Camelot unveiled the latest changes to EuroMillions in September 2016. Here’s the full scoop on what’s new.

When Did EuroMillions Change?

The changes applied starting with the Tuesday draw on 27th September 2016.

What Changed?

Here’s what is different in brief:-

• Ticket prices went going up – the price is now £2.50 a line (instead of £2)
• There is an extra Lucky Star ball – you now choose from 1-12 (instead of 1-11)
• The starting jackpot increased to €17 Million (current €15 Million)
• The rollover rules now allow a capped jackpot of €190 Million for up to 4 draws (currently 1 draw)
• The ‘UK Millionaire Maker’ add-on now pays out 2 x £1 Million prizes each draw (instead of 1)
• New ‘UK Monthly Bonus Draw’ – an online based draw once a month with a £1 Million prize
• There will be additional ‘European Millionaire Maker’ events a ‘couple’ of times per year
• Mega Friday events will become Mega Weeks, so include the Tuesday draw. Details are unclear at present.

Launch Draw

To ‘celebrate’ the changes (and encourage you to keep playing if you don’t like them), there was a EuroMillions Superdraw for that first Friday draw. So on the 30th September the jackpot was a guaranteed €130 Million (approx. £100 Million depending on exchange rates).

There was also an additional ‘fantastic event’ for the Tuesday launch draw. This turned out to be 10 Millionaire Maker prizes instead of the regular 2 plus ‘100 days around the world’ travel.

How Does The UK Monthly Bonus Draw Work?

This will be a once a month draw. Each line is an entry into the draw to win £1 Million. It will be drawn on the 2nd EuroMillions draw date of each month.

The date of the first UK Monthly Bonus Draw was rumoured to be on Tuesday 6th December, with the second on Friday 6th January. However these dates have NOT been confirmed by Camelot.

All tickets bought for draws in the previous calendar month will be eligible for that draw. So the first draw in December will include tickets bought for draws from Tuesday 1st November to Tuesday 29th November. Which UK Monthly Bonus Draw they are eligible for depends on the draw date the ticket covers, not the date the ticket was bought.

NOTE: This is an online entry. People who buy tickets online will be automatically entered. Those who buy paper tickets CAN still enter – but you will need to enter your tickets manually online, or scan them with the official mobile app.

This one is a bit unnecessarily confusing. But it’s not quite as complicated as it all sounds!

What Hasn’t Changed?

Not much! But just to be clear – the main balls have NOT changed. You will still pick from numbers 1-50.

The number of prize tiers is also not changing either – there are still 13.

How Does This Affect Your Chances Of Winning EuroMillions?

The jackpot will become harder to win. The odds will go up to 1 in 140 million (from 1 in 116 million right now).

The odds and amounts for every prize tier are changing slightly, but these are tweaks and don’t really make a great deal of difference. Yes, you will now win £3.30 for Matching 2 main numbers instead of £2.70.

Your overall odds however of winning something, will still remain at 1 in 13.

Don’t forget there is an extra £1 Million prize in the UK Millionaire Maker – so your chances of becoming a lottery millionaire (an enviable goal) in that game will double.

There is also the new monthly draw and the Mega Weeks too.

On weeks where the jackpot is capped, there will also be a ‘roll down’ of jackpot funds in excess of the capped amount (€190M). The whole jackpot will then roll down if not won within 4 draws.

Why Are They Making These Changes?

If you believe the newspapers it’s purely about greed. But I’d recommend you read between the lines of the official announcements, and ignore the ‘anti National Lottery’ press (who may or may not be supporting certain other rival games, ahem…). Because it seems to me to simply be about keeping the game alive. It’s no good waiting until sales have dropped dramatically before making changes, they need to keep us all interested in playing today.

Now, I’m not a great fan of huge jackpot games with constant rollovers. I’d rather more people win, each getting sensible amounts of money. That’s why playing EuroMillions in a syndicate makes a lot of sense (everybody gets to be a millionaire!).

But the reality is that more rollovers and bigger jackpots are what keep people interested. They sell more tickets. Presumably there is an upper limit to this where ‘more’ is no longer more in players eyes. But if you look at the USA, we haven’t reached the size of their big jackpot games yet. And they are still adjusting them to make even bigger jackpots!

More Information:-
EuroMillions Questions & Answers – EuroMillions vs Lotto Odds