As Lotto.com grows we are introducing more and more lottery details to the site; some of these lotteries we are quite familiar with but every now and again one will crop up that we have little knowledge about. The German Lotto was one such lottery game and whilst at first glance it all seemed pretty straightforward, similar to the UK Lotto game in fact, when researching the game it became apparent that there is more to the German Lotto than first meets the eye.

Our misconception when we first took a look at the German Lotto game 6/49 was that there were just six main balls and a bonus ball all drawn from just one machine and that to win the jackpot you had to match the six main Lotto balls, how wrong we were! Not only are there TWO draw machines for the German Lotto but in order to win the jackpot from this lottery game you have to match six main Lotto balls AND the bonus ball and this is where the confusion continued for us….

Not being fluent in German the confusion came regarding the difference between the Superzahl and the Zusatzzahl. The former being a number drawn from a separate machine to the main draw that helps to create a jackpot winner whilst the latter is the bonus ball drawn from the main machine that is used in three of the prize tiers for the German Lotto. To be a jackpot winner on the German Lotto you have to have participated in the Spiel (Game) 77 or Super 6 because the Superzahl number that is drawn must be the last digit of the Spiel 77 or Super 6 game and you must have matched all six main balls to be a jackpot winner as well as the Superzahl number.

It was certainly interesting to learn about the German Lotto and we are looking forward to researching the next lotto game to be added to Lotto.com, the Viking Lotto!