Hampshire and Isle of Wight top list of £100,000 Premium Bonds prizes in 2025

Hampshire and the Isle of Wight were the luckiest region in 2025 for the £100,000 Premium Bonds prize, according to data from National Savings and Investments released to This is Money. The region recorded 42 winners of £100,000 prizes in the year, roughly one six-figure prize winner for every 118 square kilometres. NS&I said 943 prizes of £100,000 were awarded nationwide in 2025, with Hampshire and the Isle of Wight accounting for about 4.5% of those prizes. There are 777,061 Premium Bond holders in the region, NS&I data show, compared with roughly 24 million holders nationwide, a share that reflects the region’s population and bond ownership.

NS&I notes that the odds of winning a prize for each £1 bond are fixed at 22,000 to 1, meaning larger holdings raise the likelihood of a win. In Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, the average holding among prize winners was £7,753, modestly above the overall average Premium Bond holding of £5,613. The higher average holding helps explain the region’s outsized share of £100,000 prizes, even as the draw assigns the same odds to every £1 bond regardless of where the holder lives. The data underscore the central role of investment size in Premium Bonds outcomes rather than geography.

Essex ranked second in the £100,000 prize tally, followed by Outer London, Kent and Lancashire. Essex reported 37 prizes at £100,000 in 2025, with Outer London awarding 32, Kent 27 and Lancashire 25. While Hampshire and the Isle of Wight led the field for £100,000 prizes, the regional pattern again reflects the distribution of bond holders across the country rather than any regional advantage in the draw itself. The national total of £100,000 prizes and the regional breakdown illustrate how entrants’ absolute holdings drive outcomes in a system designed to offer equal odds per £1 of bonds.

Turning to other prize levels, Essex again led for £50,000 prizes in 2025 with 76 such prizes, followed by Hampshire and the Isle of Wight with 65, Kent with 61, Surrey with 59 and West Sussex with 52. Across all regions, NS&I disbursed 1,881 £50,000 prizes in 2025, meaning about 4% of those prizes went to holders in Essex. The pattern shows that larger prize categories concentrate in regions with sizable bond holdings, reinforcing the overarching principle that the size of one’s stake matters more than where one lives.

The big-money stories for Premium Bonds remain the £1 million jackpot, which NS&I has offered for 31 years. This year, 24 individuals won £1 million prizes, bringing the national tally of millionaires created by ERNIE to 568 since the prize’s inception. Agent Million, the fictional messenger of prize news, delivered the jackpot announcements this year to winners across the country, including visits to Norwich and Cumbria, which each hosted two new £1 million winners. The breadth of the year’s winners highlights the geographic spread of millionaires generated by the scheme.

The year also produced notable low-holding stories. The lowest holding that won the £1 million jackpot in 2025 was £100, in Cleveland, claimed in March, marking the second-lowest holding for a £1 million win in the prize’s three-decade history. The lowest ever holding to win the jackpot remains £17, in July 2004, a reminder that extraordinary outcomes can arise from very small initial investments.

NS&I data show that the Hampshire and the Isle of Wight area is home to about 3.2% of all Premium Bond holders, a share aligned with its population size and the density of bond ownership. The region’s 777,061 holders, combined with an average holding among prize-winners higher than the national average, helped push it to the top of the £100,000 prize list in 2025. The findings aim to dispel myths that luck favors certain regions and instead emphasize that the odds of a win at any level are tied to the amount of money held in Premium Bonds rather than the geographic location of the holder.

In total, the 2025 NS&I data demonstrate a consistent link between holding size and prize likelihood in Premium Bonds. While Hampshire and the Isle of Wight led the way for £100,000 prizes, other regions followed in accordance with their share of bond holders and average holdings. The £50,000 prizes show a similar pattern, with Essex at the forefront, followed by a cluster of counties that reflect the nationwide distribution of Premium Bond ownership. As the program continues, the balance between holding size and geographic spread will likely keep shaping prize outcomes, maintaining the system’s core premise that luck in Premium Bonds is a function of investment rather than residential location. More detailed regional data from NS&I will continue to inform savers seeking to understand how to optimize their chances within the framework of one of the country’s most enduring savings instruments.