Most people who buy a Powerball ticket for Saturday’s gigantic $1.8 billion jackpot know their chances of winning a substantial amount of money are extremely remote, but millions of lottery players will try their luck anyway.

To be exact, the odds of hitting the jackpot — which offers a cash option of $826.4 million are 1 in 292,201,338. The jackpot is potentially the second largest in U.S. lottery history.

Fortunately, the overall odds of winning something after buying a $2 ticket are far better — 1 in 24.87 to be exact. If you spend an extra $1 to exercise the Power Play option, you can double, triple, quadruple or, on rare occasions, quintuple your winnings on non-jackpot lottery prizes.

If you still want to take a shot, but have never played, Powerball works like this: Five wh

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