Digit by digit, "What is daily 3 lottery?" depends on the play type. Pick 3 and pick 4 are daily number games: a player chooses three or four digits, each from 0 to 9, and a draw picks the winning digits, often twice a day. What is pick 4 lottery play compared with a big jackpot game? A small, fixed prize table instead of a rolling jackpot, much better odds, and a choice of how the digits must match. Everything else follows from that choice.
The pick 3 lottery odds are easy to count. There are a thousand possible results, so a straight play wins one time in a thousand. A box on three different digits covers six orders and wins about one time in a hundred and sixty seven, while a box with a repeated digit covers only three. The pick 3 lottery payout on a straight is typically around half of what fair odds would pay, and pick 4 lottery payout tables keep much the same share.
Pick 3 and pick 4 draws are independent: yesterday's digits say nothing about today's. Charts of hot and cold digits, sums and pairs are popular, but each digit still has the same one in ten chance at every draw, and a straight play keeps its one in a thousand whatever came before. A play chosen at random and a play chosen after hours of study win equally often. What changes the result over time is only the play type and the count of tickets.
How does pick 3 lottery work on a ticket? The player writes three digits, chooses a play type and a stake, and the prize is fixed in advance for that play type. A straight play wins only if the digits come up in the exact order. A box play wins if the same digits come up in any order. A straight and box play splits the stake between both, and a combo buys every order as separate straight plays.
A play that wins only when the drawn digits come in exactly the chosen order. It pays the most of any play type.
The fourth digit makes a straight win ten times less likely: one in 10,000 against one in 1,000.
A combo buys every order of the digits as separate straight plays, so it costs one stake per order.
They compare how many orders each play type covers and what each pays, which helps to see the trade between frequency and prize.
Cash 3 is the name some lotteries give their pick 3 game: three digits from 0 to 9, won straight in exact order or boxed in any order, with the same odds and payouts as any pick 3.
A straight pick 3 pays about 500 for one, while fair odds would pay 1,000, so the payout returns about half.