VA Lottery’s Popular New Year’s Raffle Will Award $1 Million To Four Winners

The wild popular Virginia New Year’s Millionaire Raffle is getting even bigger for the new year.

The New Year’s Millionaire Raffle is a rather unique lottery offering. After all, a limited number of tickets are available, and once they’re sold, no more are printed.

However, the raffle’s main selling point is sure to catch the eye of jackpot-chasers: Players have a (relatively) good 1-in-125,000 chance of winning a $1 million grand prize.

Virginia Lottery officials announced the expansion on Monday. They will announce the raffle winners on New Year’s Day.

Tickets, which cost $20 each, are now on sale at VA Lottery’s 5,000 retail locations. (The tickets are not available at the lottery’s website.)

Why Virginia New Year’s Millionaire Raffle is popular

Come Jan. 1, VA Lottery officials will announce their first millionaires of 2021.

In all, raffle players will collect four grand-prize jackpots. That’s up from three total $1 million winners last year.

In fact, the VA New Year’s Millionaire Raffle is so popular that the lottery has sold out of its allotment of tickets well before the deadline each year. That’s why officials expanded the game from 375,000 total tickets in 2020 to 500,000 tickets in 2021.

All of the available Virginia New Year’s Millionaire Raffle prizes include:

• 4 winners: $1 million
• 6 winners: $100,000
• 500 winners: $500

VA Lottery officials, who introduced raffle games in 2007, will announce the winners of the 2021 raffle on Friday, Jan. 1, at 2 p.m. ET.

Another success for VA Lottery?

Despite an initial decline due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the VA Lottery is having a remarkable 2020.

The commonwealth’s official lottery concluded its latest fiscal year on June 30. It garnered $2.15 billion in total sales (second all-time) and more than $595 million in proceeds (third all-time) during that 12-month period.

However, continuing its rebound from the initial coronavirus lockdown, the Virginia Lottery saw its sales surge by 36% in the first quarter of the current fiscal year.

Now, with its raffle game back in the mix, VA Lottery Executive Director Kevin Hall expects another successful start of the calendar year:

“We know Virginia Lottery players look forward to the New Year’s Millionaire Raffle each year. Between the excitement of a limited number of tickets and the prospect of starting the year with a million dollars, this is an offering that is sure to be wildly popular.”

As of Nov. 10, players had already purchased nearly 20,000 of the 500,000 raffle tickets. It is not available as a purchase option for the Virginia online lottery.