New World Record Online Slot Win of $41M Announced

Article ByDavid Weir

January 8, 2024

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Posted in: US Gambling News, US Casino News

The world of online gambling has a new record jackpot win, and by some distance.

Games Global this week announced that its renowned progressive jackpot, WowPot, awarded an extraordinary €38,461,200 ($41.633 million) to a lucky European player late in 2023.

The monumental win occurred on December 20, 2023, while playing the Wheel of Wishes slot, setting a new world record for the biggest progressive jackpot slot win.

This payout surpassed the previous online jackpot record of €24 million ($26.29 million), set in 2013. It was also won in Europe on NetEnt’s Mega Fortune.

Developer Global Gaming is the king of progressive jackpot online slots globally, producing all the other games that paid the other top five entries in the biggest online gambling wins ever.

Global Gaming bought out supplier Microgaming’s Mega Moolah and WowPot slot games division in 2022.

However, U.S. players will not find the series in any legal casinos, or indeed at many offshore casinos.

This record-breaking win beats the largest physical casino slot jackpot in the U.S, which was $33.97 million, won at the Excalibur Casino in Las Vegas in 2013.

2023 was a bumper year for jackpots at Nevada casinos. That good fortune for some bettors seemingly extended out globally, as we now have a new world record jackpot win going into 2024.

WowPot and Big Winners

WowPot is not new to dispensing large sums. Since its inception in early 2020 with the launch of Wheel of Wishes by Alchemy Gaming, the four-tier progressive jackpot has paid out more than €225 million across various games and jackpot tiers.

Global Gaming says that the series gave out one jackpot prize win every 15 seconds in 2023, with wins starting at around $100 and going up to the top multimillion pot. That totalled $140 million in jackpot payments over the year.

Games Global’s progressive jackpot network isn’t limited to the WowPot series. It includes Mega Moolah and its Ontario-ringfenced variant, Maple Moolah, and the newly launched King Millions.

This expansive network has been instrumental in paying out numerous significant eight-figure sums globally and more frequently than any other progressive jackpot game.

“This is a monumental moment for both Games Global and the entire iGaming industry. We could not be prouder to be home to the largest online slot jackpot win,” said Andy Booth, chief product officer at Games Global.

“We would also like to extend our congratulations to the winner on this celebration. Now that it has been won, our job is to reset it and go again, hopefully making another record-breaking jackpot in the process!”

U.S Jackpots

U.S. customers are currently missing out on all this action. With such big sums on the line, massive progressive jackpot slot developers tend to shy away from offshore casinos. On the regulated market side, there are only six states with legal U.S. online casinos – and some of them are small markets of just a few million in population. Rhode Island online casinos are set to open in 2024, but the market is limited to one operator.

For the moment, this state of affairs limits the levels progressive jackpots can grow to in the U.S, even with the ongoing general boom in U.S. gambling.

Online casinos in New Jersey do offer NetEnt jackpot games, which can also go into the multimillions, with titles like Divine Fortune or Hall of Gods. However, without a huge global network paying in, the top prizes don’t rack up so quickly.

Either way, the U.S. does have the world beat in terms of the largest gambling prize. In February 2023, California lottery player Edwin Castro became the world record gambling winner when he hit a $2.04 billion Powerball win.