New EuroMillions record! Player from Austria scoops 240 million EuroMillions jackpot

Can you imagine going to bed like any normal day, but waking up the next morning an overnight multi-millionaire? Well, that's exactly what happened to one lucky winner, who managed to match all the numbers in the Euromillions draw on Friday 8 December with a single bet, winning an incredible €240 million.

For now, it is only known that the player bought his bet in Austria, although details of his identity are unknown. This anonymous player will go down in history as the person who won the biggest EuroMillions prize ever drawn, surpassing the previous record of €230 million won in July 2022.

According to the laws governing lottery prizes in Austria, the winner will have a maximum period of up to 3 years to claim his prize, which he will receive in full with no reductions, as lottery prizes are not taxed in Austria, so he will be able to collect the €240 million in full.

A fortune of this size will allow this mysterious winner to accumulate a wealth greater even than that of celebrities as famous and millionaires as the singer Adele, the actress Salma Hayek or the tennis player Rafa Nadal.

Not bad for matching the winning numbers of the night, which will go down in history: numbers 17, 30, 42, 48, 50 and the stars 4 and 8.

Other winners of the draw

But in addition to this lucky Austrian winner, Friday's draw distributed several million euros across the rest of the continent.

The second prize totalled 7.9 million euros, which was shared between a total of 5 winners, each winning a total prize of 1,584,039.19 euros. 3 bets were sold in the UK, one of the countries with the highest participation in the draw. Of the other two, one is known to have been sold in France and the fifth in Spain.

New EuroMillions limit

Friday's draw left not only a new record, but also a new EuroMillions limit for the following draws.

Let's take a look at the EuroMillions rules to understand it. According to the current rules, EuroMillions always has a maximum limit up to which the jackpot can grow. However, this limit is not static, but can increase as it is reached. Each time someone manages to hit the jackpot limit, the jackpot grows by another 10 million euros for the next draw. Thus, the jackpot, which originally had a limit of 200 million euros, has been growing since 2020 until it reached the current limit of 240 million euros distributed last Friday.

What does this mean? Well, the EuroMillions limit will grow by another 10 million euros from the next draws onwards. Therefore, the EuroMillions limit has now risen to 250 million euros.

However, this will be the last time the jackpot will be raised, at least according to the current EuroMillions rules, as they state that the limit will be extended, but only up to the maximum amount of 250 million euros. Therefore, we can say that we have finally reached the lottery's maximum barrier, at least until there are new changes to the rules.