Random name picker
Paste the names, choose how many winners, and draw. Every entry has the same chance, and the list never leaves your browser.
How a winner is chosen
The picker first cleans the list: it trims spaces from the ends of each line, drops blank lines and, unless you untick the option, removes repeated entries, comparing them without regard to capital letters. “Ava”, “ava” and “ Ava ” count as one entry, and the first spelling is kept. The number of entries left is shown under the box before you draw.
The remaining entries are numbered 0, 1, 2 and so on, and the winner is the entry at a random position. The position comes from your browser’s cryptographic generator, mapped to the number of entries by rejection sampling: blocks of random bits that would favour some positions are thrown away and drawn again, so with 37 entries each has exactly a 1 in 37 chance, not almost.
For several winners the same happens one place at a time, each time from the entries not yet drawn, like names taken from a hat without putting them back. The first name drawn is 1st, the second 2nd, and so on. Each entry has a 1 in N chance of 1st place and a k in N chance of being among k winners.
1st place= 1 ÷ N40 entries: 2.5%
any of k= k ÷ N3 of 40: 7.5%
One entry each, or several
A draw is fair between entries, not people. If one person appears once and another five times, the second has five times the chance. That is what you want when people have earned extra entries, for example one per purchase, and a mistake when someone has entered twice against the rules.
Leave “Remove duplicate entries” ticked when each person should have one chance; the count under the box tells you how many duplicates were left out. Untick it when repeats are deliberate. With several entries the chance grows in proportion for a single prize, and a little less than in proportion for several prizes, because once an entry has won, that person’s other entries are still in the draw for the remaining places.
| Entries held, out of 100 | 1 winner | 3 winners, at least one prize |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1% | 3% |
| 2 | 2% | 5.94% |
| 5 | 5% | 14.4% |
| 10 | 10% | 27.3% |
The three-winner column is 1 minus the chance that none of that person’s entries is among the three: for 5 entries, 1 − (95 × 94 × 93) ÷ (100 × 99 × 98) = 14.4%. A person with several entries can win more than one prize in the same draw, so the rules should say what happens then.
Chance of being drawn
With one entry each, every entry’s chance is the number of winners divided by the number of entries. The table gives it for common sizes of draw.
| Entries | 1 winner | 3 winners | 5 winners | 10 winners |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 | 5% | 15% | 25% | 50% |
| 50 | 2% | 6% | 10% | 20% |
| 100 | 1% | 3% | 5% | 10% |
| 250 | 0.4% | 1.2% | 2% | 4% |
| 500 | 0.2% | 0.6% | 1% | 2% |
| 1,000 | 0.1% | 0.3% | 0.5% | 1% |
Drawing the prizes one round at a time, with winners taken off the list, gives the same chances as drawing them all at once. In a draw of 100 for three prizes, the first round gives each entry a 1 in 100 chance, the second 1 in 99 among those left and the third 1 in 98, and each entry still ends up with a 3% chance of one of the prizes.
A fair, documented draw
A random draw is easy to make fair and harder to show to be fair. Five steps make a draw easy to check afterwards.
Rules first. Publish the rules before entries open: who can enter, the closing time, how many entries each person may have and how many winners there will be.
A closed list. Close entries at the stated time and keep a copy of it exactly as drawn, including the number of entries.
Unclaimed prizes. Decide in advance what happens if a winner doesn’t reply or isn’t eligible, for example a redraw from the remaining entries after a set number of days. Drawing a few reserve names in order at the same time avoids a second draw.
One draw. Repeating a draw until a preferred result comes up defeats the point, and the log of draws on this page shows every draw made.
A record. Use “Copy the record” for the time, entry count and winners, and store it with the list.
Rules for prize draws and giveaways differ between countries and between social media platforms, so check the ones that apply to you before you announce a draw. The guide to running a fair random draw goes through the record-keeping in more detail.
Questions
Is every name equally likely to win?
Yes, as long as each name appears once. The picker numbers the entries and draws one number with the same chance for each, so in a list of 40 names every name has a 1 in 40 chance. A name that appears three times, with “Remove duplicate entries” unticked, has three chances.
How do I draw a 1st, 2nd and 3rd prize?
Set winners to 3. The first name drawn is 1st, the second is 2nd and so on, and no entry can be drawn twice in the same draw. To draw prize rounds one at a time, tick “Take winners off the list after each draw” and draw once for each prize.
Can someone have more than one entry?
Yes. Untick “Remove duplicate entries” and put the name on as many lines as it has entries. Its chance then grows in proportion, so 5 entries out of 100 give a 5% chance of a single prize. With several winners the same person can then be drawn more than once, so decide beforehand whether a second win passes to the next name.
Are the names sent anywhere or saved?
No. The list stays in the text box on your device and the draw happens in your browser. The address bar keeps only the settings, such as the number of winners, so a shared link opens with the example list, not yours.
How can I prove the draw was fair?
Keep the record. “Copy the record” copies the date and time, the number of entries and the winners of every draw on this visit, which you can paste into a post or a file alongside a copy of the list. A screen recording of the draw is a common extra step for public giveaways. The guide to running a fair draw sets out the rest.
What happens with commas in names?
With one entry per line, commas are kept as part of the entry, so “Smith, Jane” is one name. Commas only split entries when the whole list is on a single line.