Random Drawings

Random Prize & Gift Matcher

Randomly pair up two lists — people and prizes, or gift-givers and recipients — for Secret Santa exchanges, multi-prize raffles, and fair distributions.

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How the Random Prize & Gift Matcher works

This performs a random bipartite matching between two separate lists: people stay in the order you entered them, while the prize list is independently shuffled and paired against them one-to-one — giving every possible person-prize pairing an equal chance of occurring, without needing the two lists to be related in any way beforehand.

If the lists are different lengths, matching stops at the shorter list's length, so every matched pair is complete; consider trimming or padding your lists ahead of time if you want everyone matched.

How to use it

1
List your people and prizesEnter each group in its own box, one entry per line.
2
GenerateXrandom shuffles the prize list and pairs each person with one prize in order, so pairings are unpredictable and fair.
3
Use the pairingGreat for Secret Santa-style exchanges, distributing different raffle prizes fairly, or randomly assigning gifts to recipients.

Frequently asked questions

Can I use this for Secret Santa where nobody gets their own name?

Not directly — this tool doesn't check for self-matches; for classic Secret Santa where person A shouldn't draw themselves, enter your names in both boxes and manually re-roll if a self-match occurs, or use a dedicated Secret Santa tool with exclusion rules.

What happens if the lists are different lengths?

Matching only covers as many pairs as the shorter list allows; extra entries in the longer list are left unmatched.

Is each pairing equally likely?

Yes, since the prize list is fully shuffled independently of the people list, every possible pairing arrangement has an equal chance.