August's premium bond winners – how much do you need to win to beat top savings rates?
Two lucky premium bond holders have each won a £1m jackpot in NS&I's August 2023 prize draw.
The jackpot winners are from Essex and Hereford and Worcester, while 77 other winners secured the next-best prize of £100,000.
Here, Which? reveals the winning premium bond numbers and looks at how much you'd have to win to beat the current best savings rate.
August 2023 premium bond winners
The first winning bond (522MP682337) was bought by a lucky winner living in Hereford and Worcester, and is part of a total holding of £50,000. The winning bond was bought in December 2022.
The second winner, from Essex, bought their bond (535RC655361) in April 2023. They have a total holding of £23,700.
- Find out more: should I get premium bonds?
How many winners were drawn in August?
There were 5,516,739 premium bond prizes paid out in the August 2023 draw. Of these, 5,449,164 were worth £100 or less.
The August draw saw the prize fund rate increase to 4%, boosting the prize fund by £30m and adding 455,390 extra prizes. In total, this month's prizes were worth £404,560,900.
| Value of prizes | Number of prizes |
|---|---|
| £1,000,000 | 2 |
| £100,000 | 77 |
| £50,000 | 154 |
| £25,000 | 307 |
| £10,000 | 769 |
| £5,000 | 1,538 |
| £1,000 | 16,182 |
Source: NS&I
- Find out more: are premium bonds worth it?
Could you beat the top savings rates with premium bond prizes?
Savings rates are currently enjoying 15-year highs, with the top fixed-term accounts offering interest of around 6% AER.
Even though money held in premium bonds doesn't earn any interest at all, the promise of winning monthly cash prizes up to £1m is enough to convince some to invest.
Bearing in mind that your success depends on the luck of the draw, how many premium bond prizes would you need to win in order to beat returns from today's top savings account?
£5,000 investment
The average holding for premium bonds customers is £5,386, according to NS&I data. If you were therefore to put £5,000 in a one-year fixed-term bond earning the current top rate of 6.05% AER, that money will have grown by £311 after 12 months.
If you invested the same amount in premium bonds, you'd need all your fingers and toes crossed to match or better that amount. You'd have to win 13 £25 prizes, seven £50 prizes, four £100 prizes, or a combination of these over the year.
Sadly, the odds of that happening are stacked against you. According to premiumbondscalculator.com, based on average luck, customers with £5,000 of holdings could expect to win roughly £150 over one year.
The calculator says only 10.4% of people who have put £5,000 in premium bonds over one year win more than £300.
£50,000 investment
Even with several grand to invest, Moneyfacts data shows the highest rate you can get on a one-year fix is still 6.05% AER. The interest earned, however, is still considerable.
An investment of £50,000 – the maximum amount each individual can hold in premium bonds – into a one-year fix will yield £3,110 after 12 months. Even with average luck, a premium bond customer with a £50,000 holding would expect to win roughly half that amount - £1,500 over a year.
Only 2.44% of people who have put £50,000 in premium bonds over one year win more than £3,100, according to the calculator. To get to that amount, you would ideally need to win three £1,000 prizes plus a few smaller ones, or get lucky with one £5,000 prize.
If you're better at winning smaller prizes, then in theory you could also get 124 £25 prizes. To get that kind of return over 12 months would mean you'd need to win between 10 and 11 £25 prizes every month.
- Find out more: how to find the best savings account
What are the odds of winning any prize?
Successive boosts to the prize fund over the past year have improved the odds slightly. But despite the rate increasing from 3.7% to 4% from this month's draw – the highest it's been for 15 years – the odds of any individual premium bond number being picked remain pretty slim at 22,000 to 1.
NS&I uses Electronic Random Number Indicator Equipment, known as Ernie, to generate random numbers that are then matched against eligible bond numbers to determine the winners.
Remember, your premium bonds are only eligible for the draw once they've been held for one full calendar month. So if you invest in premium bonds now, your bonds won't be entered into a prize draw until September.
- Find out more: what is National Savings & Investments?
