Differences between the US Powerball and the Australian Powerball

Despite sharing the same name, the US Powerball and the Australian Powerball are very different.

Australia system entries vs US PowerPlay

For starters, in Australia we have a range of entry types, also known as System entries, in addition to the standard entry type.

In the US, they have access to what they call the PowerPlay. For an extra dollar (so $3 instead of $2 per entry), you get the chance to multiply your winnings. After the main numbers and the Powerball are drawn, the PowerPlay number is drawn from a seperate barrel with balls that range between 2 and 5. This number is the multiplier of your winnings. But don't be fooled, the odds are not equal for the multiplier. While it may seem intuitive that the barrel simply contains those 5 balls, the odds are skewed towards the lower end, as the barrel actually contains 42 balls, with the lower multipliers being represented more frequently. Here is the breakdown:

If the Jackpot is below $150M, an extra 10x PowerPlay ball is added to the barrel. When this happens, the odds look like this:

It should be noted that the Jackpot does not get affected by the multiplier, and multiplied wins are capped to 2 millions.

Differences in barrel sizes

The other major differences between the Australian version of the Powerball and the US Powerball are the barrel sizes. In the US, the main barrel has numbers from 1 to 69, while in Australia we have numbers between 1 and 45. In the US, the Powerball barrel has numbers from 1 to 26 and in Australia the Powerball barrel contains balls from 1 to 20. Additionally, in the US they draw 5 balls from the main barrel, while in Australia we draw 7 balls from the main barrel. Here is a visual breakdown:

As you can imagine, this affects the odds significantly. The odds to win the Australian Powerball Jackpot is 1 in 134,490,400, while the odds of winning the US Powerball Jackpot is 1 in 292,201,338.

Dividend allocation

Another difference is that outside of the Jackpot, in the US the prizes (dividends) are fixed, while in Australia, each division has an allocated percentage of the total prize that gets shared within the division.

As the dividends in Australia are dynamic, I averaged the dividends and winners for division 2 to 9 over the last 10 draws. By putting an actual number on each division, things are a little easier to compare.

Playing the US Powerball in Australia

The large Jackpots in the United States can make our Australian lotteries feel underwhelming. There is an easy way to play the US Powerball and the US Mega Millions for Ausralian residents. We describe the process here.