Lotto HotPicks prizes range from £6 to the jackpot of £350,000. You get to decide which prize you want to go for when you purchase your entry, whether you want to play for the big money or capitalise on the lower odds offered by some of the other prize tiers. You can even win something for matching just one number.
You have to match all the numbers you pick to win the prizes stated. If you play a Pick 5 game, for example, you must match all five numbers to win the top prize – there are no other prizes for matching four or fewer numbers.
Pick 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 Odds
Lotto HotPicks prizes are the same in every draw. That means if you play a Pick 5 game and match all five numbers, you’re guaranteed to win £350,000 unless prize capping comes into play (see below for more details). The table below shows the Lotto HotPicks odds and prizes that are available for each game type:
| Game | How to Win | Prize | Odds of Winning |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pick 5 | Match 5 out of 5 | £350,000 | 1 in 834,398 |
| Pick 4 | Match 4 out of 4 | £13,000 | 1 in 30,342 |
| Pick 3 | Match 3 out of 3 | £800 | 1 in 1,626 |
| Pick 2 | Match 2 out of 2 | £60 | 1 in 115 |
| Pick 1 | Match 1 | £6 | 1 in 10 |
In other lotteries you get overall odds of winning a prize because you could win one of several different prizes with every entry. This doesn't apply to Lotto HotPicks, however, because you only ever play for one prize at a time.
Prize Capping in Lotto HotPicks
Lotto HotPicks prizes are capped if the total payouts for a particular game - for example, Pick 5 - are worth more than the prize fund for that game.
Each game has a prize cap multiplier and to determine the maximum that is available to pay out in prize money, the National Lottery multiplies the total value of all the entries for a particular game by the prize cap multiplier. The table below shows each prize cap multiplier and the average percentage of revenue from ticket sales that is paid out as prize money in each game:
| Game | Average % of sales paid out in prizes | Prize cap multiplier |
|---|---|---|
| Pick 5 | 41.95% | 28.0 |
| Pick 4 | 42.85% | 9.0 |
| Pick 3 | 49.22% | 2.8 |
| Pick 2 | 52.6% | 1.3 |
| Pick 1 | 61.02% | 1.2 |
Why are Lotto and Lotto HotPicks odds different?
The odds of winning a HotPicks prize are longer, meaning it’s harder to win, because you don’t pick as many numbers.
Take the Match 3 prize, for example. In Lotto HotPicks you choose three numbers and those exact three numbers must appear in the winning line for you to win – the odds of that happening are 1 in 1,626. In Lotto, however, you choose six numbers and you can match any three of those to win the Match 3 prize – those odds are 1 in 97, meaning it’s significantly easier to win.
It may be harder to win when you play HotPicks but you are equally rewarded, as the prizes are much higher than those in Lotto. To continue the example above, the Match 3 prize in Lotto HotPicks is £800, while the equivalent prize in Lotto is £30.
If the value of a particular game’s payouts exceeds the prize cap, the capped amount will instead be shared equally between the winners. For example, if the prize fund for the Pick 5 game is capped at £1.2 million and there are four winners, each winner will receive £300,000 instead of the usual £350,000 prize.