How Does Postcode Lottery Work?

Our winning postcodes are selected via draws using random number generator software which has been certified by a Gambling Commission-approved testing house. Only playing postcodes (or, for the Postcode Millions and the £1 Million shared prize, valid tickets) are entered into our draws. So, there's always a guaranteed winner for every prize.

20 draws are conducted each month with an independent adjudicator present, usually on the first Wednesday of the month (unless 1 January is a Wednesday, in which case the 20 draws will be carried out on 2 January). The winning postcodes are then announced on a daily basis as shown in the Prize Draw Calendar.

For each prize except the shared monthly Postcode Millions and the £1 Million shared prize, all playing postcodes are entered once. . These prizes aren’t shared, and each ticket holder with the winning postcode wins the full advertised prize. Playing with more than one ticket in the same winning postcode? You win the prize amount for each ticket you play with. So, if your postcode wins a £30,000 Street Prize, and you play with two tickets, you'd win £60,000. Playing with three tickets? You’d win £90,000! Some of these prizes will only have one winning postcode and others will have multiple winning postcodes, as shown in the Prize Draw Calendar.

Postcode Millions Shared Prize

For the Postcode Millions prize, all tickets play, and a single winning ticket is selected to determine the winning postcode. The specified prize money (which will be more than £1 Million) is shared. Insofar as allowed by the maximum possible prize per ticket limit mentioned below, half of the specified prize money will be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode. The other half, plus any left-over amounts which cannot be given to tickets playing with the winning postcode due to the maximum possible prize per ticket, will be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode sector. In the extremely unlikely event the maximum possible prize per ticket limit meant the relevant amount cannot be fully shared by tickets playing with the winning postcode sector, any remaining balance would then be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode district. All of the advertised prize will, therefore, be won. For more information about how this works, check out section 2.7 in our Terms and Conditions.

£1 Million Shared Prize

For the £1 Million prize, all tickets play, and a single winning ticket is selected to determine the winning postcode. The £1 Million prize money is shared. Insofar as allowed by the maximum possible prize per ticket limit mentioned below, the £1 Million prize will be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode. If the maximum possible prize per ticket mentioned below means the full £1 Million cannot be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode, any balance will be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode sector. In the extremely unlikely event the maximum possible prize per ticket limit meant the relevant amount cannot be fully shared by tickets playing with the winning postcode sector, any remaining balance would then be shared equally by tickets playing with the winning postcode district. All of the £1 Million prize will, therefore, be won. For more information about how this works, check out section 2.6 in our Terms and Conditions.

Maximum Possible Prize Per Ticket

The maximum possible prize per ticket for the shared Postcode Millions and £1 Million Prize is 10% of the proceeds of the lottery draw, up to £500,000. These are the maximum prize limits allowed by the Gambling Act 2005 for a ticket to win as a prize (or prizes) in a lottery draw.

We announce winning postcodes every single day! Check out the Prizes you can win with your People’s Postcode Lottery ticket. This also includes details of the Postcode Millions prize which is a shared prize between players in a winning postcode and sector (or occasionally, the postcode district) every month.

The prizes advertised are drawn first. If, because of the number of players in the winning postcodes, this amounts to less than 40% of the money raised through ticket sales for that draw, we will usually keep drawing more postcodes to win more £12 prizes. On occasion after all advertised prizes have been drawn, any remaining money from the 40% of ticket sales is carried forward to be won in future draws by the same promoting society.

People's Postcode Lottery manage society lotteries for 20 different Postcode Trusts. Have a look at our Prize Draw Calendar which highlights the Postcode Trust promoting the draws. 33% of the cost of each ticket goes to the Postcode Trust promoting the draw, 40% is used for prizes and 27% is used for our lottery operating expenses. In 2023 our ticket sales were £633 Million.

The 20 Postcode Trusts may use proceeds from their lotteries to give grants to beneficiaries who meet their aims. Information about how the grants are allocated and previous recipients can be found on their websites, which can be accessed from our Charities page.

It isn’t possible to predict the likelihood of winning a prize in future draws as this depends on the number of postcodes and tickets entered into the draws, and this can vary.

As a guide, 18.51% of playing postcodes won a prize from October's draws.