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Overdue EuroMillions numbers are those numbers from the available range that haven’t been drawn for the longest period of time. The most overdue main numbers are therefore the five numbers in the main number range of 01 to 50 that were drawn least recently, whilst the most overdue Lucky Star numbers are the two numbers in the Lucky Star range of 01 to 11 that were drawn least recently.
Regular readers will have noted that we often highlight the current overdue numbers in our news items. Playing one or more of those numbers won’t alter the odds of winning any EuroMillions prize in any way (the odds of winning the jackpot with a single entry are always 1 in 116.5 million and the odds of winning any prize at all with a single entry are always 1 in 13) but many players like to play them just for the additional interest that overdue numbers provide. That being the case, we will now highlight some interesting ways of playing overdue EuroMillions numbers, and also warn you about one approach that is probably best avoided…
First, the approach best avoided is following overdue numbers blindly, which means entering all five overdue main numbers and both overdue Lucky Star numbers in a single entry. The reason you would probably want to avoid doing this is that, if all of those numbers came up, the chances are very high that you would have to share the jackpot with a disproportionately large number of other players who have done the same. That might mean winning €150,000 instead of €15,000,000 if 1,000 players followed the same numbers blindly, and winning even less if more players took the same approach. So, what are some alternative approaches?
One idea is to play just one or two overdue main numbers OR one or two overdue Lucky Star numbers and use random selections for the rest of the numbers. You could use the Random Number Generator at this site to generate all of your selections, and then replace one or two random selections with the closest overdue number(s) that you want to include. For example, if the random main numbers generated are 12, 24, 15, 11 and 26, and you wanted to play 06 and 29 as overdue numbers, you could replace the 12 with the 06 and the 26 with the 29. Of course, you could replace any other numbers if you would prefer to do so.
Another idea is to play the most overdue main number AND the most overdue Lucky Star number in every entry until one or both of them appear. For example, if the most overdue main number is 35 and the most overdue Lucky Star number is 03, you could include both of those numbers until one or the other is drawn, at which point you would replace the drawn number with the new ‘most overdue’ number. You can see which numbers are most overdue at any time by visiting our EuroMillions Statistics page.
A third approach is to use the least overdue of the ‘most overdue’ numbers with the assumption that most players will be focusing on the numbers at the other end of the scale. For example, if the most overdue main numbers were 01, 02, 03, 04 and 05, with 01 being the most overdue of all, you would focus on the number 05 because it is the least overdue of the selection highlighted. Of course, you could include the least overdue of the most overdue Lucky Star numbers in the same way.
These are just some of the ways of playing overdue EuroMillions numbers, and hopefully these ideas will have inspired you to come up with a few of your own. As we said earlier, playing overdue numbers doesn’t increase your chances of winning, but it certainly doesn’t decrease them and it can definitely add an extra element of interest to the game. Have fun playing EuroMillions online and good luck!
Written by Tim Reynolds
6th November 2012
