Every winter, coats come out of closets with lottery tickets in the pockets. Glove compartments, junk drawers, the pages of a book, old tickets turn up constantly, and the question is always the same: is this still worth anything? Often, yes. Here's how to find out properly.

First: the ticket is only ever about one drawing

A draw-game ticket is entered in the drawing (or drawings) printed on it, those exact dates, nothing else. A ticket from March doesn't ride along into April's draws, and checking it against last night's numbers tells you nothing. So the job is: read the game, the draw date(s), and the numbers off the ticket, then compare against the winning numbers for those exact dates. That's tedious by hand, it's exactly what scanning it with WonYet does in one step: we read the ticket and check it against the official results for the drawing it's printed for, even if that drawing was months ago. We keep the results history, so "old" doesn't mean "uncheckable." (An advance-play ticket printed for several drawings is checked against the one WonYet reads, verify the other dates against the official numbers.)

How long you actually have

Claim windows are set per state and per game, and they're shorter than most people assume:

• Draw games (Powerball, Mega Millions, state lotto and digit games): most states give between 90 days and one year from the drawing date. 180 days and 365 days are the most common windows.
• Scratch-offs are the trap: the clock usually runs from the date the game officially ends, not from when you bought the ticket. A scratcher bought yesterday can have a deadline sooner than a draw ticket from last spring, and vice versa.

We keep a sourced state-by-state table here: lottery claim deadlines. When a scan lands inside a live claim window, WonYet shows the deadline with the verdict, so you know how much runway you have.

If it's a winner

Sign the back, photograph both sides, and verify through official channels before celebrating too hard, for anything big, the state lottery's app or a retailer terminal is the final word, and our verdict screen links you straight to the official source for the game. (Then read our guide on what to do if you win, the first 72 hours matter.)

If the deadline has passed

We won't pretend otherwise: an expired winning ticket is, in almost every state, simply expired, the money joins the estimated $1-3 billion that goes unclaimed every year. A handful of states have made rare exceptions for extraordinary circumstances, but nobody should plan on one. The real lesson of an expired ticket is for the next ticket: check it the day you buy it. Scan it once and the question answers itself the moment its drawing's results are in.

Always verify your results through official lottery channels before claiming any prize. WonYet is not affiliated with Powerball, Mega Millions, or any lottery organization. · All lottery names and marks are trademarks of their respective owners.