Glossary

Expected Value is the average dollar amount a ticket is statistically worth based on the prizes still in circulation. It is computed by summing each remaining prize multiplied by how many of that prize are still unclaimed, then dividing by the total tickets still in circulation. EV is a long-run average across many plays — not a per-ticket prediction. Every individual ticket is still random.

See also: EV/Dollar, Tickets Remaining, Remaining Prizes

EV per Dollar is Expected Value divided by the ticket price. It normalizes EV across price points so a $1 ticket and a $30 ticket can be compared on the same scale. EV/Dollar above $1.00 is uncommon and indicates a game where high-value prizes have not been claimed proportionally to ticket sales. It is informational only and is not a prediction for any individual ticket.

See also: Expected Value (EV), Static EV, Dead Zone

Prize Ratio (sometimes called Top Prize Ratio) compares how depleted a game's top prize tier is relative to the game overall. A ratio above 1.0 means the top prizes have been claimed slower than tickets sold to date — proportionally more headline jackpots are still in circulation per ticket sold. A ratio below 1.0 means the top prizes have been claimed faster than the rest of the pool. It is a secondary signal that EV/Dollar already reflects implicitly.

See also: EV/Dollar, Remaining Prizes

Tickets Remaining is the total number of unsold scratch-off tickets still in circulation for a given game. State lotteries rarely publish this number directly. Scratch IQ derives it from two published values: the total prize-winning tickets still unclaimed (summed across all prize tiers) multiplied by the published overall odds. Tickets Remaining is the denominator in the EV/Dollar formula.

See also: Overall Odds, Remaining Prizes, Expected Value (EV)

Claim Lag is the time delay between a winning ticket being sold and the prize being claimed at the lottery. State lotteries update remaining-prize counts when a winner claims, not when a ticket is bought, so the published data is always at least slightly behind real ticket sales. Some prizes go unclaimed for weeks. EV/Dollar should be read as a snapshot of the most recent published data, not a live count.

See also: Remaining Prizes, EV/Dollar

Remaining Prizes are the prize-winning tickets at each tier that are still unclaimed for a given scratch-off game. State lotteries publish this count, usually broken out by prize amount (top prize, $10,000, $1,000, and so on). Scratch IQ collects this data once per day and uses it to compute current EV/Dollar. Some states publish complete tier-level counts; others publish only partial data and Scratch IQ reconstructs the rest from published odds.

See also: Modeled Tiers, Claim Lag, Tickets Remaining

Overall Odds are the printed lifetime odds of any prize on a scratch-off ticket — the '1 in N' figure on the back of the ticket. These odds are set when the game is printed and never change. Scratch IQ uses overall odds to derive Tickets Remaining from the published Remaining Prizes count, which is the basis for the daily EV/Dollar calculation.

See also: Tickets Remaining, Remaining Prizes

Static EV is the EV/Dollar value Scratch IQ shows for state lotteries that do not publish daily depletion data. Without daily updates, the calculation is frozen at the launch payout percentage and does not change day to day. Three states currently fall into this category: Minnesota, Colorado, and Montana. The Static EV value is mathematically correct for the launch state of the game; it just does not reflect any depletion that has happened since.

See also: EV/Dollar, Modeled Tiers

Modeled Tiers are prize tiers whose remaining counts Scratch IQ reconstructs from published lottery signals (per-tier odds, observed claim ratios, sell-through percentages) when the lottery itself does not publish them. Eight states currently have at least some modeled tiers: Indiana, Iowa, Nebraska, Vermont, Wisconsin, Montana, Pennsylvania, and Maine. Modeled values are estimates based on real published inputs; they may differ from the actual remaining prizes the lottery would publish if it published them.

See also: Remaining Prizes, Static EV, Sell-Through

Sell-Through is the percentage of a game's print run that has been sold. A sell-through of 80% means 80% of the printed tickets are no longer in retail circulation. Sell-through is the inverse of remaining tickets relative to the launch print run. Scratch IQ uses sell-through (when published) as one input to model lower-tier remaining counts on Vermont scratch-offs.

See also: Modeled Tiers, Tickets Remaining

A dead-zone game is a scratch-off whose current EV/Dollar has dropped below $0.50 — typically because most or all of the headline prizes have been claimed but tickets are still being sold. The published overall odds stay the same, so the chance of winning some prize is unchanged, but the average prize-dollar return per $1 spent is much lower than the launch-day payout percentage. Scratch IQ surfaces dead-zone games on per-state Lowest-Value pages.

See also: EV/Dollar, Claim Lag

Validation Status is a per-game classification Scratch IQ assigns based on what the source state lottery publishes. Active means the game is still being sold by retailers. Ended means the lottery has removed the game from active circulation, even if some tickets may still be claimable. Validation Status determines whether a game appears on the dashboard and per-state ranking pages or is filtered out as historical.