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The Picker Wheel is a free online spinner that picks one option from any list you give it. Type your choices, one per line, spin the wheel and it lands on a winner. It works as a random name picker for a classroom, a decision wheel for dinner, or a fair way to draw a giveaway winner.
Everything runs in your browser. There is no account, your list is remembered on your own device, and you can share the exact same wheel with anyone using a link.
What is a picker wheel?
A picker wheel is a digital version of a spinning wheel: each entry becomes a slice, the wheel spins, and the slice under the pointer is the result. It turns a list into a random choice that everyone can watch happen.
That visible spin is the point. Picking a name in your head can feel biased; a spinning wheel shows every option, makes the moment fun and ends arguments about who was chosen.
How to use the picker wheel
Add your options, spin, then decide what to do with the result. The whole thing takes a few seconds.
1. Add your entries
Type into the Entries box and press Enter after each option. You can also paste a list from a spreadsheet or document, or use Import .txt/.csv to load a file; lines and comma-separated values both work, and imported items are added to what is already there. The counter on the Entries tab shows how many slices the wheel has.
2. Tidy the list
- Shuffle mixes the order of the slices.
- Sort A–Z puts entries in alphabetical order, with numbers in natural order (2 before 10).
- Clear removes everything, after asking you to confirm.
- Reset brings back the default example list.
3. Spin
Click the wheel, press the SPIN button in the centre, or press Ctrl + Enter on a keyboard. On a phone, a floating SPIN button appears when you scroll the wheel out of view, so you can edit the list and spin without scrolling back up.
4. Use the result
A result window shows the winner. From there you can Spin again, Remove from wheel, Copy the result, or share it to WhatsApp, X or Facebook. Every result is also logged in the Results tab with the time it was picked.
Normal, Elimination and Accumulation modes
The Settings tab has three spin modes. Pick the one that matches what you are doing with the result.
Normal
Winners stay on the wheel, so every spin starts with the full list. Use it for one-off decisions such as what to eat or which game to play.
Elimination
Each winner is removed automatically, so nobody is picked twice. This is the mode for calling on every student once, setting a presentation order, or picking first, second and third place from one list.
Accumulation
Winners stay on the wheel and the tool keeps score. The Results tab shows a leaderboard of the entries with the most wins, which is handy for a best-of-ten contest or a running tally over a game night.
Weights: give some options a bigger chance
Weights let you make one option more likely than another on purpose. Turn on Weights in Settings, then start a line with a number from 1 to 10 and a dot.
- 3.Pizza has three times the chance of an entry with weight 1.
- Lines without a number count as weight 1.
- The slices are drawn in proportion, so a weight-3 entry visibly takes up three times the space.
Weights suit lists where some options should come up more often than others. Without weights, a simpler trick is to type an entry twice: each line is its own slice.
Is the picker wheel really random?
Yes. The winner is chosen before the animation starts, using the browser's cryptographic random number generator (crypto.getRandomValues), the same kind of randomness used for security keys.
The wheel then spins to land inside the winning slice, never right on a dividing line, so there is no ambiguous result. With equal weights, each of 8 entries has exactly a 1 in 8 chance. How long you spin, where you click and what came up last time make no difference. A run of the same winner can happen; that is what real randomness looks like.
Picker wheel vs drawing names from a hat
A picker wheel does the same job as a hat full of paper slips, with fewer ways for it to go wrong.
- No slips to write, fold or lose, and a 200-name list takes one paste.
- Every entry has an equal chance; folded slips can stick together or sit at the bottom.
- Elimination mode is the same as not putting a slip back, and Normal mode is putting it back.
- The Results tab keeps a record, so you can prove who was drawn and when.
Ideas for using the picker wheel
Any time a group needs a fair pick, a spinner wheel helps. Common uses include:
- Classrooms: a random name picker for questions, reading turns or helpers, with Elimination mode so everyone gets a turn.
- Social media giveaways: paste entrant names, spin on a live stream and copy the winner.
- Food and plans: settle where to eat, what to cook or which film to watch.
- Chores and rotas: assign jobs in a household or office without arguments.
- Parties: truth or dare, forfeits, or who goes first.
- Personal decisions: when two options feel equal, let the wheel break the tie.
For special cases there are dedicated wheels: Yes or No for single questions, Team Picker for splitting a group, Number Picker for random numbers and Letter Picker for word games.
Save, share and embed your wheel
Your current list is kept in your browser automatically. To keep several lists, press Save wheel and give it a name; it appears under My saved wheels, ready to reopen later.
The share icon under the wheel copies a link that contains your entries, so anyone who opens it gets the identical wheel. The embed icon copies a short iframe code for a website, blog, LMS page or stream overlay. Saved wheels stay in the browser where you made them, since nothing is uploaded.
Tips for a better spin
- Set a Result title in Settings, such as Tonight we're eating, to make the result window match the moment.
- Change Spin length (1 to 15 seconds) for a quick answer or a dramatic reveal.
- Use the full screen icon to hide the side panel when presenting to a class or audience.
- Turn off sound or confetti in Settings for a quieter room.