Powerball Ticket Sold In Arkansas Wins $1.82 billion Jackpot
Topline
A single ticket sold in Arkansas emerged as the winner of the $1.817 billion Powerball jackpot in a Christmas Eve drawing on Wednesday night—claiming the second biggest ever lottery prize in the U.S.—although the winner will take home a much smaller payout after taxes and deductions.
The Powerball jackpot of $1.82 billion was won by a single ticket buyer from Arkansas.
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Key Facts
The six winning numbers drawn on Wednesday night were 4, 25, 31, 52, 59 and Red Powerball 19.
The winner will now have to choose between taking the $1.817 billion billion prize split across 30 annual payments or a one-time lump-sum amount of $834.9 million—the preferred choice for most winners.
If the cash reward is picked, the winnings will first drop to around $634.5 million after a mandatory federal withholding of 24% is applied.
The winner is likely to face a federal marginal rate of 37%, depending on their taxable income, further cutting their winnings to around $526 million.
If they go with the installment option, the winner’s annual payments of around $60.5 million will drop to around $38.1 million after the 37% federal marginal rate is applied.
Arkansas is one of the states that taxes lottery prizes and the winner will have to pay the state 5.9% of their winnings.
Big Number
1 in 292.2 million. Those are the astronomical odds the Powerball ticket buyer had to overcome to win the big prize. This is even worse than the Mega Millions jackpot’s already poor odds of 1 in 290.4 million.
Key Background
This is the biggest lottery prize of 2025 and the second biggest U.S. jackpot ever, behind the $2.04 billion prize won by a California Powerball ticket buyer in November 2022. In September, a $1.78 billion Powerball prize was split between two ticket buyers, one from Missouri and another from Texas, the second biggest of 2025. However, the Arkansas ticket buyer will end up with a much larger prize as they will not have to split their winnings with anyone else. Last month, a single ticket sold in Georgia won the Mega Millions’ $980 million.
Further Reading
Two Winners Will Split Second-Largest Powerball Jackpot In History (Forbes)
This content is sourced from www.forbes.com and is shared for informational purposes only.
