Last updated on March 1, 2024
Buy more lotto tickets. That’s the only way to increase your chances of winning. However, buying hundreds of tickets is useless if you make the wrong choices. Such a strategy is not only dangerous to your wealth but also hazardous to your health.
At the basic level, those groups who use the mathematical method of covering have a better chance than those who pick numbers by guesswork or quick pick. Since buying more tickets is the only way to increase your chance of winning the lottery, make sure you make the right choices.
There’s a big difference between having thousands of wrong combinations and having the right hundreds of combinations.
What’s the difference? Let’s dig into that.
Table of Contents
Letter From Mr. R.M.
Dear Edvin,
I like how you use mathematics to boost the chance of winning the lottery. But I have a problem with the conceptual crux of it: lotto tickets with 3-odd-3-even numbers on them are highly recommended. I agree that from 8 million+ combinations, a 3-odd-3-even class appears more often than a 6-odd class because there are more sequences in the first class than in the latter. But the chance of hitting a particular sequence out of 8 million+ possibilities is 1 in 8 million. I wonder what you think of my take.
Sincerely,
Mr. R.M
All Combinations Are Not Created Equally
I agree with Mr. R.M. 100%. All combinations have the same probability.
That’s because there’s only one way to win the jackpot, and we have no power to change the results of a mathematical calculation.
Will a 3-odd-3-even combination increase your chance of winning the lottery?
Of course not.
The truth, no matter what you do, the underlying probability never changes.1
Here in Lotterycodex, I don’t preach that a 3-odd-3-even combination will increase your chance of winning the jackpot, far from that.
If you’re buying lotto tickets by randomly picking numbers, your probability is no different than those who choose the 3-odd-3-even composition.
But to answer the question, “Is a 3-odd-3-even combination a better choice than a 6-odd combination?“
My answer is a resounding “YES.”
There’s a mathematical advantage to focusing on a well-balanced combination.
And the best way to describe it is through the ratio of success to failure.
When Buying Lotto Tickets, Consider Your Success-to-Failure Ratio
Odds and probability are not mathematically equivalent.2
Probability relates to your chance of winning. No matter what your combination is, your chance is always the same.
Probability is usually expressed in percentages by using the formula:
For example, in a 6/45 game, the probability of one ticket is 0.000012%.
Of course, the only way to improve your chances is to increase the number of lines you play. So if you buy two lotto tickets, the percentage of winning gets increased by 0.000025%
How do we calculate the odds?
Odds, on the other hand, refer to your advantage. The odds refer to the number of ways you win against the number of ways you lose.
In simple terms, odds refer to the success-to-failure ratio.
We can see that we have less control over our chances of winning. And we have less control over how odds are calculated.
In short, we cannot change the underlying probability. And we cannot beat the odds of the lottery.
But there’s hope. You have the power to choose your odds. You can make an intelligent choice based on the possible choices.
For example, in a 6/45 lotto, there are 74,613 ways you can combine purely six even numbers. That means you have 8,070,447 ways to fail. Simply put, you only have one favorable shot out of 109 attempts or a success-to-failure ratio of 1:8.
A well-balanced combination such as 3-odd-3-even will give you 2,727,340 ways to match the winning numbers. This means the number of ways you fail gets reduced to 5,417,720 only. Therefore, your success-to-failure ratio is approximately 1:2, meaning you have 33 favorable shots to match the winning combinations out of 100 attempts.
So, while you cannot change the probability and not beat the odds, at least you have the power to make an informed choice. Here in Lotterycodex, we reinforce that a true mathematical lotto strategy is to know all the possible choices and make an intelligent choice.
Choosing the quality of your combinations is all about choosing a better success-to-failure ratio.
You don’t want to spend your money on 108 attempts to get one favorable shot. Your job as a lotto player is to win the jackpot. Therefore, you should focus on a combinatorial group that gives you more favorable shots. Mathematically speaking, these are combinatorial groups that dominate the lottery draws.
Take note that a 3-odd-3-even combination is just a basic example. Using the Lotterycodex calculator, you will know exactly what groups dominate your lottery game.
Please understand that the probability is fairly distributed across the entire number field. We can divide the number field into two sets, odd and even numbers. According to probability theory, it’s rare to see a winning combination composed purely of odd numbers or purely even numbers. Both sets have equal probability. This explains why most winning combinations are composed of a balanced 3-odd-3-even composition.
The first thing you should know when buying lotto tickets is to know your ratio of success to failure. You cannot change the underlying probability and you cannot beat the lottery’s odds, but as a lotto player, you have the power to make informed choices. Even choosing not to play is a strategy by itself.
Buying Lotto Tickets with Covering Strategy
I can’t stress enough the importance of having a covering strategy when playing the lottery.3
In the lottery, your gut feeling doesn’t add up. Your special leaning over a certain number doesn’t matter in a random event. Hot and cold numbers don’t exist. The same holds for lucky and unlucky numbers.
The principle behind a lottery wheel (Covering)
The idea behind using a lottery wheel is to take advantage of the mathematical principle of covering.4
Let’s talk about the simplest form of a lottery wheel, the full-wheel type.5 For example, in a pick-5 lottery game, you can pick seven, eight, or nine numbers instead of choosing five numbers. This method is advantageous because trapping the winning numbers is much easier when you cover more than five numbers.
In this covering system, seven numbers like 8, 16, 17, 21, 24, 25, and 36 will produce 21 possible combinations. Then, you play all these 21 combinations to increase your chances of winning.
21 / 8 million = 1 to 380,952
Instead of having 14 million ways to lose, the wheel only reduces your odds to 381,000 ways. And, therefore, giving you a better advantage.
Suppose the numbers 8, 17, 24, and 36 are drawn, then you get two 4-matches and nine 3-matches, as shown below.
With a lottery wheeling system, you win 11 tickets while losing 10.
Buying more lotto tickets with a covering system gives you a better advantage. It’s important to understand that choosing 21 lines randomly or using a quick pick will not give you this advantage.
Learn why a lottery wheel is better than random selections of numbers. Please read this: Lottery Wheel: A Clever Mathematical Strategy That Works
However, it is expensive to use a full-wheel type system. If you increase your covering size, the number of combinations increases quickly. Ten numbers will produce 252 possible combinations. Make it Twelve, and you need to play 792 combinations.
So, your budget dictates how much covering size you can afford to play.
The principle behind Lotterycodex calculator
Lotterycodex created a calculator to eliminate guessing, so you only spend your money on dominant groups. Lotterycodex calculator is the only lottery wheel that uses probability theory to separate combinatorial groups according to the success-to-failure ratio.6
This objective is mathematically possible by analyzing the composition of each combination.7
Buying Hundreds of Thousands of Combinations is Not Designed For Solo Players
Buying lotto tickets by volume is recommended for lotto syndicates only.
If you’re a solo player planning to buy hundreds of thousands of tickets, think twice. Let me remind you that the lottery’s expected value is always negative. So you can’t win small prizes frequently.8
The probability calculation shows that the number of ways you lose is much higher than the number of ways you win.
As a solo player, you might consider buying only one ticket. Lotterycodex intends to reinforce the fun side of the lottery and to encourage you not to gamble into volume betting. To understand why, please read my article on how to win the lottery mathematically.
Starting a lotto syndicate is the best way to play the lottery.9
Thank you for reading. Please read my other articles to learn more about lottery strategies:
A Truly Random Lottery with a Deterministic Outcome
A Mathematical Lottery Hack That Works
How To Use Lucky Numbers To Win The Lottery
Questions Related to Buying Hundreds of Lotto Tickets
To calculate your odds, first, you must know the total number of combinations in your game. For example, there are 8,145,060 combinations in a 6/45 lotto game. So 1000 / (8,145,060 – 1000) will give you the odds of 1 to 8144. This ratio means you have 8,144 times to lose against one chance of winning.
The minimum number of tickets you need to buy to guarantee to win a prize can be calculated using the formula below: P(win at least one prize) = 1 – P(winning none)number of tickets. The calculation depends on your local lotto operator’s payout scheme. For example, if you plan to buy ten tickets for Canada Lotto 6/49, the calculation can be P(win at least one prize) = 1 – 0.8489844259910. The answer is 0.805465230391999. So the likelihood that your ten tickets will win any prize is 80%. This percentage represents your confidence level. If you’re unhappy with the 80% confidence level, you might want to increase the number of tickets. If you want a 99.99% confidence level to win at least one prize, then you are looking at buying 56 tickets.
There’s a huge difference in terms of advantage. With 100 tickets using a covering method, you have more chances to trap the winning numbers since you can select more than the required combinations. For example, in a 5/69 game, if you choose five numbers mathematically, you have one way to match the winning combination. However, selecting ten numbers gives you 252 ways to match the winning combination. As you increase the size of your covering, you increase your chances of trapping the winning numbers.
Buying hundreds or thousands of lottery tickets is not recommended for individual players. The expected value in lottery games is always negative, meaning the more you play, the more likely you are to lose. This approach is only suitable for lottery syndicates, where a group of players pools resources to buy tickets. For solo players, please enjoy the lottery as entertainment without heavily investing in volume betting.
Yes. Purchasing more lottery tickets does mathematically increase your chances of winning. However, it’s important to note that the strategy used in selecting numbers also matters, not just the quantity of tickets. Lotto players are advised to consider success-to-failure ratios when making their choices for the best possible outcome. To make this strategy more effective, using a lottery wheel can help strategically trap winning numbers. Additionally, playing as a syndicate can offset the cost of buying more tickets.10
Additional Resources
- Introduction to Probability [↩]
- Odds, Probability, and the Lottery [↩]
- Covering strategy [↩]
- Covering (of a set) [↩]
- Lottery Wheel: A Clever Mathematical Strategy That Works [↩]
- Lottery Calculator: Knowing the Best Lotto Combinations Without a Math Degree [↩]
- The Winning Lottery Formula Based on Combinatorics, Probability Theory, and the Law of Large Numbers [↩]
- The Truth About Winning Small Prizes in the Lottery [↩]
- Lottery Syndicate: A Simple Yet Effective Strategy [↩]
- The Lotto Secret: Three Math Strategies for Winning Revealed [↩]
