Florida's $803 Million Mega Millions Winner Walked In, Took the Cash, and Said Nothing

For a little over four weeks, the biggest lottery prize of 2026 so far belonged to nobody in particular. The ticket existed, the store was known, the numbers were public - and the person holding it stayed exactly where they wanted to be, which was out of sight. That ended on Friday, 28 August, when the winner came forward and claimed. The Florida Lottery confirmed the claim and the amount taken: a single lump-sum payment of $345,524,955.

There was no announcement event, and the Florida Lottery did not issue a news release afterwards. The agency's explanation was simple and slightly unusual for a prize this size: the winner is entitled to stay anonymous, so there was nothing to announce. Under Florida law, a winner of a prize of this magnitude may remain anonymous for the first 90 days after claiming. The name has not been released.

The winning ticket was a Quick Pick - the numbers chosen by the terminal, not the player - sold at the Wawa at 14510 State Road 70 East in Bradenton. It was the only ticket in the country to match all six numbers in the 28 July drawing: the white balls 34, 48, 49, 59 and 70, plus the gold Mega Ball 12.

The jackpot was advertised at an estimated $800 million going into the drawing. Final jackpot figures are set by actual ticket sales rather than the pre-draw estimate, and sales came in slightly ahead: Mega Millions put the final value at $803 million, with a cash option of $345.5 million. The lump sum the winner ultimately took, $345,524,955, lands squarely on that figure. At $803 million it is the tenth-largest jackpot in the game's history.

This was only the third Mega Millions jackpot won anywhere in 2026, after a $536 million prize in Illinois on 10 March and a $60 million prize in Ohio on 17 March. Florida joined the game in 2013 and has now won or shared six Mega Millions jackpots, including the game's all-time record of $1.602 billion, taken in Florida on 8 August 2023 - almost exactly three years before the Bradenton ticket was sold.

The 28 July drawing produced 645,993 winning tickets across all prize levels alongside the jackpot. Two tickets matched all five white balls for the second tier: one in New York, worth $3 million with a 3X multiplier, and one in Illinois, worth $5 million with a 5X multiplier. Fifteen more tickets took the third tier, ranging from $20,000 to a single $50,000 prize in New Jersey.

Mega Millions tickets are sold in 45 states, Washington DC and the US Virgin Islands, and cost $5 each, with a randomly assigned multiplier of 2X, 3X, 4X, 5X or 10X included in the price. Drawings are held on Tuesday and Friday nights at 11 p.m. Eastern Time in Atlanta. The odds of winning any prize are 1 in 23; the odds of the jackpot are 1 in 290,472,336. Players outside a selling jurisdiction can use a licensed lottery courier, which buys an official ticket on your behalf and holds it securely. 18+.