Players checking the Powerball numbers last night were looking at an estimated $86 million jackpot for the Saturday, May 16 drawing, with a $37.8 million cash option. The prize had rolled after the last jackpot was hit on May 2, when players in Florida and Texas split a $20 million payout.
The drawing came after a prior jackpot of $143.4 million was split by players in Kansas and Indiana, a reminder that the game can move fast when the top prize is hit. Powerball drawings are held three times a week — Monday, Wednesday and Saturday — at 10:59 p.m., with Monday drawings added in 2021 to give players one more chance each week.
For anyone still checking tickets, the game costs $2 and the optional Power Play adds $1. That add-on can multiply certain non-jackpot prizes up to five times, except for the jackpot and Match 5, and there is a 10x possibility when the jackpot is below $150 million. A quick pick can be generated by the lottery machine at random, but players can also choose their own numbers: five numbers from 1 to 69 for the white balls and one number from 1 to 26 for the red Powerball.
Prizes start at $4 for matching the Powerball and rise to $1 million for matching all five white balls, except in California, before reaching the jackpot for matching all six balls. Tickets are sold in 45 states plus Washington DC, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, usually at gas stations, convenience stores and grocery stores, though some airport terminals also sell them.
The deadline to buy a ticket in New Jersey is 9:59 p.m. on the day of the drawing, while New York closes sales at 10 p.m. That makes the last-minute window tight for anyone hoping to get in before the 10:59 p.m. drawing, and it is the detail that matters most on a Saturday like this: miss the cutoff, and the numbers do not count.
With the jackpot still unclaimed on Saturday night, the next drawing becomes the only thing that matters for the players who are still in it. For everyone else, the answer was already in hand: a fresh shot at an $86 million prize, and another round of ticket checks in the hours after the draw.
