New Macau Mark Six

'Macau Mark Six' is a scam with no link to Macau's legitimate lottery

If you have seen a website, app, or message offering "Macau Mark Six" or "Toto Macau" betting, with results posted online and accounts you can top up, you are looking at a scam. The so-called Macau Mark Six is a fraudulent scheme run by overseas scam groups, and Macau's government has never approved any lottery project named "Mark Six"².

The scam works the way most illegal gambling frauds do. All "draw results" are randomly fabricated by the operators, and they adjust the numbers based on the bets victims have not purchased, so most players lose. The platform looks real: it has results, odds, and a balance in your account. None of it is connected to any actual draw².

The clearest warning signs are promises of inside information. Any claim of "Macau Mark Six insider numbers for guaranteed wins" or "profitable bets with our boss" is a scam, full stop. Platforms that require upfront payments or promote referral commissions are a trap. If you cannot walk to a counter in Macau and buy a physical ticket or use an official betting account, it is not the real game².

The legitimate product is the New Macau Mark Six lottery, sold through official channels in Macau. Everything below describes that game.

What the New Macau Mark Six lottery is and how the draw works

The New Macau Mark Six is a number-draw lottery. The operator draws winning numbers from a pool of 1 to 49 inclusive, unless the operator decides and announces a different pool. At the draw, the first six numbers selected automatically are the "drawn numbers," and a seventh number selected automatically is the "special number"¹.

Your entry is a selection of numbers, and each selection counts as one "chance." How your numbers match the drawn numbers and the special number determines which prize tier you fall into:

• Match all six drawn numbers: you share the first prize tier fund
• Match any five drawn numbers plus the special number: you share the second prize tier fund
• Match any three drawn numbers plus the special number: you win the sixth prize¹

The money you and everyone else stakes goes into a pool. The "prize fund" is that pool minus a percentage deduction, which covers the lottery tax, an allocation to the Government Lottery Fund, and the operator's commission¹. For comparison, Hong Kong's Mark Six, a closely related game, has historically paid out about 54 percent of stakes as dividends, with 15 percent going to a lotteries fund and 6 percent as the operator's commission, so you can expect a similar shape in Macau: a little over half of everything staked comes back as prizes³.

If you buy a physical ticket rather than betting through an account, there are rules about how you fill it in. The ticket must be marked with a vertical line in blue ballpoint pen, it must not be folded, and no alterations are allowed. A ticket scrawled in pencil or corrected with correction fluid is not a valid entry, so take the thirty seconds to fill it in properly¹.

Bet types: single, multiple, banker and random entries

There are four ways to enter, and you can mix them across your tickets¹.

Single entry. You pick six numbers from the 49. Each single entry is one chance. This is the basic bet: six numbers, one line, one shot at each prize tier¹.

Multiple entry. You pick at least seven numbers from 49. Every possible six-number combination of your selection counts as a separate chance. Pick seven numbers and you have seven combinations; pick ten and you have many more. The cost adds up accordingly, since you are paying for each combination as its own entry¹.

Banker entry. This is the "banker" or "banker-set" style of entry. You pick at least seven numbers from 49, and you designate some of them as bankers. Every combination in the entry must include all of your banker numbers. It is a way to weight your combinations around numbers you feel most strongly about, while the remaining slots rotate through your other picks¹.

Random entry. The fourth type is the random entry, where the numbers are selected for you rather than by you. It is the quick option when you do not want to fill in a playslip¹.

One more thing worth knowing if you bet through an account rather than in person: only betting account holders can place fixed instructions, which are standing instructions to enter future draws automatically. A fixed instruction must be made in writing to customer service, and your account must hold sufficient funds by close of business the day before the draw. If the money is not there in time, the instruction does not go through¹.

Prize tiers and how the prize fund is divided

The prize fund is divided into tier funds before anyone is paid. After the percentage deduction described above, the remaining prize fund is split as follows¹:

The top three tiers are pari-mutuel: the tier fund is shared among all winning chances in that tier, so the more winners, the smaller each share. The first tier prize must be at least twice the second tier prize, which keeps the jackpot clearly ahead of the second tier even in draws with many winners¹.

The lower tiers, fourth through seventh, pay fixed amounts. There is a safeguard on those: if the total of fourth to seventh tier prizes would exceed 60 percent of the prize fund, the deduction is capped at that percentage and the balance is paid from the public trust fund. In other words, a freak draw with a huge number of small winners does not eat the jackpot money¹.

If nobody matches all six drawn numbers, the first tier fund is not lost. It rolls into the first tier fund of the next draw, which is how jackpots build over successive draws until someone hits them¹.

What a winning ticket pays: MOP 9,600 down to MOP 40

The bottom four tiers pay fixed amounts per winning chance, so you know exactly what you have won the moment the numbers are drawn¹:

The fourth tier is the biggest fixed prize: MOP 9,600 for each winning chance. The fifth pays MOP 640, the sixth MOP 320, and the seventh MOP 40. Because these are fixed, a fourth tier win is worth the same whether you are the only winner in the tier or one of a thousand¹.

The top three tiers are different. Their values depend on the prize fund for that draw and the number of winners sharing each tier fund, so a first prize in a draw after several rollovers can be far larger than in an ordinary draw. The structure, with 45 percent of the fund reserved for first tier winners and a minimum of double the second tier, is designed to keep the headline prize the star of the show¹.

Claiming prizes: 60 days, in person, at a lottery sale outlet

All winning tickets and refund claims must be made within 60 days of the date of the draw, on any working day, at a lottery sale outlet. You claim in person, with the ticket. A winning ticket is valid for 60 days; miss the window and the prize or refund is forfeited¹.

A few related deadlines and rules are worth knowing:

• Damaged tickets. If your ticket is damaged, you must ask the operator to verify it within 60 days of the draw date¹.
• Lost tickets. If you lose a physical ticket, you have only 7 days from the draw date to ask the operator to verify it. The lesson is obvious: treat a Mark Six ticket like cash, because the deadlines for a lost ticket are far shorter than for a damaged one¹.
• Cash vouchers. If you are paid with a cash voucher rather than cash, that voucher is valid for 180 days, much longer than the ticket itself¹.
• Withdrawal. You cannot withdraw a valid entry once it is placed. The single exception is a physical winning multiple-draw ticket: you can return it and withdraw the remaining draws¹.
• Terminated draws. If the operator terminates a draw, all valid entries in that draw's pool are refunded in full¹.

Who can play: the minimum age of 18 and the penalties for under-18 entries

The minimum age for the Mark Six is 18. Anyone under 18, and anyone in school uniform, may not place entries, may not claim prizes, and may not enter a lottery sale outlet unless authorized¹.

The penalty for slipping through is real: if a participant is proven to have been under 18 when placing an entry, that entry can be declared void, and any prize or refund the participant would have received is forfeited. There is no payout to an underage winner, even with a genuinely winning ticket¹.

Note that this 18 threshold applies to the lottery and to betting on football and basketball in Macau, not to casinos. Horse racing in Macau ceased from April 1, 2024, so there is no horse racing betting for the rule to cover⁴. Casino entry in Macau requires you to be at least 21, a higher bar than the lottery's⁴. If you are between 18 and 21, the Mark Six counter is open to you while the casino floor is not.

What else you can play in Macau instead

If you are in Macau and want more than the lottery, the city's gambling offering is much broader than one number draw. The casinos are the main draw, open 24 hours, with baccarat the dominant game and everything from blackjack and sic bo to poker rooms and slot lounges alongside it⁵. You can read more in our guide to casinos in Macau and the wider overview of gambling in Macau.

Sports betting is the other big category. Macau's licensed football betting offers win, draw, double, parlay and over/under bets, among others, through cash betting centers, telephone betting, and the concessionaire's official website⁵. Basketball betting works on fixed odds set at the time the bet is accepted, with a half-point handicap system, and winnings must be collected within 30 days of the official result⁶. Horse racing in Macau is no longer available, as racing activities ceased from April 1, 2024, so win, place, double, quinella, forecast and quinella place bets can no longer be placed there⁵.

For lottery players specifically, Macau also runs pacapio and other instant games alongside the Mark Six, covered in our page on the Macau lottery. And if your interest in "Toto Macau" came from an online site, the honest answer is that Macau's legal gambling runs through licensed outlets and concessionaires you can walk into, not through offshore apps. Our page on online gambling in Macau explains what that means in practice.