A Modern Twist on a Game of Chance
In an unusual intersection of artificial intelligence and games of chance, a Michigan woman has won a substantial lottery prize after using the AI chatbot ChatGPT to select her numbers. Tammy Carvey, a 45-year-old from Wyandotte, secured a $100,000 Powerball prize, turning a playful experiment with technology into a life-changing windfall.
Carvey explained that she typically only plays the lottery when the jackpot reaches a significant size. With the Powerball grand prize soaring to a historic $1.787 billion in early September, she decided to try her luck. “I only play Powerball when the jackpot gets up there and the jackpot was over $1 billion, so I bought a ticket,” Carvey said. Instead of using personal dates or random picks, she turned to the popular AI tool. “I asked ChatGPT for a set of Powerball numbers and those are the numbers I played,” she explained.
The Winning Ticket and a Surprising Discovery
The numbers generated by the AI for the September 6, 2025, drawing were 11, 23, 44, 61, 62, with a Powerball of 17. Carvey’s ticket, purchased online, matched four of the five white balls and the red Powerball. This combination typically yields a $50,000 prize. However, because Carvey had opted for the Power Play feature for an extra dollar, her winnings were automatically doubled to $100,000.
The realization of her full winnings came as a shock. “When I checked the winning numbers, I saw I matched four white balls and the Powerball and knew I had to have won something,” she recalled. “Google told me it was a $50,000 prize, so that’s what I thought I’d won.” It wasn’t until she logged into her official Michigan Lottery account that she discovered the Power Play had boosted her prize. “It wasn’t until I logged into my Michigan Lottery account that I realized I added the Power Play to my ticket and actually won $100,000! My husband and I were in total disbelief.”
A Stroke of Luck, Not AI Prediction
The massive $1.787 billion jackpot from that drawing was ultimately split between two winning tickets sold in Missouri and Texas, as reported by digitaltrendstoday.com. While Carvey didn’t hit the grand prize, her six-figure win is a remarkable story. However, lottery officials were quick to emphasize the role of chance.
In a statement, the Michigan Lottery clarified that AI cannot foresee lottery results. “The results of all Lottery drawings are random and cannot be predicted by utilizing artificial intelligence or other number-generating tools,” an official said. The win, while facilitated by a novel method of number selection, remains a product of pure luck.
Interestingly, Carvey is not the only person to find luck with AI-generated numbers. A woman in Virginia, Carrie Edwards, also recently won a significant prize after asking ChatGPT for her numbers, turning a $50,000 win into $150,000 thanks to her own Power Play multiplier. These instances highlight a growing, albeit purely for fun, trend of lottery players incorporating modern technology into their gameplay.
After claiming her prize at the lottery headquarters, Carvey announced her practical plans for the money. She intends to use the winnings to pay off her home and put the remainder into savings, securing a more stable financial future thanks to a fortuitous prompt given to an AI.
