National Lottery (Ireland)

The National Lottery Act 2013 was signed into law on 14 May 2013 and repealed the National Lottery Act 1986, so every current rule about the State lottery traces back to the 2013 Act and the licence granted under Part 4 of it.

Section 26 of that Act provides for the licence to hold the National Lottery, and Premier Lotteries Ireland took it over in November 2014 for a 20-year term, paying an upfront sum of €405 million to win it. The licence is published, as the Act requires, and the Regulator keeps the original document alongside every amendment made since, including changes covering e-payments, a self-exclusion facility, remote prize claims and the addition of EuroDreams.

One operator, one licence, one regulator.

That structure matters because the operator does not set the rules alone. The Regulator’s functions are listed in section 9 of the 2013 Act, and section 10 gives the Regulator power to hold, or arrange the holding of, the lottery when no licence is in force.

Most people meet the National Lottery at a shop counter or on lottery.ie, where Lotto, Lotto Plus, EuroMillions, Daily Million, EuroDreams and scratchcards are sold by Premier Lotteries Ireland and no one else.

Lotto is the game readers ask about most. Its jackpot starts at €2 million and rolls over until won, and independent results sites report a cap of €16 million, after which the money flows down to lower prize tiers once the jackpot has sat at the cap for a set number of draws. The game’s matrix and its draw days have been changed by the operator in the past, so treat any odds figure you see quoted elsewhere as tied to the version of the game it was calculated for, and check the current game rules on lottery.ie before relying on it.

A complaint goes to Premier Lotteries Ireland first, and then, where you believe the Act or the licence has been breached, to the Regulator of the National Lottery in Dublin.

The term is most often confused with lottery betting on foreign sites and with local charity draws, which sit under different law. The table sets out who authorises each and who hears complaints, drawn from the 2013 Act, the Gambling Regulation Act 2024 and the operators’ own published terms.

A site that lets you bet on the result of a Lotto or EuroMillions draw is not selling National Lottery tickets, and whatever licence it holds, whether from the Malta Gaming Authority or elsewhere, it gives you none of the protections that come with the 2013 Act.

Winnings on those sites are paid from the bookmaker’s own funds under its own terms, so a dispute is settled by its rules and its regulator abroad, not by the Regulator of the National Lottery. What we check first on any lottery-themed page is the footer: the National Lottery’s own site states that its games are promoted by Premier Lotteries Ireland Designated Activity Company under licence from the Minister.

The Gambling Regulation Act 2024 also lists the 2013 Act among the legislation it touches, but the State lottery has remained with its own Regulator rather than moving under the GRAI, and several parts of the 2024 Act still depend on commencement orders. Where a page tells you a lottery product is covered by the new Irish regime, read the section it relies on and confirm that a commencement order actually brought that section into operation.