One lucky ticketholder won £177,000,000 when the EuroMillions numbers were drawn on Tuesday night – but it’s only the third biggest jackpot of all time in the UK.
The record was set and broken – and nearly broken again – in the space of just four months in 2022.
Last night’s draw knocks the lowest of that year’s big wins to the fourth place in a ranking of the highest sums of all time.
Although £177million doesn’t quite nab the top spot, it would be a truly lifechanging sum – if and when someone claims the prize.
But as some lottery winners have found, that change isn’t always good.
So who are the 10 reigning EuroMillions champions who’ve won the biggest ever UK lottery jackpots?
10. Frances and Patrick Connolly – £114,969,775
Originally from Northern Ireland, Patrick and Frances Connolly were the fourth biggest winners when they it the jackpot on New Year’s Day, 2019.
They splashed their cash on a lot of things – Jaguar, Aston Martin and Alfa Romeo cars, and a County Durham Mansion with seven acres of land, and gifts worth £60million for their family and friends.
A grant-giving charity – PFC Trust – they founded funds community groups in Hartlepool, where they moved for work in 1990.
It’s become such a backbone of the charity sector, scammers masqueraded as the Connolly couple to offer cash to 50 people if they hit 10,000 subscribers on a bogus YouTube channel.
But the very first thing they bought with their winnings was a pair of M&S underwear
9. Anonymous – £121,328,187
The identity of the person who won this April 24, 2018 Superdraw jackpot has never been revealed after their chose to stay anonymous.
8. Anonymous – £122,555,350
This jackpot started as just £14million before rolling over all the way to the all-time spot of the UK’s ninth biggest lottery prize on April 2, 2021.
The winner, however, has kept their identity a secret.
7. Anonymous – £123,458,008
Another anonymous winner bagged this Superdraw jackpot on June 11, 2019, after it rolled over from a previous draw.
6. Adrian and Gillian Bayford – £148,656,000
The life of a lottery winner isn’t all glitz and glam. Sometimes it’s a catastrophe – and Adrian and Gillian Bayford can attest to that.
Since winning in August 2012, the married couple are no longer married.
Gillian now has a conviction for threatening her ex-boyfriend, domestic abuse charity worker Gavin Innes, who she pushed and shouted at in 2017.
She then married convicted fraudster Brian Deans, before ditching him because he begged for more and more money after blowing the monthly allowance she gave him on cars, watches and trips with friends.
Adrian, meanwhile, turned to eating 50 Cornish pasties a day to cope with loneliness after being dumped by younger women, one of whom he dated while sending saucy messages to an ex.
The 53-year-old since partnered up with fiancée, 46-year-old Tracey Biles, 46, who’s encouraged him to plant a vineyard the size of six football pitches at his estate on the border of Cambridgeshire and Suffolk.
Now, they’re planning to turn 20 acres of the vast estate into a children’s theme park with a train ride and maze.
5. Colin and Chris Weir – £161,653,000
Within a decade of winning the EuroMillions draw, Colin and Chris Weir, from Largs in North Ayrshire, had divorced after 38 years of marriage.
Colin died of sepsis and an acute kidney injury a few months later in December 2019, at the age of 71.
By then he had spent half his £80million share of the fortune on cars, property and a controlling stake in his favourite football club, Partick Thistle.
The former TV cameraman also donated millions to the Scottish National Party and the pro-independence Yes campaign ahead of the 2014 referendum.
He left behind £212,000 worth of furniture, jewellery and artworks, a £10,000 Bentley Arnage, a Jaguar F-Pace SUV, a Mercedes Benz E Class Estate, a Mercedes Benz V Class people carrier, and a pot of petty cash containing £263.90.
After the split, Chris, previously a psychiatric nurse, kept their Frognal House mansion, which they bought for £3.5million after a 10-minute viewing.
She sold the property in Troon, Ayrshire, for £2.3million in 2019.
They had also set up the Weir Charitable Trust, which funded projects across Scotland.
4. Anonymous – £170,221,000
This EuroMillions jackpot had to go somewhere when it reached the stag of a Must Be Won draw.
It had already sat at the €190million cap for the maximum five draws by the time one UK ticketholder bagged it.
They chose to stay anonymous.
3. Anonymous – £171,815,297
An anonymous ticketholder claimed their EuroMillions jackpot within 48 hours of the numbers being drawn on September 23, 2022.
It was the third big win in the UK that year.
2. Joe and Jess Thwaite – £184,262,899
A new wardrobe and drawers for their bedroom were the first buys for Gloucestershire couple Joe and Jess Thwaite.
They had bought a EuroMillions Lucky Dip ticket on The National Lottery app, ‘because it’s easier’, on the very day of the May 10, 2022, draw.
A communications sales engineer, and the business manager of a hairdressing salon, they were the first of three big winners that year.
Joe saw they’d won when he woke early the next morning. He said: ‘I saw how much and I didn’t know what to do.
More Trending
‘I couldn’t go back to sleep, I didn’t want to wake Jess up so I just laid there for what seemed like forever.
‘I spent some time searching for property with no budget limit, which was a novelty!’
When the alarm finally rang, Joe turned to Jess and said: ‘I’ve got a secret, I’ve got something to tell you.’
1. Anonymous – £195,707,000
Just two months after Joe and Jess Thwaite set the record for all-time biggest jackpot, their crown was taken by a winner who chose to keep their identity private.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@metro.co.uk.
For more stories like this, check our news page.
MORE: Biggest ever lottery winner did exactly what he shouldn’t have done with £1,600,000,000
MORE: My husband went out for milk and he came back with £1,000,000
MORE: Woman who joked she’d quit her job if she won the lottery scoops $1,000,000
