Irish Lotto Review & Information

Irish Lotto began in 1988 shortly after the Irish government passed the National Lottery Act which supports several segments of society including sports, health, welfare, arts and national history.

The first drawing of the Irish Lotto took place on 16 April 1988 and since its inception, the Lotto has received more than €36 billion to support Irish society. All proceeds are stored in the national lottery fund and is distributed at the discretion of the Minister of Finance. Two thirds of the adult population of Ireland has played the Irish Lotto lottery since it started.  The style of the game has changed throughout its 24 years of operation.

The Irish lottery starts with a jackpot of €2 millions. The second prize can be as much as €25,000. The highest jackpot even won with Irish lottery is €9,505,290. For 10 years, this record was unbeaten. In 2008, the record was broken again by Irish lottery as the jackpot amounted to €18,963,441. The jackpot was won by a syndicate group consisting of 16 members from a concrete factory.

How does Irish lotto work?

To play the Irish lotto, you have to select six numbers out of 47 numbers. You also have to choose a bonus ball. The lotto additionally presents two extra games – Lotto Plus 1 and Lotto Plus 2. The lottery draws are held on Wednesday and Saturday at 8PM. You can use the quick pick option to pick the lottery numbers randomly. To improve your chances of winning some prize, you should enable the Lotto Plus 1 and Lotto Plus 2 option.

The minimum jackpot offered by the Irish lotto is €1.2 millions. The maximum jackpot amount is fixed at €13.83 millions. However, this maximum cap is simply a temporary setting as the lottery organizers have stated that they are working on making larger jackpots viable for winners. Apart from the Irish citizens, the UK players can also play the jackpot after the regulations of UK gambling commission. Your chances of winning Irish lotto are four times better than the chances of winning UK lotto.

Players from UK have to play a minimum of two lines per ticket. You can increase your winning chances by paying a little extra to play the Lotto Plus games. The syndicate playing option is gaining popularity in recent times especially after syndicates winning jackpots. With more numbers, the chances of winning is more. With syndicates, winnings are shared which can be a good motivation for the team.

Irish lotto lottery rules

You must be at least 18 years of age to play the Irish lotto. The three draws are popularly called as Main draw, 2^nd draw and 3^rd draw. You can play the 6 number or 7 number draw according to your preference. Needless to say, playing with the bonus ball increases your chances of winning the lottery. You should place your bets before 7PM on the days of the draw.

To win the jackpot lottery, you have to match all the six numbers. Numerous other prizes are offered and you can purchase €3 scratchcard to win some surprising prizes. The scratchcard allows you to win some prize by matching 2 numbers and the bonus ball. The value of the prize increases as you match more numbers. You should claim your prize within 90 days of winning the lottery.

There is no tax for the prize money if you live within Republic of Ireland. However the taxes apply when you live outside of Ireland. According to the new rules, there is no limit on the number of times that the Irish lotto can roll over.

How to win Irish lotto?

To win a lottery, you have to play as many times as you can. The Lotto Advanced play option allows you to play a month of lottery in advance. Even if you don’t win the jackpot, you can win huge prizes by playing Lotto plus games in the 2^nd and 3^rd draw. Players who play the Lotto plus game will also get a chance to play the Lotto Plus Raffle Draw to win €300. A four digit raffle  number will be allocated to you randomly. If you match the entire number, you can win the raffle. You can use the same playslip to play the same numbers multiple times.

In the Irish lotto there are no lucky numbers. The hot and cold numbers are insignificant. Picking numbers relevant to the calendar won’t help you to win the lottery much. In fact in the entire lottery history, the calendar strategy has only hel[ed 6% of thw times. In Irish lotto, the numbers are repeated extensively. This means that you can dramatically improve your chances of winning by playing with numbers chosen based on past results. The numbers have repeated in 3-4 consecutive draws.

With Irish lotto, you can improve your winning chances using strategies instead of relying on pure luck. The only problem is that you can’t easily predict which number will be repeated in the consecutive draws. The probability theory will greatly help you to improve your winning chances.

How to choose the best Irish lotto numbers?

To win the best numbers in Irish lottery, you have to focus on the winning patterns. You don’t even have to research about the repeating numbers. All you have to do is find the patterns that have the best winning chances and incorporate those patterns in your picks. In Irish lottery, a combination of 3 high and 3 low and a combination of 2 high and 4 low has won the lottery 31% of the time each. Instead of dividing your numbers as high and low, choose numbers in high, mid and low range groups. You should achieve a balance in the numbers by picking 3 odd and 3 even numbers which has won the lottery 32.88% of the times. You should play the lottery without consecutive numbers as such a pattern has won 51% of the lottery jackpot.

The odds of winning Irish lotto

The odds of winning a prize if you play Irish lotto alone is 1 in 29. If you choose the Lotto plus option your odds will increase to 1 in 14. Your odds of matching all 6 numbers to win the jackpot are 1 in 10 million. You can match 4 numbers along with bonus more easily as the odds are 1 in 1.7 million.  You can easily win a prize by matching 2 numbers and a bonus.