How many ways can you select 6 numbers out of the range of 1-50?

Answer 1

If the same number can't be used more than once, then ...

-- The first number can be any one of 50. For each of these,

-- The second number can be any one of the remaining 49. For each of these,

-- The third number can be any one of the remaining 48. For each of these,

-- The fourth number can be any one of the remaining 47. For each of these,

-- The fifth number can be any one of the remaining 46. For each of these,

-- The sixth number can be any one of the remaining 45.

So there are (50 x 49 x 48 x 47 x 46 x 45) = 11,441,304,000 different ways to select 6 numbers out of 50.

If it doesn't matter what sequence they're in ... like on a lottery ticket ... then there are

(6 x 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1) = 720 ways to arrange each group of 6 numbers, so the number of unique lottery picks is only

11,441,304,000 / 720 = 158,907,000