How to Claim Your Lottery Winnings
How you claim a South African National Lottery prize depends on two things only: how much you won, and whether you played on a paper ticket or online. It is the same process for every game, so Lotto, Lotto Plus 1, Lotto 5 Max, PowerBall, PowerBall Xtra and Daily Lotto are all claimed the same way.
Sign the back of your ticket now
Before anything else, sign the back of the ticket with your full name and ID number in permanent ink. A lottery ticket is a bearer instrument, which means whoever presents it can claim the prize. An unsigned ticket gives you no protection at all if you lose it.
Then confirm the win properly, by scanning the ticket at a retailer terminal, checking the official National Lottery site, or using the operator's app. Do not rely on numbers you copied down from television or radio.
Where to claim, by amount
| Prize amount | Where to claim | What to bring |
|---|---|---|
| Up to R2,000 | Any authorised National Lottery retailer, paid on the spot. Some retailers will pay up to R5,000 at their own discretion. | Your signed ticket |
| R2,001 to R49,999.99 | An authorised payment centre or a National Lottery regional office. Any retailer can tell you where your nearest payment centre is. | Signed ticket, completed Prize Claim Form, and valid South African ID, driver's licence or passport |
| R50,000 and above | In person at a National Lottery regional office only. This tier cannot be paid at a retailer or a payment centre. | Signed ticket, completed Prize Claim Form, valid ID, and South African bank account details |
For anything at R50,000 or more it is worth contacting the operator or your regional office first, because large claims may need an appointment. You can also claim by post: send the signed original ticket, a completed claim form and certified proof of ID by secure trackable mail, and photocopy everything before you send it.
You have 365 days, and then it is gone
Every National Lottery prize must be claimed within 365 days of the draw date. After that it is forfeited permanently and the money goes to the National Lottery Distribution Trust Fund. There are no exceptions, so if you have old tickets sitting in a drawer, check them.
You can look up any past draw on this site to check an old ticket. Start from the results history for your game, for example Lotto results history or Daily Lotto results history, or use the ticket checker for the most recent draw.
Is a lottery win taxed in South Africa?
No. National Lottery winnings are exempt from both income tax and capital gains tax under the Income Tax Act, and SARS does not require you to declare them as income.
Interest you subsequently earn on the money once it is banked is taxed under the normal rules, so the winnings themselves are tax free but what they earn afterwards is not.
If you played online or through your banking app
Playing through the official website, the operator's app, or a linked banking app removes the paper ticket entirely. Your entries are recorded against your account and checked automatically after each draw, and you will be contacted if you win rather than having to check unprompted.
Smaller prizes are credited automatically to your lottery wallet or linked bank account, with no claim needed. Above a certain amount you will still need to complete a formal claim form and attend a regional office in person, exactly as with a paper ticket. Very large digital wins may also trigger source-of-funds checks with your bank before the transfer completes.
On the exact figure where automatic payment stops and a formal claim begins, sources currently disagree: some report it is unchanged at R49,999.99, others that it has risen to R249,999.99. We are not going to guess. If your online win falls anywhere near either figure, confirm the current threshold with the operator before making plans.
Large prizes and jackpots
Above the regional-office threshold a few extra steps usually apply:
- Ticket and identity validation, including additional checks the operator is entitled to make to confirm the ticket is genuine, unaltered and unclaimed.
- Your choice about publicity. Staying anonymous is entirely the winner's decision, no details are released without written consent, and even winners who accept some publicity can withhold specifics like their address.
- Free financial advice from an accredited advisor, and trauma counselling, both offered at no cost. Taking these up is sensible rather than a formality.
- Payment by EFT into a South African bank account once everything is verified.
What you need to bring
| For any claim over R2,000 | Notes |
|---|---|
| Original signed winning ticket | Not needed for online or app wins, which are matched to your account automatically. |
| Valid South African ID, Smart ID card or passport | A driver's licence is accepted as proof of identity by some sources. |
| Completed Prize Claim Form | From retailers and regional offices, or issued to you directly for digital wins above the automatic-payment threshold. |
| South African bank account details | All prize payments are made by EFT into a South African account, including for online winners. |
| Proof of residential address | Sometimes requested for larger claims. |
Tickets bought before 1 June 2026
Sizekhaya Holdings took over the National Lottery from Ithuba on 1 June 2026, and that changeover affects claims in a few specific ways.
- Old tickets are still honoured. Sizekhaya inherited Ithuba's prize records and, after a verification exercise, confirmed on 10 June 2026 that claims on pre-handover tickets could resume through the normal channels.
- Online accounts did not carry over. Any account you held with Ithuba was closed at the handover. You need to register a fresh account on the new platform, though this does not affect a claim on a win from before the change.
- If you were told a claim was on hold, that pause related to the record transfer between operators and has since been lifted. If a claim is still being refused, contact the National Lotteries Commission directly as well as the operator.
- Game formats changed, claiming did not. Lotto's number range narrowed from 1 to 58 down to 1 to 52, Lotto Plus 2 became Lotto 5 Max and PowerBall Plus became PowerBall Xtra. None of that changes how a prize is claimed. More detail is in our summary of the 2026 lottery changes.
Lost or damaged tickets
Because a ticket is a bearer instrument, a lost one is genuinely hard to recover: there is no simple way to prove you once held a specific physical ticket. If a ticket is damaged but the serial number and key details are still legible, a regional office may still be able to validate it, so contact the operator's player helpline rather than assuming it is hopeless. Tickets not claimed within 365 days are forfeited with no exceptions.
Watch for scams
Only ever act on a win confirmed through an official channel: the National Lottery website, the operator's app, an authorised retailer terminal, or direct contact from your own bank.
Unsolicited messages, calls or emails telling you that you have won a lottery you never entered are always a scam, however convincing they look. Never pay an upfront "release fee", "tax" or "admin charge" to collect a prize. A genuine lottery prize never requires a payment to release it.
Before you rely on this
The figures and tiers above are compiled from National Lottery consumer information, the operator's published claim guidance and South African news coverage of the June 2026 handover. Because the operator changed recently and some figures are reported inconsistently, confirm anything that matters directly with the operator or the National Lotteries Commission before acting on a significant claim. We publish results, we do not administer prizes, so we cannot check, hold or pay out a claim ourselves.