Winner of Third Biggest Irish Lotto Jackpot Claims Prize
Last Updated: Monday 22nd September 2025, 13:41 pm
Less than a month after the third-biggest Irish Lotto jackpot of all time was won, the winners of August 27th’s €17 million drawing have come forward “pinching themselves”.
The Winners
The Co Mayo-based family, who have chosen to stay anonymous, claim that they are waiting for “cameras to pop out and tell us that this is all a big joke” and that they are still waking up in the middle of the night wondering whether it’s all just a mad dream.
They told news outlets that on the night of the draw, they "were all together when the email came in, and I checked the account. You always imagine that you’ll be jumping up and down, but we sat in silence and total disbelief.”
Ireland’s lottery policy ensures a 90-day claim period after which the winning ticket expires and the forfeited funds are disseminated to good causes. One wonders whether this ever happens. Not on this occasion. The family was on to the claims team first thing the next morning and definitely “breathed a sigh of relief when the guys confirmed the win. I couldn’t tell you what else they said on the phone though, it’s all just a blur at this stage.”
What to Do With €17 million?
This amount of money removes basically every financial barrier from life. “It’s a big change to go from checking your bank balance before shopping, to not worrying about that any more.” They also "can’t wait to book a few trips to America and Australia” since it’s been a bucket list goal for years.
That’s a common plan for a lot of lottery winners with a sudden and enormous confirmation of wealth, but it turns out that the ‘big cheque’ cliché isn’t. The family says they were expecting to “walk out of there with one of those massive cheques you see in the photos. We were saying to ourselves, ‘how can we not attract an audience with that under our arms?’”
A small cheque will have to do then, or at least a sizable bank transfer.
What’s Next?
The Irish Lotto rolls on in the meantime. It’s currently at €3.8 million and will increase every time it’s not won. With draws taking place every Wednesday and Saturday, players pick six numbers from 1 to 47 and await their odds just like the family in this story did right before winning the huge sums.
You can bet online for the next draw and see the biggest winners here. Two of the previous biggest winners were Co Mayo residents as well, with the biggest ever Lotto jackpot being as large as €19 million (2022), and the second largest amount won by a Carlow winner of an amount just shy of €19 million (2008).
Why not try your luck? You never know what could happen, especially if you live in Co Mayo.
