🎯 Neighbour-number strategy: EuroMillions
A popular player strategy: instead of repeating the latest winning numbers you play their neighbours – for every drawn number x, the numbers x − 1 and x + 1. Here you get the neighbours of the last 5 EuroMillions draws and those of any draw M draws ago (M from 1 to 119), ready-made picks from them and, for each variant, the backtest over all 1,992 draws: would the strategy have hit more numbers than chance?
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How the neighbour-number strategy works
For every winning number x, x − 1 and x + 1 are noted (within 1 to 50). Numbers that were drawn themselves do not count as neighbours. With the last 5 draws the pool can reach 50 numbers; a neighbour that occurs several times (e.g. 13 next to a 12 and a 14) ranks higher. Picks are drawn at random from the pool – for the last 5 draws preferably from the most frequent neighbours. If a pool is too small for 5 numbers, it is topped up at random.
Filter: draw day and calendar week
With a filter only the series of matching draws counts (e.g. Saturday draws only, or even calendar weeks only, also combined): the last 5 draws, the draw M draws ago and the backtest then refer exclusively to that series – every filtered draw is “predicted” from the previous draws of the same type. Without a filter the whole history is used.
Neighbours of the last 5 draws
The last 5 draws
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Pool of neighbour numbers
Picks from the pool
Neighbours of the draw M draws ago
Pool of neighbour numbers
Picks from the pool
Which M would have done best?
For every M from 1 to 119 the backtest was run over all draws: ratio of actual hits to the hits expected by chance. A value above 1 means “more hits than chance”.
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With 119 variants tested, some M almost always gets a “notable” result by chance – the mean close to 1 shows what is really behind it: nothing. No M remembers the next draw.
Questions about the neighbour-number strategy
What are neighbour numbers in the lottery?
The numbers right next to a winning number: if 23 was drawn in EuroMillions, its neighbours are 22 and 24. The strategy plays these neighbours instead of the winning numbers themselves – usually those of the last draw or the last few draws.
Do neighbour numbers give more hits?
No. Every draw is independent of the previous ones; the balls do not “know” which number came up last time. The backtest on this page shows it: over all draws the ratio of actual to chance-expected hits is about 1.
Why is there an M from 1 to 119?
Some players do not use the last draw but an older one – the draw a year ago, say. With M you can choose any draw up to 119 draws back; the table below shows how every M would have performed in the past.
Why does a certain M score “well” in the backtest?
Because 119 variants are tested. With that many tries, one of them almost always gives a notable result by chance – the well-known multiple-testing problem. Today's best M is usually unremarkable again in the next round of draws.
Does the strategy have any advantage?
Not for hitting numbers. One small practical point: whoever repeats last week's winning numbers shares a prize with the many players who do the same. Neighbour numbers are less common – a prize, if any, is shared with fewer people.
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The neighbour-number strategy (“adjacent numbers”) comes from player forums and lottery guides; it has no statistical basis.