While we all dream about winning big on the lottery, some people have been fortunate enough to scoop jackpot prizes multiple times. In fact, one lucky woman from Virginia even won an astonishing 30 times in a single day!
Read on for some incredible stories of multiple jackpot winners, ranked from the people who've had the fewest multiple wins to those who've enjoyed the most.
All dollar amounts in US dollars, except where otherwise specified.
Duane Ketterman from Delaware was a regular player of the Maryland lottery, buying a ticket whenever he crossed state borders for work.
In July 2022, the powerline technician had his first major win when he netted $18,000 (£14k) in the Maryland Lottery's Racetrax game. The following month, he struck lucky again, winning an additional $30,785 (£25k).
While claiming his second prize in Baltimore, Ketterman said: "I couldn't believe I won the first time. So, when I saw this one, I was just stunned."
A trailer park is probably the last place you'd imagine a lottery winner to live – let alone somebody who's actually won the lottery twice. But that's exactly where Evelyn Adams wound up.
A convenience store worker from New Jersey, she netted a total of $5.4 million (£4.4m) across two separate wins in the space of just four months in the mid-1980s.
Evelyn's chances of winning her first jackpot back in October 1985 were reportedly one in 3.2 million, while her odds of winning the second in February 1986 were just one in 5.2 million. However, her story didn't have a happy ending.
Before her second win, Adams was spending $100 a week on lottery tickets, and she found it hard to kick her gambling habit. She eventually lost the majority of her winnings on the slot machines in Atlantic City. "I won the American dream but I lost it too", she later observed in an interview.
Bill Morgan, a then-37-year-old Australian truck driver living in a caravan, won the lottery twice in bizarre circumstances.
After surviving a near-fatal heart attack that rendered him comatose for 15 days, Morgan decided to try his luck on the lottery and promptly won a car with his winning ticket. The local news station in Melbourne wanted to feature his good fortune as a news story and asked Morgan to return to the store where he bought his winning ticket to re-enact the purchase.
Lo and behold, as Morgan was filmed scratching the duplicate card, he discovered that he'd won the lottery again, this time scooping a very healthy AU$250,000 ($180k/£144k).
Indianapolis resident Robert Hamilton (pictured) had a very memorable 2014 when he won the lottery twice in the space of just three months.
The first jackpot moment happened when he bought a ticket at a convenience store in Indiana and promptly won $1 million (£800k). A few months later, he purchased another $1 million winning ticket from a different local store.
After the first win, Hamilton bought a house and paid off all his debts. After his second win, he bought a motorcycle and said: "It's the icing on the cake."
At the time, Hoosier Lottery officials said the odds of winning a top prize from its scratchcard game were one in 2.1 million.
British mum-of-four Wendy Baron had the surprise of her life when the UK's People's Postcode Lottery knocked on her door in Wokingham in February 2023.
Baron had entered the lottery draw with five of her neighbours, who split the total prize of £210,000 ($260k) between them.
Baron's prize – £30,000 ($37k) and a holiday worth £5,000 ($6k) – would have been exciting enough but, incredibly, this was the second time she had struck lucky with the People's Postcode Lottery. In 2020, she won over £11,000 ($13k) before moving to her new address.
Mary Riedel was extremely lucky when she won the Ohio Lottery twice in 2014.
Mary's first win was in the 40th Anniversary Millions and she received a cheque for $50,000 (£40k). The generous mother didn't even spend the money on herself, opting to instead give it to her daughter to help her buy a house.
Four months later, Mary bought another ticket at a gas station in Brunswick and won a few dollars. Instead of taking the money home, she asked the clerk to pick her another ticket. They picked one out and Mary scratched her way to $100,000 (£80k).
Riedel plans to use the money to add to her retirement fund. When asked how she felt about her double win, she said: "I just feel like the luckiest person I know."
Another twice-lucky winner of the Ontario lottery is Antoine Beaini, a man who purchased a winning lottery ticket from a convenience store in his hometown of Milton in September 2022.
Incredibly, Beaini's CA$1 million ($735k/£590k) prize was his second in just 13 months – he'd already won the same sum in August 2021.
Ryaan Othman from Brampton, Ontario won CA$1 million ($735k/£590k) in January 2023, and also picked up an extra CA$7 "on his other selections", according to Canadian news outlet blogTO.
The life-changing sum wasn't Othman's only windfall. Just a month earlier, he'd netted CA$180,000 ($132k/£106k) on his "favourite game", Lotto Max.
"I was speechless for at least three minutes," he said. "I knew the odds of this happening were slim but for it to happen twice is out of this world." He reportedly plans to spend his winnings on investments and travel.
Kenneth J Stokes was a lottery season ticket holder living in Massachusetts when he accidentally won the same jackpot twice, scooping up $546,000 (£440k) in the process.
Stokes had forgotten that his family had gifted him a season pass to the Massachusetts State Lottery Lucky for Life draw with their lucky numbers, and bought himself a second ticket with the exact same numbers.
Unbelievably, that very same set of figures turned out to be the winning digits in the draw. Experts put the odds of Stokes winning twice in one draw as one in 985,517. If he'd chosen two sets of different numbers and still won, his odds would have increased to one in 9.7 trillion.
ABC News reported at the time that Stokes planned to use his winnings to pay for his son's college tuition, his daughter's remaining car payments, and a family vacation.
Brooklyn resident Wayne Murray's lottery-winning streak began in August 2022 when he scored $10 million (£8m) playing the Black Titanium scratch-off game. In December 2023, Murray struck gold again, winning another $10 million from the 200X scratch-off.
But despite a combined pot of $12 million (£9.7m) after taxes, Murray is still on the hunt for his next big win. According to Hassan Nabil, a former clerk at H&A Gas & Convenience, where Murray made one of his winning purchases, the lottery winner drops around $500 (£400) daily on tickets. Nabil noted that Murray's strategy involves buying different types of tickets to maximise his chances, even though he often ends up losing more than he wins.
Murray, who has been described by neighbours as "humble", said he wished to remain “discreet" after his big wins and has not splashed his cash. He continues to reside in his modest East Flatbush home. However, he did treat himself to a sleek $200,000 (£160k) Range Rover.
Juan Hernandez of Nassau County, New York defied all the odds by winning $10 million (£8m) in the New York Lottery's Deluxe scratch-off game – twice.
The wins netted him a total of over $13 million (£10m) after tax. Hernandez said he was still trying to spend his original 2019 winnings when he doubled his fortune at a Stop & Shop store in Hempstead in February 2022.
Back in 2016, Kevin Miller from Massachusetts bought a $1 million (£800k) winning lottery ticket at a Food City supermarket in Turner Falls.
Six years later, his winning streak continued when he won $25,000 (£20k) a year for life in the Lucky For Life lottery game after buying a ticket at that very same store.
Instead of the yearly payments, Miller opted to receive a lump sum of $390,000 (£315k) before taxes. Food City also received a one-off payment of $5,000 (£4k) for selling him his most recent winning ticket.
According to reports, Racy Pel bought lottery tickets because he liked the fact that the money raised was donated to California's state schools.
In 2013, the charitable Pel purchased $20 worth of Super Lotto Plus tickets. His first ticket earned him the jackpot-winning sum of $50 million (£40m), while his second ticket won him $32,304 (£26k).
And he didn't even cash his winnings right away, patiently waiting a whole week until he had a day off work. He revealed at the time that he planned to spend some of his newly acquired fortune on a car.
In February 2018, Michigan man Mark Maltz won the lottery three times in one day, scooping up a hefty sum of cash in the process.
It all started when truck driver Maltz stopped at a BP petrol station. While inside, he bought a scratch-off ticket and won $10 (£8). Feeling lucky, he then decided to buy a Fast Cash ticket and won $15 (£12). Deciding to push his fortune even further, he purchased a $5 (£4) Fast Cash Black Jack ticket and a $10 (£8) Jackpot Slots ticket.
The Jackpot Slots ticket matched three symbols on one of the 15 spins, making him the jackpot winner with a fortune of $325,184 (£260k) – his biggest prize. Maltz told Michigan Lotto at the time: "I’m going to sit on this for a little while and decide how to best invest it and make it last me a long time."
In 2023, Steven Antal from Ontario, Canada celebrated his third major lottery win, scooping CA$550,000 ($400k/£320k) in the Bigger Spin instant game, an Ontario-only lottery that launched in October 2018.
According to the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG), the odds of winning the Big Spin jackpot are one in 1,034,075. This makes it all the more incredible that Antal later went on to win CA$250,000 ($180k/£145k) in 2018 and CA$100,000 ($73k/£59k) in 2019.
Melvyn Wilson began his lucky streak with a $25,000 (£20k) win on a scratchcard back in 2004.
A year later, he scratched his way to another two Virginia Lottery wins of $1 million (£800k) and $500,000 (£400k). The retired postal worker got lucky again in 2013, winning $500,000 (£400k) on yet another Virginia Lottery scratchcard.
Asked what he does with all his winnings, he told lottery officials: "I invest in Melvyn!"
Virginia-based Calvin and Zatera Spencer were hailed "the luckiest couple in the world" when they won two $1 million (£800k) prizes and a further $50,000 (£40k) in 2014, making them lottery winners three times over. What makes their trio of jackpots even more remarkable is that the three wins came within the space of a month.
The pair's winning streak began on 12 March 2014 when they won $1 million in the Powerball drawing. They then won $50,000 on 26 March in the Virginia Lottery Pick 4 game before winning another $1 million in a scratch-off game the very next day.
After claiming the winnings, Calvin said he would continue to play the lottery, declaring: "We're not finished yet." And they certainly weren't. In 2017, Calvin won a further $100,000 (£80k) in a Virginia Lottery Cash 5 drawing.
Joan R. Ginther has been called "the luckiest woman in the world" after winning the lottery no fewer than four times, with all her winning tickets purchased within the state of Texas.
Experts have calculated that the chances of her winning the lottery this many times are one in 18 septillion (a septillion has 24 zeros in it). Ginther is actually a former maths professor and has a PhD from Stanford University in statistics, causing some to suggest that she may have drawn on her expertise to achieve her winning streak.
Ginther's first Texas Lottery win saw her receive $5.4 million (£4.3m) in 1993. A decade later, she won a further $2 million (£1.6m), followed by another $3 million (£2.4m) two years later. In 2008, she hit a $10 million (£8m) jackpot and, in total, has won over $20 million (£16m).
Massachusetts man Raymond Roberts credits his "intuition" for his astonishing six lottery wins. Roberts played the same numbers six times in the Lucky for Life lottery game. In a drawing on 14 December 2022, he won $25,000 (£20k) a year for life on each of his tickets.
His winning numbers, which he's been playing for over 20 years, netted Roberts a pre-tax total of $1.95 million (£1.6m) for five of his tickets after he chose to redeem the cash as a lump sum.
For his sixth ticket, he opted to redeem the annuity prize, which entitles him to at least 20 yearly payments of $25,000 (£20k) before tax.
The late Richard Lustig became a celebrity when he won no fewer than seven lotteries between 1993 and 2010. His smallest prize was a holiday trip to Memphis while his largest was $842,152 (£677k), with a collective winning total of over $1 million (£800k).
Lustig took a slightly different path from other lottery winners, writing a book called Learn How To Increase Your Chances of Winning the Lottery and appearing on multiple TV shows to offer his tips for jackpot success.
However, his methods were largely criticised for not actually raising anyone's odds. Financial journalist Felix Salmon even questioned how much money Lustig had spent on lottery tickets, and whether he'd ended up with any profit at all.
In 1992, Stefan Mandel won $27 million (£22m) in the Virginia jackpot on behalf of an Australian syndicate. But it wasn’t through luck; he schemed and planned to win it by buying every possible combination of numbers.
Astonishingly, it was his 14th jackpot win – so how did he do it? "He doesn't just go out and buy random tickets," NPR’s Planet Money producer Alex Goldmark reported. "He goes to the library and he starts reading math paper after math paper after math paper, and he comes up with a formula for buying blocks of tickets that he thinks should guarantee him a prize."
Thinking of trying out a Mandel-style system for lottery luck? Think again. Today's lottery system has changed irrevocably, with the number of combinations now too great to guess winning numbers accurately.
Armand Paganelli is a businessman from the Bronx in New York – and something of a local legend for purchasing 16 winning lottery tickets in the space of just two years.
The winning tickets were all bought between 2013 and 2014 at the drugstore that Paganelli owns and runs with his brothers, leading to suspicion from others. However, it's perfectly legal for retailers to buy tickets that they sell themselves.
The lucky numbers have won Paganelli a total fortune of around $625,000 (£502k). Talking about his wins, he's admitted that he buys a lot of tickets as he likes to gamble. He's spent most of his winnings on his children's college education and donations to charity.
In 2019, Deborah Brown had an incredible stroke of luck when she won the lottery an astonishing 30 times in a single day.
She bought 20 Pick 4 tickets, choosing the same combination of numbers (1-0-3-1) for each. Brown, who lives in Richmond, Virginia recalled seeing the numbers multiple times throughout that day and decided to buy another 10 tickets with the same numbers at the same location.
The top prize in the Pick 4 category is $5,000 (£4k), which is what Brown won on all 30 of her tickets, netting her an amazing $150,000 (£120k).
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