How big are the gaps between Powerball numbers?
Powerball has been drawn as 5 numbers from 69 plus a Powerball from 26 since October 2015. Everything on this page counts only the 1,418 draws since that change.
Sort a Powerball draw and the commonest distance between neighbouring numbers is 2: 7.6% of all gaps, where chance predicts 6.8%.
5 numbers leave 4 gaps, and across 1,418 draws that is 5,672 of them. The widest gap of a draw has averaged 23.71 against a predicted 23.75, the narrowest 3.24 against 3.31.
What was measured 4 gaps per draw
Put a draw in order and measure each step from one number to the next. A draw holding 070820 has gaps of 1 and 12. Two numbers side by side give a gap of 1, which is the smallest a gap can be.
Every predicted figure here is computed from each draw's own pool and then added up. A gap of 45 only exists once the pool is large enough to hold it, so a single history wide rate would print a shortfall at every wide gap that is an artefact of the pool, not of the draws. This game has drawn from one pool of 69 numbers throughout, so the per draw sum and a single rate agree, and the sum is kept because it stays right if the pool ever changes.
The record 1,418 draws, 5,672 gaps
Red marks a figure outside the range ordinary variation produces
| Gap | Seen | Share | Chance | SE |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 409 | 7.21% | 7.25% | -0.11 |
| 2 | 431 | 7.60% | 6.82% | +2.37 |
| 3 | 362 | 6.38% | 6.41% | -0.10 |
| 4 | 302 | 5.32% | 6.02% | -2.24 |
| 5 | 314 | 5.54% | 5.65% | -0.39 |
| 6 | 308 | 5.43% | 5.30% | +0.44 |
| 7 | 283 | 4.99% | 4.96% | +0.09 |
| 8 | 247 | 4.35% | 4.64% | -1.04 |
| 9 | 238 | 4.20% | 4.34% | -0.53 |
| 10 | 254 | 4.48% | 4.05% | +1.64 |
| 11 | 199 | 3.51% | 3.78% | -1.05 |
| 12 | 196 | 3.46% | 3.51% | -0.24 |
| 13 or more | 2,129 | 37.54% | 37.26% | +0.55 |
SE is the gap between seen and predicted divided by one standard error. The last row bundles every gap of 13 and above, so it is large by construction and does not compete with the single sizes above it. Thirteen rows are read here and 2 of them sit outside that range. Reading thirteen is exactly how that happens: at two standard errors, about one row in twenty lands outside by chance alone, so a couple is what thirteen readings cost, not a finding.
Recent trend last 100 draws, then blocks of 20
result for the blockrange ordinary variation allowsoutside that range
Each point is one block of 20 draws: the average widest gap in that block. The band is what chance predicts for those draws, computed from their own pools, which is why it is not a flat line. A point outside the band is marked.
Applied to this draw draw 1418 · 2026-10-10
The numbers are the draw, the rings between them are the gaps. Its widest gap is 18 where chance predicted 23.75 for a draw from 69 numbers, and its narrowest is 3 against a predicted 3.31.
| Gap size | How many | Chance |
|---|---|---|
| 3 | 1 | 0.26 |
| 13 or more | 3 | 1.49 |
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