All Eyes on Spain Ahead of Friday’s Annual El Nino Draw

Loteria del Nino, better known simply as El Nino (literally “the child”), is the much-loved draw held in Madrid, Spain, every January. Named after the Three Wise Men’s adoration of the baby Jesus, El Nino is hugely popular both at home and abroad thanks to its staggeringly large prize pool. With a total of €630 million up for grabs this year, Friday’s draw guarantees 45 tickets worth €2 million, promising to make 2017 extremely lucky for some.

The El Nino raffle follows a similar format to that of Christmas draw El Gordo, wherein players, who are issued tickets with a unique number somewhere between 00000 and 99999, hope to match their numbers with those drawn on the night.

Although there are technically only 100,000 numbers printed for each El Nino draw, 45 copies of each ticket are made available, with each copy split up into 10 “shares” (though it is possible to purchase an entire ticket for oneself and win the whole prize for that ticket). Two machines are used in the raffle: the first determining the value of the prize, the second deciding which ticket gets to take that prize home.

2017’s El Nino draw will be held this Friday, 6th January, and is expected to be one of the most popular to date, not least because of its unbelievable odds of winning a prize — just 1 in 3 for secondary prizes. In total, there are 17 different prizes that El Nino players can pick up, from a happy €20 all the way up to the “Gordo” jackpot of €2 million, should the player hold the entire ticket.

Here’s a breakdown of the larger prizes on offer this coming Friday:

Since El Nino is a raffle, the game doesn’t stop until every single prize has been won, so players will need to be prepared for a long one. But with this much money on offer, and with such fantastic odds of walking away a little bit richer, it’s bound to be worth the wait!