Spin the Wheel: Free Random Name Picker for Giveaways and Lives

Spin the wheel and Notablia picks a winner from the names, prizes or comments you paste, using your browser’s cryptographic random generator. Go full screen on your lives, remove each winner as you go, and skip the account: there’s nothing to sign up for.

How to use this wheel spinner

1. Paste your list

   Done

   Type one name or prize per line in “Names or prizes.” Coming from a post? Paste the comments, one per line with the author first, and pick “Comments: authors only.” Tagged @friends don’t get a slice.

2. Pick your settings

   Done

   Check “Remove the winner after each spin” when you’re handing out several prizes, and “Remove duplicates” when someone entered twice. “Sound” adds a soft click on every slice; turn it off if it bugs you.

3. Spin the wheel

   Done

   Hit “Spin the wheel,” click the wheel itself or press Enter on your keyboard. A few seconds later you have a winner, announced to screen readers too.

4. Grab the results

   Done

   Every spin is logged under “Spins.” “Copy results” gives you a numbered list ready for your post or an email, and “Download record” saves a .txt with the date and time, the participants, the winner and the alternates.

Your list stays saved in this browser, so a reload won’t wipe it; “Clear” deletes it. If “reduce motion” is on in your system settings, the wheel skips the spin and shows the result right away.

How the random name picker chooses a winner

Here’s what sets it apart: the winner is decided before the wheel starts moving, and the animation just reveals it. To pick, your browser uses crypto.getRandomValues from the Web Crypto API and throws out any value that would skew the odds (rejection sampling). Then the pointer stops at a random spot inside the winning slice.

Situation	Odds for each entry
N different names	1/N (8 names = 12.5%)
A name listed k times	k/N
After removing the winner	1/(N − 1) on the next spin

The winner’s odds show up under every result, so nobody can cry foul. That makes this name picker wheel easy to defend in front of a live chat.

Prize wheel and giveaway picker ideas for your business

• Instagram and TikTok giveaways: paste your entrants, hit “Full screen” and spin in front of your audience. A screen recording is your best proof it was fair. A well-run giveaway is one of the plays in our guide on how to get more followers on Instagram.
• Prize wheel at your store or trade show booth: list the prizes, open the wheel on a tablet and let customers spin.
• Team meetings: who presents first, who takes notes, which lead you call today.
• Classrooms and workshops: who answers next, with zero accusations of favoritism.

Running a numbered raffle instead? The random number generator with a draw record gives you winners, alternates and a timestamped record. And to hype the draw, set up a shareable countdown timer.

Yes or no wheel, letter wheel and custom picker wheel

Under “Load a list” you get three shortcuts: “Yes or no,” “Alphabet” and “Numbers 1-10.” The yes or no wheel settles a debate in a second, and the alphabet one works for word games or for picking the first letter of a brand name. Use it as a decision wheel for lunch spots, tasks or dares.

For a custom picker wheel, type anything you like. Up to 120 slices show their names; past that, the random wheel shows colors only and the winner’s name appears underneath. Long names shrink or get trimmed to fit.

Secret Santa generator: run the draw with this wheel

You can run Secret Santa on a wheel with one trick: build a chain instead of pairs. Everyone buys for the next name on the list, and the last person buys for the first. Nobody draws themselves, and nobody lands in a swap where A buys for B and B buys for A.

1. Paste the names, one per line, and check “Remove the winner after each spin.”
2. Spin until one name is left: with 8 people that’s 7 spins, and the name left on the wheel closes the chain.
3. Hit “Copy results” and add the leftover name at the end.
4. Message each person privately with only their recipient.

If you organize and also play, you’ll know every match, so ask someone who isn’t playing to spin. If two people shouldn’t buy for each other, like a couple, hit “Put the picked names back on the wheel” and draw again. It works the same for an office, a class or a family group chat.

Random team generator: split a group into teams with the wheel

This isn’t a one-click random group generator, but it builds fair teams in a minute. The wheel pulls one name at a time and you deal them out like cards. With 12 people and 3 teams:

Spin	Team
1, 4, 7 and 10	A
2, 5, 8 and 11	B
3, 6, 9 and 12 (the name left over)	C

Check “Remove the winner after each spin” and spin 11 times; the name left on the wheel is number 12. The order is random, so the teams are too. Need balance, like one designer and one salesperson per team? Load one wheel per role and deal each one out in turn. As a team picker wheel for a workshop, it also settles the favoritism question, because the whole room sees the list.

Need more for your socials or campaigns? Browse all our free marketing tools, no sign-up and no uploads.

Frequently asked questions about this wheel spinner

01

How do you pick a winner for a giveaway?

Close entries at the time you announced, then gather every valid entry in one list: one line per person, or per entry if your rules allow extra entries. Paste the list into the wheel, check “Remove duplicates” if each person only gets one shot, and spin live or while recording your screen. Post the winner’s name publicly, DM them, and give them a deadline to reply. If they miss it, spin again for an alternate.

02

Is a wheel of names really random?

It depends on how the site picks. This one picks the winner before the wheel moves, using crypto.getRandomValues, your browser’s cryptographic generator, with rejection sampling so no name gets an edge. The spin is just the reveal. Nothing goes through a server, ours included. We ran 4,000 spins with four names, and each one landed between 977 and 1,054 times, right in line with pure chance.

03

How do you do a giveaway on Instagram?

Write simple rules in your caption: what you’re giving away, who can enter, what they need to do, and the exact end date and time. When entries close, copy the participants, paste them into the wheel and spin on camera or with a screen recording. Announce the winner in a post or story and DM them. Before you launch, check Instagram’s promotion guidelines and the giveaway rules in your state, since they vary.

04

How do I make a custom wheel with different odds?

Type one prize per line and leave “Remove duplicates” unchecked. Every line is a slice, so repeating a prize gives it better odds: if “10% off” shows up five times and “Free shipping” once, the discount wins five times out of six. Under each result you’ll see the exact odds that prize had. Your custom wheel is saved in this browser, so it’s there next time you open the page.

05

Can this pick a winner from Instagram comments?

Not by logging into Instagram: this wheel never asks for passwords or connects to any social network. Instead, copy the comments, paste them one per line with the author first and choose “Comments: authors only.” Each commenter goes on the wheel once, no matter how many times they commented, and the friends they tagged never do: @mentions in the text don’t count. Before you spin, check the entry count matches the number of people who commented.