New Zealand Lottery – Lotto NZ
 Current Jackpot NZ$ 13,500,000
NZ Lotto – New Zealand Lotteries Commission 
The New Zealand Lottery – NZ Lotto – can trace its history back to 1985 when it was first identified that lotteries would provide a potentially good source of additional income that would benefit various areas of life in New Zealand. The New Zealand Lotteries Commission (Lotto NZ – NZ Lotteries) was established on June 1st 1987 after the New Zealand governmental cabinet approved the introduction of an NZ Lotto in February 1986. The New Zealand Lotteries Commission has since operated lottery games right across New Zealand very successfully and their games have become a popular part of New Zealand culture over the years. The very first Lotto NZ tickets went on sale on July 22nd 1987 with the first NZ Lotto draw taking place on August 1st 1987. There are various games you can play in the Lotto NZ portfolio with the New Zealand Lottery offering Lotto Strike, Winning Wheel, Big Wednesday, Keno, Instant Kiwi and the games that we will be taking a closer look at here - Lotto and Powerball….
NZ Lotto + Powerball - Overview
NZ Lotto 
The NZ Lotto – or Lotto NZ as it is sometimes referred to – is the flagship game in the NZ Lotteries portfolio. It is the oldest lottery game in New Zealand and is hugely popular indeed. It has been going since 1987 and is still the most popular game amongst New Zealand lottery players. The NZ Lotto jackpot prize is a minimum of NZ$1 million and each week and apart from the jackpot itself, there are 5 other ways in which you can win. The Lotto NZ offers people the chance to become a millionaire every single week with draws taking place on Saturday evenings at 8pm New Zealand time. The Lotto draw is televised live on New Zealand’s channel TV2 where you can check the NZ Lotto results.
NZ Powerball 
The Powerball game in New Zealand is an added extra to the NZ Lotto and anyone playing the Lotto also has the chance to play the Powerball alongside it. Lotto NZ introduced the Power Ball game to its portfolio in February 2001. The minimum NZ Powerball jackpot prize is NZ$3 million and this figure will keep increasing each week that it is not won until the numbers are matched correctly or until it is shared out in one of the “Must Be Won” draws. The jackpot aside, there are a further 5 ways in which you can win on the NZ Lotto Powerball game. You can check the NZ Lotto results for Powerball at the same time as the main Lotto draw when it is televised at 8pm on Saturdays on New Zealand’s TV2 channel.
How It Works…
NZ Lotto 
The NZ Lotto is a standard jackpot style draw game which uses a matrix of 6/40+1. This means that 6 main numbers plus a Bonus Number are drawn and you will need to select your 6 numbers from a pool of numbers from 1 to 40 – if you match all 6 main numbers drawn then you will be a Lotto NZ jackpot winner. A “Easy Dip” facility is available when playing the NZ Lotto similar to the “Lucky Dip” option that is used in the UK National Lottery or EuroMillions or the “Quick Pick” used by most USA lottery games – which means that you can ask the lottery retailer or computer to randomly select all your NZ Lotto numbers for you. When playing the New Zealand Lotto you need to play a minimum of 4 lines at 60 cents a line. This means that the minimum cost pf playing is NZ$2.40.
NZ Powerball 
The Lotto NZ Powerball game runs right along side the main Lotto game and provides you with the chance to dramatically increase the size of your Lotto winnings. Directly after the 6 main NZ Lotto numbers have been drawn, the Powerball number will then also be drawn from the Power Ball machine. The NZ Lotto Powerball uses a matrix of 1/10 which means that when playing, you need to select 1 number from a pool of numbers from 1 to 10. This will be your Powerball number. So, the Powerball game is simply an extra number that is added to each line in the main Lotto NZ. If you have won a prize in the NZ Lotto and have elected to play Powerball too, you will win the Power Ball prize as well as the Lotto prize, if you have also correctly matched the Powerball number drawn. Playing the NZ Lotto Powerball costs NZ$0.50 per line which will be added on to the cost of the line in the main NZ Lotto. In synch with the man draw, you will need to have a minimum of 4 Powerball lines when playing. Therefore, when playing the Lotto NZ Powerball game, you will be using both games’ matrices of 6/40 and 1/10.
Random Number Generator
Unlike many of today’s lottery games, the New Zealand Lottery uses a traditional style, ball drawing machine for making its draws on the NZ Lotto and not one of the random number generators that are now becoming ever familiar.
Who Can Play? 
Particular to New Zealand Lotteries is the fact that it has never mattered where in the world you live – you are eligible to play in any of the Lotto New Zealand games including the NZ Lotto and Powerball. Normally you would have to reside in a country itself, to be able to play in any of its lottery games. These days, though, this is of little concern anyway, as there are bona-fide and fully authorized online lottery ticket sales companies such as TheLotter that you can get your lottery tickets from wherever in the world you may be. This is good news, of course, if you wish to play the New Zealand Powerball lottery and you live abroad or even if you simply want to enjoy the convenience of being able to buy lottery tickets online. Another thing that is pretty unique amongst lottery games is that with Lotto NZ, there is no age limit for playing either the NZ Lotto or Power Ball. The only stipulation is that if you are under 18 years of age and win a prize of more than NZ$1,000, you will need to get a Parent/Guardian Acknowledgement Form completed.
Information & Background
Lotto NZ paid out NZ$64.5 million in prizes for the Lotto games in 1987/8 - its first full year of operation. By the year 2007/8, this figure had risen to NZ$274.15 million in prize payouts. To date, more than NZ$3.75 billion has been paid out to lucky lottery winners of the NZ Lotto since it began back in 1987. Powerball winnings amount to more than NZ$432.4 million since it began in 2001 and this has been paid out to over 1.12 million winners. There have been at least 370 people who have won NZ$1 million or more on the NZ Lotto and 95 who have scooped over NZ$1 million on the Powerball game. A change to the Powerball game occurred in October 2007 when the starting jackpot figure was tripled from NZ$1 million to NZ$3 million. At the same time the Powerball matrix was altered from 1/8 to 1/10. The NZ Lotteries Powerball game has a threshold of NZ$30 million and once it has rolled over to this amount, there will be a “Must Be Won” draw – the first of these taking place on October 18th 2008 You can check the New Zealand Lotto results and Powerball results in numerous ways – at the shop where you purchased your ticket, in New Zealand’s newspapers, on teletext or on the website of your Lotto NZ online lottery ticket agent.
What Are The Odds?
With so many ways you can win on the Lotto NZ there are quite a few different combinations here depending whether you are playing only the main NZ Lotto game which includes a Bonus Ball or playing the additional Power Ball game too. The table below best explains the various odds involved with this game…
Record Jackpots… 
As of 2006, the record NZ Lotto Powerball win was NZ$17,992,975 which was won on a single ticket bought in Kaeo, Northland on May 20th. This record was broken when the NZ Lotto Powerball jackpot reached a whopping NZ$19,054,243 and was won on April 5th 2008 from a supermarket in New Plymouth. Once again, this was won on just a single ticket. To give you an idea of how this top prize was broken down, NZ$18,816,031 came from the Power Ball and NZ$238,212 came from the NZ Lotto. The record for the most number of people sharing in a Lotto NZ jackpot win occured when 38 people were all winners of the top prize on September 11th 1993. Each lucky winner receievd NZ$35,937.
How Are Jackpots Paid? 
All jackpots and other prizes won in Lotto NZ games are paid to you as cash lump sums either as a check/cheque or directly into your bank account. If you have won a prize on the NZ Lotto or Powerball you must make your claim within 12 months of the game being drawn. If you have won any prize up to NZ$1000, the Lotto Shop where you purchased your lottery ticket from will be able to pay this to you straight away. If you have won NZ$1001 or more, the lottery retailer can still check this but you will need to claim your prize at NZ Lotteries offices in Wellington. You will need to fill in an NZ Lotteries Prize Claim Form which you can obtain from your retailer and send the form and winning ticket to the Wellington office. Of course, if you play lottery online with the NZ Lotto, you will not need to be concerned with any of this as your online lottery ticket agent, such as TheLotter will take acre of all of these details for you.
How New Zealand Benefits…
The mission for the New Zealand Lotteries Commission is to raise monies for the communities. Proceeds from NZ Lotteries are transferred to the New Zealand Lottery Grants Board who then determine which organization is to benefit and where the money needs to go. Areas that have benefited from lottery funding in New Zealand are community organizations, the arts, recreation, film, sports and other deserving causes that affect nearly all of the population. Since the Lotto NZ began, more than NZ$2 billion has been donated to these worthwhile causes from NZ Lotteries via the New Zealand Lottery Grants Board. Click here to
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