Jan's Bingo Boggle Information Home Page

Mind boggling information about the popular game of BINGO!

Have you ever considered mind boggling statistics of BINGO?
No one could live long enough to print every possible BINGO card.
Here the scoop!
Updated and corrected January 28, 2008

In the game of BINGO there are seventy-five numbers broken up into five groups of fifteen numbers each; B-1 thru 15, I-16 thru 30, N-31 thru 45, G-46 thru 60, and O-61 thru 75.
The BINGO card has five columns corresponding to the letters B-I-N-G-O. The player's card has twenty four numbers; five numbers pre-printed in four of the columns under the B-I-G-O and four numbers under the N.

Calculating the total number of possible combinations yields the result that there exists
552,446,474,061,129,000,000,000,000. (That's 552-million-billion-billion or 0.5 quadrillion) possible BINGO cards. 
There would be 111,007,923,832,371,000 groups of cards with 4,976,640,000 cards (almost 5 billion) in each group.  
Every card  ( all 4,976,640,000 of them) in each group would have the same twenty four numbers, but in a different arrangement on each card. (see the explanation in the paragraph below the next divider.)

If we presume that there are six billion people in the world today, that means that there are 92,074,412,343,521,400 cards for each and every person in the world. 

Doesn't it make you wonder how the BINGO Barons choose which cards to print?
If you could print a million cards per second, it would take
17,505,972,382,599.7 years to print every possible BINGO card.

If you put four BINGO cards on a standard 8-1/2 X 11 sheet of paper, and if you spread all of the BINGO cards out over the surface of the earth, they would cover the earth to a depth of over 800 miles.

If there were one million cards per inch of height, and all of the possible cards were put in one stack, the stack would extend for 1485 light-years.  (A light year is 6-trillion miles.)
Alpha Centuri, our nearest star beyond the Sun, is only 4 light-years away.

Here's some proof.  You can have 120 different arrangements of five numbers under each of the four columns under the B, I, G, and O.   You can have 24 different arrangements of the four numbers under the N.  So, 120 times, 120 times, times 24, times 120, times 120 equals 4,976,640,000.  That's the number of cards that could exist, all with the same twenty-four numbers, but just in a different arrangement on each card.

Here's a document that shows you how you can have five numbers in 120 different arrangements.   -> Click Here <-  

Doing the arithmetic then, there are 111,007,923,832,371,000 possible unique BINGO combinations where no two cards would have the same twenty four numbers.  (That's 111-million-million.)

Here's some more interesting information.  Would you believe that you can have over sixteen million different combinations of numbers covered on a BINGO card.
For proof, click here --------> Combinations

A while back, some one had sent an e-mail asking about the chances of getting a coverall in 24 numbers. 
The answer is, "it depends on how many cards the house sold for that session". 
Another obvious answer is, "if all 75 numbers are called, every card would have a coverall".
My calculations indicate that if there were 2000 cards being played for a specific game, it would be probable that someone would score a coverall when 58 numbers have been called.  If there are 6000 cards being played,  then the probability would occur at 56 numbers being drawn.  

It would be interesting if a regular BINGO player would compile some actual statistics.  Send me an e-mail with the results if you decide to do it.  
E-mail:guestwho@worldnet.att.net<-click here

Read a little bit about the The History of BINGO

Here's a link to an interesting page of statistics
about the Ohio Lottery games.
Len's Ohio Lottery Page