South Carolina’s lottery is known for being dedicated to supporting education in the state. With online purchases growing like never, it would make sense to improve that program even further by allowing you to buy lottery tickets online. To this day, there have been no authorizations issued to provide those games online, but we will go through the legal scope and the real situation for online lottery players.
Quick Jump
Is It Legal to Buy Lottery Tickets Online in South Carolina?
Anything related to playing the lottery and winning money has to be duly analyzed from the legal perspective for you to be in perfect safety. In South Carolina, it is not that buying lottery tickets online is illegal, but it is illegal to buy tickets from unauthorized sellers. Since the South Carolina Lottery offers no tickets online and has not authorized anyone to do so, it remains an illegal option.
Therefore, it is a matter of following the examples of states like Virginia and start selling its lottery tickets online or even partnering up with services as Arkansas did back in 2020. Here is the specific state lottery law if you are interested in checking it out. However, it will not allow you to find any breach to play lotteries online.
| Law | Purpose | Prohibition |
|---|---|---|
| SC Const. Art. 17, Sec. 7, 59-150-10 et seq. | The proceeds after expenses and prizes are directed to the Education Lottery Account, only used for educational programs and purposes. Every prize above $500 is subject to garnishments as per the law. | Sale to minors; unauthorized sales; forging tickets. |
According to US law and due to the fact that South Carolina has only licensed physical distributors, you cannot play the lottery online in South Carolina. While you do not have any online lottery sites, go check out the nearest licensed retailer.
Best Lottery Tickets to Buy in South Carolina: What Games Are Available?
Even though you cannot buy lottery tickets online in South Carolina, it is worth knowing about the games. You might decide to play them with physical tickets or at least acknowledge their existence for when the South Carolina Lottery finally starts to offer them.
+USD 20,000 
South Carolina Pick 3 and Pick 4
South Carolina has a Pick 3 and a Pick 4 game, both coming with the amazing Fireball add-on that replaces digits and adds up dozens of possibilities to win. Of course, they are easy lotteries and also count with smaller prizes, but they make it much more exciting. It always makes sense to include a few Pick 3 or Pick 4 tickets in your purchase.
Palmetto Cash 5
Palmetto Cash 5 has an interesting fixed jackpot of $100,000 with odds of a bit more than 1 in 500,000, plus overall odds of 1 in 8.4. It has four prize tiers, which is common for local games, but its highlight is an optional Power-Up that can multiply any of those prizes by x2, x3, x5, or even x10. In other words, with the same odds, you might end up winning $1 million. The odds of getting an x10 multiplier are 1 in 28.
Source: sceducationlottery.com
Powerball
Powerball is one of the two multi-state games available in South Carolina and easily one of the most popular ones. Although the odds of winning Powerball are really tough, the fact that its jackpot starts at around $20 million makes it worth it. Responsible for billionaire records, we already know that Powerball’s odds are better than Mega Millions’s odds.
Mega Millions
Sharing a place of great importance with Powerball, the Mega Millions game has several prize tiers, a tempting multiplier, and a secondary prize of $1 million. Therefore, even by not winning the jackpot, it is possible to cash out a good lot from this game. Of course, it comes with difficult odds to test your patience.
How to Play the South Carolina Lottery Games Online?
At the moment, you cannot play the South Carolina Lottery games online. That is not only not legal due to the unavailability of an authorized online seller but also not a possibility. In other words, you will find no source of those digital tickets. Simply look for the nearest retailer and go there once in a while to buy your tickets, knowing that you can buy lottery tickets in advance.
How to Check South Carolina Lottery Tickets Online?
The best and easiest way to find out if your tickets are worth any prize is to open our page with the South Carolina lottery results. You will find not only the drawing results of all the local games but also information on the lottery rules and how claiming works. If you open any of the games’ pages, you will also get extra information on all of them and a complete record of the drawings.
