The £1m winners are from Greater Manchester and West Scotland. Meanwhile, 90 other winners were picked for the next-best prize of £100,000.
Despite the huge payout, not everyone checks to see if they have won. There are currently more than 2m premium bond prizes waiting to be claimed by their winners, worth a total of almost £81m.
Here, Which? reveals the winning premium bond numbers, and how to find out if you have a prize waiting for you.
October 2023 premium bond winners
The first winning bond (284MT463803) was bought by a lucky winner living in Greater Manchester, and is part of a total holding of £50,000. The winning bond was bought in October 2016.
The second winner, based in West Scotland, bought their bond (159TJ094783) back in September 2009. They have a total holding of £50,000.
Find out moreHow many winners were drawn in October?
There were 5,786,217 premium bond prizes paid out in the October draw. Of these, 5,707,543 were worth £100 or less
In total, this month’s prizes were worth £470,853,175.
Find out more:Could you have an unclaimed prize waiting for you?
A prize is recorded as unclaimed if you haven't come forward after 18 months. There are currently 2,307,167 unclaimed prizes worth £80,552,900, according to NS&I data.
There are tens of thousands of prizes waiting to be claimed in this month's jackpot-winning areas alone. Greater Manchester has 48,413 unclaimed prizes worth £1,629,450, of which the largest is for £100,000, from the September 2010 draw. The oldest unclaimed prize here was from the December 1963 prize draw for £25.
In West Scotland, there are 14,190 unclaimed prizes with a total value of £432,325. One lucky winner has a handsome £25,000 waiting for them and this was from the February 2018 prize draw. The oldest unclaimed prize in this winning area is from June 1961 and is worth £50.
Excluding premium bond holders from areas listed as unspecified in NS&I data, the lion's share of unclaimed prizes belong to people who live or have lived in the capital. A combined total of 268,104 prizes are waiting to be claimed in outer and inner London, adding up to more than £8m. This might be down to the fact people in the city are more likely to move home more often and forget to let NS&I know their current address.
How to check for unclaimed premium bonds prizes
NS&I will write to you by letter or email every time you win a premium bonds prize. These alerts, however, can get lost if you move home or change your email address without updating your NS&I account.
There are a few ways to check if you think you might be missing a prize:
Call or seek help online:Use the online prize checker tool:Write to NS&I:The best way to avoid a prize going unclaimed is to opt to automatically receive your winnings via bank transfer or reinvestment. NS&I says more than nine in 10 prizes are now paid this way.
source https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/octobers-premium-bond-winners-have-you-missed-out-on-a-prize-a8NF39R6qq98