The Mega Millions jackpot has soared to $1.25 billion. Here's how hard it is to win

NEW YORK (AP) — There’s no shaking it. Your chances of winning the lottery are extremely slim.

After no big winner Tuesday night, the Mega Millions jackpot climbed to an estimated $1.25 billion. If someone wins it all on Friday, when the next Mega Millions drawing takes place, the prize would one of the largest in U.S. lottery history.

But don’t plan on entering a new tax bracket anytime soon. The odds of winning a Mega Millions jackpot — no matter the size — stand at about 1 in 302.6 million. And chances of taking home a top prize for Powerball, which had an estimated jackpot of $95 million Wednesday, are near 1 in 292.2 million.

Because of the almost impossible chance of winning big, experts stress that you shouldn’t spend all your money on lottery tickets. If you choose to play, it’s important to be mindful of what you can afford — and maybe consider other places to put your money, even if it’s just a few dollars at a time.

Lottery tickets are “definitely not good investments,” Matthew Kovach, an assistant professor in Virginia Tech’s economics department told The Associated Press last month. “They’re not even investments ... there’s an expectation you will always lose money.”

Here are some things to know about the odds of winning the lottery.

WINNING THE LOTTERY IS NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE. WHAT’S MORE LIKELY?

There’s a long list of rare events that are more likely than winning the Mega Millions or Powerball jackpot.

A common comparison is the odds of getting struck by lightning once in your lifetime, which stand at about one in 15,300. Even if you bought a lottery ticket for every drawing over 80 years — two times a week for Mega Millions and three times a week for Powerball — you would still be far less likely to win than to be struck by lightning one time in your...