How Lotto Max, MaxPlus and MaxMillions work

Written by NextGen, British Columbia · Last updated October 2026

Lotto Max is Canada's biggest national lotto game. It changed in April 2026 — new number range, new price, a higher jackpot cap and a new layer of $100,000 prizes — so a lot of explanations online are now out of date. Here is how the current game works, using the official game descriptions from WCLC, BCLC and OLG.

What you get for $6

Each Lotto Max play costs $6 and contains four selections of seven numbers from 1 to 52. You choose one selection yourself (or ask for a Quick Pick) and the terminal adds three more Quick Pick selections. Before April 2026 a play cost $5 and contained three selections from 1 to 50, so if you have older notes, the numbers 51 and 52 and the fourth line are the main changes.

Draws are held every Tuesday and Friday. In Western Canada, WCLC lists ticket sales as closing at 7:30 p.m. Pacific on draw day. You can buy the same numbers for up to 25 consecutive draws (Advance Play), and you can add Extra (or Encore in Ontario) for $1 — see Extra and Encore explained.

The main draw

Seven main numbers and one bonus number are drawn from 1 to 52. Prizes are based on how many main numbers you match on a single selection — numbers matched on different lines do not add up. WCLC's prize table, per $6 play:

The overall odds of winning any prize are about 1 in 5.8 per play. "Pools Fund" prizes are pari-mutuel: the money for that tier is divided among everyone who hits it, so the amount varies from draw to draw. Where the jackpot odds come from is shown step by step in our odds guide: there are 133,784,560 possible lines, and four lines per play brings that to 1 in 33,446,140.

The jackpot: $10 million to $90 million

The Lotto Max jackpot starts at $10 million and grows when it is not won. In April 2026 the maximum was raised from $80 million to $90 million, which the lottery corporations describe as a record-setting amount for a Canadian lottery. Unwon jackpot money carries over to the next draw.

MaxPlus: $100,000 prizes every draw

New with the 2026 format, every draw includes extra $100,000 prize draws called MaxPlus. There are as many $100,000 prizes as there are millions in the jackpot: a $10 million jackpot comes with 10 MaxPlus prizes, a $40 million jackpot with 40, and a $90 million jackpot with 90. Each MaxPlus prize is a separate set of seven numbers. To win one you must match all seven numbers exactly on one of your selections — there are no smaller prizes for partial matches. If more than one ticket matches the same set, they share it.

MaxMillions: $1 million prizes on big jackpots

When the jackpot grows past $50 million, additional MaxMillions draws are held, each worth $1 million. Like MaxPlus, each MaxMillions prize is its own set of seven numbers that must be matched exactly on one line, with no secondary prizes. Every selection on your ticket is checked against every MaxMillions set for that draw. WCLC explains that MaxMillions and the jackpot keep growing until the jackpot reaches $90 million; after that, only the MaxMillions keep growing. MaxMillions prizes that are not won carry over.

For a real example, before the Tuesday, October 6, 2026 draw WCLC's jackpot banner advertised a $75 million jackpot together with 12 × $1 million MaxMillions prizes and 75 × $100,000 MaxPlus prizes. You can follow how these figures move on our Lotto Max results archive.

What MaxPlus and MaxMillions mean for your odds

According to the official odds tables, each MaxPlus and each MaxMillions draw has the same odds as the main jackpot: 1 in 33,446,140 per play. More prize draws mean more chances in the same draw, but each chance is tiny. Here is a fair way to think about a big night with 75 MaxPlus draws and 12 MaxMillions draws: your play is checked against 1 + 75 + 12 = 88 seven-number sets, so your chance of hitting at least one of those top prizes is roughly 88 in 33,446,140 — about 1 in 380,000. Better than the jackpot alone, still very unlikely.

Because MaxPlus and MaxMillions prizes can be shared and must be matched exactly, picking "unpopular" numbers will not raise your chance of winning, though it can lower your chance of having to share. See odds explained.

Checking a Lotto Max ticket

Checking four lines against the main draw plus dozens of MaxPlus and MaxMillions sets by hand is slow and easy to get wrong. Use your lottery's app (BCLC's Lotto! app in British Columbia, the Lotto Spot app in WCLC provinces) or a retailer's ticket checker, which reads the barcode and checks every prize category at once. The official results pages also list every MaxPlus and MaxMillions number set. Our guide to checking and claiming prizes covers the next steps if you win.

Quick summary

• $6 buys four lines of seven numbers from 1 to 52; draws are Tuesday and Friday.
• Jackpot: $10 million to $90 million; odds 1 in 33,446,140 per play.
• MaxPlus: one $100,000 prize per million in the jackpot, every draw, exact match only.
• MaxMillions: $1 million prizes once the jackpot passes $50 million, exact match only.
• Any prize: about 1 in 5.8 per play — mostly Free Plays and $20 prizes.