When most people play online casino games, they don’t win anything at all. A few lucky people earn a decent payout and make a profit. Then there are the extremely fortunate few who manage to defy the odds and land massive, life-changing cash prizes. Believe it or not, some people have become millionaires thanks to playing at online casinos.
Here, we look at five of the biggest ever online casino wins. The ridiculously lucky people who have struck gold from playing casino games have had their lives changed in countless ways. All it took for them to become rich from gambling online was a bit of money and a whole lot of luck.
All the biggest online casino wins come from progressive jackpots. These are slots with a jackpot that increases whenever someone places a bet and keeps on growing until it’s won. When it’s won, it resets to its seed value, which is the smallest possible amount you can win. It can be quite high - even over a million dollars for some slots - so you can still earn a huge payout even before a jackpot’s had the chance to grow.
£15.1 Million on Book of Atem WowPot by a British Player
Book of Atem WowPot is an online slot from Games Global with not one, but four progressive jackpots. Each of them has a different seed value, and the WowPot is the biggest with a starting sum of $/€/£2 million. The book symbol can land on any spin and whenever it does, you have a very small chance of getting to spin the jackpot wheel. This has 20 segments and whichever one you land on, you win the corresponding jackpot. Naturally, there’s only one segment for the WowPot.
In April 2021, a British player at 32Red Casino scooped a staggering cash prize worth £15.1 million (roughly $18.7 million today) from playing Book of Atem WowPot. This player managed to earn a spin of the jackpot wheel and defied 1/20 odds to win the top prize.
€18.9 Million on Mega Moolah by an Unknown Player
Mega Moolah works in a similar way to Book of Atem WowPot in that it has a jackpot wheel and four progressive jackpots. However, this slot’s top jackpot, the Mega one, starts at $/€/£1 million, which is still one of the biggest in the world. In September 2018, the slot paid out its biggest ever cash prize when a Belgian player won the Mega jackpot. It was worth €18,915,721, which is more or less $22.3 million.
The winner was playing at the Grand Mondial online casino when they earned the incredible cash prize. It further cemented Mega Moolah’s status as the world’s top-paying progressive jackpot slot. Most of the previous biggest wins before this one had come from Mega Moolah. The original slot has an African animal theme. Lots of other slots with the four Mega Moolah progressive jackpots have since been released.
€17.9 Million on Mega Fortune by a Finnish Player
What’s believed to be the single biggest online casino win came about in 2013. A player from Finland, who decided to stay anonymous, was playing the progressive jackpot slot Mega Fortune from NetEnt, which is themed to riches and the high life. The Finnish gambler was playing at Paf Casino and supposedly placed a bet worth less than a dollar when they scooped the slot’s progressive jackpot prize.
The total amount won by the Finnish player was €17,860,868, which is approximately $23.6 million in today’s money. Their win was record-breaking, as the previous biggest online casino win was around €11 million.
€19.4 Million on Absolootly Mad: Mega Moolah by a Belgian Player
In 2021, three years after Mega Moolah’s Mega jackpot awarded a player €18.9 million, it paid out an even bigger sum to a Belgian player. This unbelievably lucky person was playing the Absolootly Mad: Mega Moolah slot at Napoleon Casino in April when they won €19.4 million from the Mega jackpot. This is worth around $26.7 million today.
The Mega jackpot was able to grow as much as it did simply because no one was lucky enough to win it. What helped was the popularity of the Mega Moolah slot series and its reputation for having a particularly high-paying top jackpot. The more people there are who play it, the bigger the jackpot will grow.
€38.4 Million on Wheel of Riches WowPot by an Unknown Player
The current biggest online casino win ever is the jaw-dropping amount of €38.4 million on Wheel of Riches WowPot. This slot shares the WowPot jackpot with Book of Atem and several others. In December 2023, an unknown player was taking a gamble on Wheel of Riches WowPot when they won the top payout. Like the Mega Moolah slots, the WowPot slots have four progressive jackpots, each with a different seed value.
Most progressive jackpots, including the ones we’ve discussed here, don’t have an upper limit. There’s no telling how high they can reach before they’re won. While the prizes we’ve listed are unbelievable, in a few years’ time the biggest online casino wins could be even greater.
