If you hoped to win a big online casino jackpot in 2024, it helped to live in New Jersey. In 2024, the three biggest payouts by BetMGM Casino were won in the Garden State.
BetMGM awarded prize money totaling $128.5 million from progressive jackpot to online casino players in 2024. The company did not indicate if that was a record.
The three largest BetMGM online casino jackpot payouts in 2024 totaled $11.7 million, all from slots in New Jersey. One lucky customer playing Fruit Blaster won $6.5 million in what the company called “the largest jackpot in the history of legalized iGaming in New Jersey.” That’s life-changing money, and just one of three huge payouts from BetMGM Casino New Jersey.
The second-highest payout of 2024 was $4 million to a BetMGM customer playing Bison Fury Megaways. Third-highest payout was to a player of Independence Pays for $1.2 million.
Why did BetMGM award so many NJ jackpots?
New Jersey is the longest-standing multi-license online casino market in the United States. So you might guess that New Jerseyans won more jackpots because there are more of them playing. But that may not be the case.
New Jersey is a big market for BetMGM Casino, but it’s not the biggest. That title goes to Michigan, and Pennsylvania isn’t far behind. Last year, BetMGM Casino Michigan earned $575 million in revenue for the 11 months from January to November. That’s more than it did in New Jersey, even including all the company’s secondary brands: Borgata Online, Party Casino, and Wheel of Fortune. Those three and the flagship BetMGM Casino only made a total of $487 million over the same period.
Providing an exact total for Pennsylvania is impossible because the revenue is mixed in with other brands on the same license, but PlayNJ estimates that it would be in the ballpark of $440 million.
So, with all three states being of similar importance, BetMGM’s New Jersey sites account for roughly one-third of its nationwide online casino play. That makes it all the more impressive that the state produced three out of the top five prizes. It could be that New Jerseyans are more likely to gravitate toward progressive jackpot games, or maybe they’re just luckier.
Rounding out the top five payouts of 2024 was $1 million paid to a Bison Fury slots player in Michigan, and $960,920 to a BetMGM player via the game 15 Lanterns in West Virginia.
A progressive jackpot is a prize that accumulates through entries by multiple players of a single game. As the player entries fail to result in a win, the entry fees add up to build a large jackpot. In some cases an entry can be as little as 20 or 40 cents, depending on the state gaming rules.
BetMGM Michigan awarded several notable jackpots
According to BetMGM, a $0.40 bet netted a customer in Southfield, Michigan $1 million playing Bison Fury in 2024. Michigan currently has a record-setting progressive jackpot waiting to be won. That jackpot has grown for 11 months, and will represent the national record once it hits for a lucky winner in Michigan.
A $0.40 bet hit for a West Virginia man last year too. That resulted in a $532,969 jackpot win from the Bison Fury slots game via BetMGM Casino.