Period 3 · Money & draws
In a Canadian 50/50 draw your chance of winning is simply the number of entries you hold divided by the total entries sold, and the prize is half of gross sales. What changes your expected return is the price you pay per entry: discount bundles can cost a fifth as much per number as a single-ticket pack. Every draw runs under a provincial charitable licence, which is why you must be physically in that province to buy.
A 50/50 draw is a lottery scheme, and the Criminal Code, section 207(1)(b) allows a charitable or religious organization to run one only under a licence issued by the Lieutenant Governor in Council of a province, with proceeds going to charitable or religious purposes. That single clause explains most of what a buyer runs into: the hockey team's foundation, the hospital or the trail-riders' club holds the licence, the province sets the conditions, and the conditions follow the licence wherever the tickets are sold.
In Ontario the regulator is the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario. A typical AGCO licence certificate, such as licence RAF1371528 for an electronic 50/50 at Trent University, states it is issued under section 207(1)(b), that each draw must be held on the approved date and time regardless of how many tickets sold, that the online platform has been reviewed against AGCO electronic raffle technical standards, and that the rules of the ticket must include a notice regarding the odds of winning where applicable. That last condition is why a well-run 50/50 has a rules page you can read before paying.
The prize in a classic 50/50 is half the money taken. The AGCO describes it plainly in its 2023 hospital e-raffle framework: the prize is one half the value of all tickets sold during an event or a defined period, and any early-bird or consolation prizes must be paid from the charity's half. Because the pot grows with sales, the pot and the odds move together: the bigger the jackpot on the scoreboard, the more numbers you are competing against.
The formula is the same for every draw:
Note the word numbers, not tickets. Many online draws sell a pack as one purchase but enter it as many separate numbers. The Edmonton Oilers Community Foundation rules, for example, list a $10 regular ticket that carries 10 raffle numbers and a $100 discount ticket that carries 550. What matters for your odds is the count of numbers.
The useful exercise is to divide each pack price by the numbers it contains. The table uses the published packs from three licensed draws.
| Draw (province) | Pack | Numbers | Cost per number |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oilers 50/50 (AB) | $10 | 10 | $1.00 |
| Oilers 50/50 (AB) | $29 | 97 | about $0.30 |
| Oilers 50/50 (AB) | $50 | 250 | $0.20 |
| Oilers 50/50 (AB) | $100 | 550 | about $0.18 |
| Manitoba Lucky STARS 50/50 (MB) | $10 | 2 | $5.00 |
| Manitoba Lucky STARS 50/50 (MB) | $25 | 10 | $2.50 |
| Manitoba Lucky STARS 50/50 (MB) | $50 | 50 | $1.00 |
| Manitoba Lucky STARS 50/50 (MB) | $100 | 250 | $0.40 |
| CNIB BC online 50/50 (BC) | $10 | 5 | $2.00 |
| CNIB BC online 50/50 (BC) | $20 | 20 | $1.00 |
| CNIB BC online 50/50 (BC) | $50 | 100 | $0.50 |
Pack sizes come from the Oilers rules, the STARS Manitoba rules and the CNIB BC rules; the per-number cost is our division. In the STARS draw, the smallest pack charges 12.5 times as much per number as the largest.
Here is the part most guides skip. Since the pot is half of all dollars and your share is your numbers over all numbers, your expected payout per dollar spent works out to:
Expected return per $1 = 0.5 × (average price per number paid by all buyers) ÷ (price per number you paid)
If everyone paid the same price per number, every buyer would expect back 50 cents per dollar. Bundles break that symmetry. Worked example, with an assumed field average of $0.30 per number (the real average is not published during a draw):
Both are still losing propositions on average, which is the point of a fundraiser. But the single-pack buyer is funding the bundle buyer's odds as much as the charity. If you are going to spend $50 over a season anyway, one larger pack usually buys far more numbers than five small ones. If $10 is your limit, the honest framing is a donation with a lottery attached.
Some licences fix the maximum number of entries, which lets you compute your odds if the draw sells out. The STARS Manitoba draw states it will only sell 1,199,250 tickets. Worked example: a $100 pack of 250 numbers in a sold-out draw gives 250 ÷ 1,199,250, about 1 in 4,797; a $10 pack of 2 numbers gives 1 in 599,625.
The BC Children's Hospital 50/50 Plus caps sales at 640,000 tickets in packs of 2 for $20, 6 for $35, 16 for $70 and 32 for $100, and it can only be bought together with a main Dream Lottery ticket. Worked example: the 32-pack in a sold-out draw is 32 ÷ 640,000, or 1 in 20,000. The sell-out pot depends on which packs people bought: if every ticket went in 32-packs (about $3.13 each), gross sales would be $2,000,000 and the prize $1,000,000; if every ticket sold as 2-packs ($10 each), gross sales would be $6.4 million and the prize $3.2 million.
Uncapped draws give you no ceiling. The Oilers draw lists no maximum, so your odds can only be estimated after the fact from the final pot.
A few draws promise a floor. The Heart & Stroke 50/50 in Ontario pays 50% of the accumulated jackpot with a guaranteed minimum payout of $500,000 and no limit on tickets. If sales fall short of $1 million, the winner receives more than half. That is the only situation in which a 50/50 can pay out more than its name suggests.
Since September 20, 2024, Ontario charities can apply to run a Split the Pot 50/50, dividing the 50% prize among several winners, provided the rules of play say how it will be divided. Your chance of winning something rises; the top prize shrinks. Early-bird prizes work differently again: under the AGCO framework they come out of the charity's half, so they do not reduce the main pot, but early-bird winners in many draws face very short claim windows.
Claim rules are set in each licence and rules page, and they vary more than most buyers expect.
| Draw or rule | Province | Claim window | If unclaimed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Oilers 50/50 | AB | 4:00 p.m. MT, 4 business days after the number is announced | Added to one or more future jackpots at the Foundation's discretion, with AGLC approval; early-bird prizes forfeited |
| Manitoba Lucky STARS 50/50 | MB | 30 days from the draw | Retained by the STARS Foundation |
| CNIB BC online 50/50 (2020 edition) | BC | 30 days after close of sales | Added to the next licensed 50/50 draw |
| BC Children's Hospital Dream Lottery and add-ons | BC | One year from the draw date | Not stated on the rules page |
| AGCO licence condition (example licence) | ON | Prize held in safekeeping six months from the draw | Donated to a beneficiary approved by the licensing authority |
Sources: Oilers, STARS, CNIB BC, BC Children's, AGCO licence RAF1371528. The four-business-day window in Alberta is the one that catches people out: if you buy at a game and do not check the winning number until the weekend is over, the money may already be rolling into the next jackpot. For how this compares with provincial lottery products, see our guide to unclaimed lottery prize deadlines.
Because the licence is provincial, the rules restrict sales to buyers inside that province, and the online platforms enforce it at the moment of payment. The Oilers rules limit sales to people 18 or older located within Alberta at the time of purchase. The BC Children's Hospital rules require buyers to be 19 or older and physically in British Columbia for the entire payment transaction. The STARS Manitoba draw is 18+ with purchases made in Manitoba, and the Heart & Stroke FAQ says it blocks IP addresses from outside Ontario and requires buyers to be 18 or older.
Practical consequences for a buyer:
A 50/50 is the most transparent lottery most Canadians will ever play: the payout rate is printed in the name. What is not printed is how unevenly that 50% is spread across buyers. The bundle tables are where that information is hiding. If you also play provincial draw games, our online lottery guide covers how those odds are published.
Divide the number of entries you hold by the total entries sold. For online draws, count the raffle numbers in your pack, not the number of purchases.
Per dollar, usually yes, because discount packs charge less per number while the prize is half of all dollars. In the Oilers draw a $10 pack costs $1.00 per number and the $100 pack about $0.18.
No. The licence is provincial, and the rules of the draws reviewed here require you to be inside the province at the time of purchase; online platforms check your location.
It depends on the licence. The Oilers add unclaimed amounts to future jackpots with AGLC approval, STARS Manitoba keeps them, and an AGCO licence condition requires donation to an approved beneficiary after six months.
Only when there is a guaranteed minimum and sales fall short, as with the Heart & Stroke 50/50's $500,000 floor.
Prepared by the CasinoInspectors editors from the sources listed above. This is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Spotted a mistake? Write to [email protected]. Gambling help: ConnexOntario 1-866-531-2600.
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