Paste in your viewers' names, spin live on stream, and let the hype do the rest. No account. No download. No nonsense. Just the most exciting 10 seconds of your broadcast.
Open the Giveaway WheelBecause your giveaway deserves better than a random number in a spreadsheet that nobody can see.
The whole point of a giveaway is the moment. Your chat needs to watch it happen. NameWheel runs entirely in the browser, so OBS can capture it as a window or browser source with zero setup. The spin is live. The winner reveal is live. The chaos is live.
You don't need to install anything, sign up for anything, or configure a bot. You open the page, paste your list of names, and you're done. It takes about 30 seconds from "let's do a giveaway" to "the wheel is spinning." Your chat doesn't have time to get bored.
Every name gets an equal shot. The result is decided by a proper random number generator before the wheel even starts moving, so there's no way to game it. Every single viewer on that wheel has the same odds. You can tell your chat that, and it's actually true.
Got three prizes to give out? Pick a winner, remove them from the wheel, pick again. NameWheel lets you spin multiple times without resetting the whole list. Perfect for tiered giveaways where first place gets the good stuff and everyone else fights for second.
100 names? 500 names? Doesn't matter. You can paste a full list from a spreadsheet, a Discord message, or a Notepad file, one name per line, and the wheel populates instantly. No clicking "add" 400 times like some kind of punishment.
No freemium limit of "10 names max." No monthly subscription for the spin sound effect. No watermark on the wheel. NameWheel is completely free because a giveaway wheel should just be free. You're already giving away money, you don't need to spend more to do it.
A real step-by-step guide, not the vague three-sentence version you find everywhere else.
Before you open the wheel, your chat needs to know what they're entering for, how to enter, and who's eligible. Put it in your chat commands or type it in chat. Something like: "Giveaway open. Type !enter to join. Must be following. Closes in 5 minutes." Keep it simple. Complicated entry rules frustrate chat and you'll spend the next four minutes answering "wait how do I enter" instead of playing your game.
The two most common methods are a chat bot and manual collection. If you use a bot like StreamElements or Nightbot, you can set it to log everyone who types a specific command and then export the list. If you don't have a bot, just watch chat during your entry window and copy names as they come in, or ask your mods to help collect. Either way, you'll end up with a list of usernames. That's all you need.
Go to namewheel.org in your browser. Click into the names input area and paste your full list. One name per line works best. If you're copying from a spreadsheet column, it usually pastes perfectly. If names are separated by commas, just do a quick find-and-replace in Notepad to swap commas for newlines. Takes 10 seconds. Once you paste, the wheel updates in real time so you can see all the entries are there before you go live with it.
You've got two options here. The cleaner one is to add a Browser Source in OBS pointing to namewheel.org and set the width and height to whatever fits your layout. The faster option is Window Capture pointed at your browser tab. Both work. Window Capture is quicker to set up. Browser Source looks cleaner and lets you layer it with your other overlays. If you're using Streamlabs, same deal, it has both options in the source menu. Either way, test it before going live so you know the wheel is actually showing up.
Don't just silently click spin. That's a waste of a perfectly good moment. Build it up. Do a 5-second countdown. Ask your chat to type who they think is going to win. Put a poll up. Make it a whole thing. The spin itself only takes a few seconds, but the 20 seconds before it is when your chat is most engaged. Use that. Then spin. Watch the chaos unfold in your chat. Even people who didn't win are usually hyped because they saw it was fair and they were part of the moment.
Once the wheel picks a name, read it out loud, show it on screen, and immediately reach out via DM. Give winners a reasonable time to respond, usually 10-15 minutes if you're live, or 24-48 hours for a later claim. If they're not eligible or don't respond in time, just spin again. Have a clear policy on this before you spin so there's no confusion in chat about whether you "rigged" the second spin. Something like "winner has 15 minutes to respond or we re-spin" is totally standard and nobody will argue with it.
Post the winner in your Discord, tweet it out, or at minimum put it in your chat and clip the spin moment. Public winner announcements build trust and create content. The clip of the wheel landing on someone's name and chat going crazy is a great highlight reel moment. Lots of streamers get follows from those clips because people see a community that actually does giveaways and actually delivers on them.
This one should be obvious but it's worth saying anyway. Actually send the prize. Do it quickly, ideally within a day or two. If you're giving out a digital code, deliver it instantly via DM. If you're mailing something, keep the winner updated. Streamers who follow through on giveaways build long-term viewer loyalty. Streamers who ghost their winners end up in drama clips. Don't be the second one.
Whether you're on Twitch, YouTube Live, TikTok, or Discord, these formats actually get people excited.
Tie your giveaway to hitting a goal. "When we hit 500 subs, we're spinning the wheel." Or "1000 followers and we're doing a $50 game key giveaway." This type of giveaway does two things at once: it rewards your community for growing the channel and gives people an active reason to share your stream. The anticipation builds for days or weeks before the spin even happens. When you finally hit the number and spin live, the chat energy is through the roof because everyone worked for it together.
Restrict entries to subscribers or members only. This is a classic retention tool and it works. Your existing subscribers feel rewarded, and casual viewers who were on the fence about subscribing suddenly have a reason to pull the trigger. Run these regularly, even with small prizes, and you'll see it keeps your subscriber count from dropping. A $10 game key giveaway exclusively for subs is worth more than a $50 one open to everyone, in terms of the value signal it sends to your paying supporters.
Instead of "type !enter," add anyone to the wheel who actually participates during the stream. Answered a question you asked? On the wheel. Guessed the right answer in a trivia segment? On the wheel. Made the best joke in chat? On the wheel. This format rewards people who are actually watching and engaged, not just the ones who type a command and tab out to watch Netflix. It also gives you more natural reasons to interact with chat throughout the stream.
Ask your community to clip or screenshot something from your stream, post it somewhere (Twitter, Discord, TikTok), and tag you. Collect the usernames of everyone who entered and add them to NameWheel. Spin live. This one gets you user-generated content, extends your reach on social media, and creates a giveaway that lives beyond the stream itself. The clips people make to enter are marketing content for your channel. It's one of the smarter formats out there.
Post in your Discord that you're doing a giveaway for active members. People react to a message or post in a specific channel to enter. Collect the usernames of everyone who reacted and paste them into NameWheel for a spin during your next stream or a short live reveal. This bridges your Discord and your stream community, pulls lurkers out of your server, and gives Discord members a reason to actually check the channels. Great for re-engaging a quiet server.
Set up a prediction or poll ("Will I beat this boss in under 5 tries?") and only add viewers to the giveaway wheel who guessed correctly. Now the giveaway is tied to actual in-stream content and viewers have to pay attention to what's happening to enter. It creates a feedback loop where people watch more closely because watching closely is how they get into the wheel. Works great on Twitch with the built-in Predictions feature, but also works manually with a chat poll and collecting right-answer names.
When someone raids you or hosts your channel, throw their whole raid party into a giveaway. You can use NameWheel to spin among the raiding channel's recent chatters or just add the raider's name with extra entries. This is a great way to encourage raid culture on your channel because raiders know they're bringing their community to a chance at something. Even smaller streamers doing 10-person raids feel valued when you acknowledge them with a giveaway entry.
For YouTube Live and TikTok Live specifically, announce a surprise giveaway mid-stream and add the first 20 or 50 people who type a specific word to the wheel. Spin immediately. This creates urgency, gets people commenting fast, and is perfect for platforms where the algorithm rewards comment activity. On TikTok Live especially, a sudden "GIVEAWAY, type FIRE in the next 60 seconds to enter" can double your concurrent viewers because people share the stream to friends so they can enter too.
Follow these and your chat will never question your giveaways. Ignore them and get ready for the accusations.
Every single time. No exceptions. "Who's eligible, what's the prize, how do you enter, when does it close." If you announce rules after some people have already entered, you'll spend the rest of the stream explaining yourself. State them upfront, keep them simple, and pin them in chat if your platform lets you.
Never pick a winner off-stream and just announce it later. That's the number one way to get accused of rigging it. Even if you're 100% honest, "I picked the winner last night" opens the door for doubt. Spin it live, on camera, where chat can see every name on the wheel and watch the result happen in real time. Transparency is everything.
Before you hit spin, scroll through the wheel or show the name input so chat can see all the entries are actually there. If people entered and don't see their name, give them a second to call it out before you spin. This 30-second step prevents a massive amount of post-giveaway drama and makes the whole thing feel airtight.
If you say "must be following to enter" then you need to actually check if the winner is following. If you say "subs only" and a non-sub sneaks in and wins, you need to re-spin. Pick eligibility rules you can actually enforce and be upfront about them. Inconsistent enforcement feels sketchy even when it's just an honest mistake.
Set a time limit for the winner to claim their prize and announce it before you spin. "The winner has 15 minutes to respond in chat or DMs, otherwise we re-spin." This prevents the awkward situation where you're waiting around for someone who left the stream. And it means you never have to make a judgment call on whether to re-spin. The rules were stated, you follow them. Easy.
This should go without saying, but giveaway winners talk. They post about it. If you don't follow through, that story travels. If you do follow through quickly, that story also travels, and it's a good one. Deliver the prize within the timeframe you promised, send a follow-up message to make sure they got it, and if anything goes wrong (a code doesn't work, the mail gets lost), fix it. Your reputation as a streamer is worth more than whatever the prize costs.
The actual questions people ask, with actual answers.
Real feedback from people who run giveaways regularly.
"ok so i used to run giveaways with this other tool that had a fake loading bar and a countdown like it was building drama. my chat saw through it immediately. switched to namewheel and the first thing my mod said was 'wait you can actually see everyone's name on there.' zero accusation of rigging since. 40+ giveaways. it just works."
"no cap i had 800 entries for a live giveaway. pasted the whole thing in. spun it. clip of the spin went 40k views. FORTY K. new followers for three days straight. the wheel slowing down is genuinely content. chat was UNHINGED. i did not expect a free tool to become part of my brand but here we are bestie"
"I run a semi-professional production stream. I don't have time mid-broadcast to troubleshoot why a tool won't load or walk my mod through a signup flow. NameWheel is a link. I send it, they paste the bot export, we're done. Zero explanation needed. That's what zero setup actually means. Not 'easy setup.' Zero."
"sub-only giveaway every friday. copy sub list from twitch dashboard, paste it in, spin, done. the whole thing takes 90 seconds. one of my subs literally told me they resubbed specifically because of the weekly giveaway. a free bookmark generating subscriber retention is not something i expected to be typing but here i am"
"genuinely was not expecting to post about a spinning wheel but here we are. ran a collab giveaway for our brand account, 1.2k entries from instagram. pasted the list, spun it on stories, the winner reposted it. we got 300 new followers from one spin. the aesthetic of the wheel actually fits the vibe of our feed which i know sounds insane but it matters"
"posted on r/Twitch asking if anyone had a good giveaway wheel and someone linked namewheel.org. was skeptical because free tools usually have some catch. there's no catch. no ads. no account. no 10-name limit. no upsell. i actually went back to that thread and updated my comment because i felt bad doubting it. chat loves the animation. highly recommend."
Not all wheels spin the same way.
| Feature | NameWheel | Wheel of Names | StreamElements Giveaway | Manual Spreadsheet |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Free to use | Yes | Yes (limited) | Yes (with account) | Yes |
| No account required | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Visible spin animation | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| OBS Browser Source compatible | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| Paste large name lists | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Remove winner and re-spin | Yes | Yes | Yes | Manual only |
| Mobile friendly | Yes | Partial | No | No |
| Setup time | Under 1 minute | Under 1 minute | 5-15 minutes | 5+ minutes |
| Works without a bot | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Chat hype factor | High | Medium | Low | Very low |
No setup. No account. Just open the wheel, paste your names, and make someone's day while the rest of your chat absolutely loses it.