Free YouTube comment picker

Draw a giveaway winner from your video's comments. Duplicate entries are filtered out, and every draw comes with a seed so entrants can check the result themselves.

How to run a giveaway people trust

The complaint under every giveaway announcement is the same: how do we know you did not just pick your friend. A random picker on its own does not answer that, because nobody watched you use it and nothing stops you drawing twenty times until you like the name.

A seed answers it. The seed decides the outcome, so if you post the seed before you draw, anyone can run the same seed against the same video afterwards and get the same winner. Re-rolling becomes visible, because the published seed would no longer match the name you announced.

1. Announce your entry conditions and a seed in the video or a pinned comment.
2. When entries close, paste the link here with that seed.
3. Publish the winner, the seed, and the entrant list CSV.

What counts as an entry

• One entry per channel is on by default, so twenty comments from one viewer count once. Their earliest qualifying comment is kept.
• Required keyword excludes anyone who did not follow the instruction.
• Minimum words filters out one-character entries left by bots.
• Replies are excluded, since a reply is usually a conversation rather than an entry.

How the seed makes a draw checkable

Every draw records a seed, and the seed is what turns "trust me" into something a viewer can test. It is the starting value for the random selection: the same seed against the same entrant list always produces the same winners, and a different seed produces different ones.

That matters because the usual objection to a creator-run giveaway is not that the draw was rigged, but that nobody can tell either way. Publishing the seed alongside the winner, together with the entrant count and the time of the draw, means a sceptical viewer can re-run the draw and either get your winners or not.

The practical version is short. Announce the closing time before you draw. Draw once. Post the winner with the seed, the number of eligible entrants, and the draw time. If someone disputes it, they have everything needed to check.

Mistakes that make a giveaway look rigged

None of these require bad intent, which is why they are worth naming.

• Redrawing because the winner did not reply. Understandable, and it looks exactly like drawing until you get an answer you like. Say up front how long a winner has to respond and what happens if they do not.
• Changing the entry rule after entries are in. Adding "must be subscribed" after the fact both invalidates the draw and, if you enforce it, runs into YouTube's rules on making rewards conditional on engagement.
• Drawing from a partial list without saying so. If the comment count exceeded what was read, a draw from the most recent 500 is not a draw from everyone. This tool tells you when it hits that ceiling for exactly this reason.
• Announcing only the winner. A name with no entrant count, no time and no seed is unfalsifiable, which is a strange thing to aim for when the alternative is free.

The legal side varies by country and is worth checking separately — the rules that apply to YouTube giveaways covers the platform's own requirements, and proving a draw was fair goes further into the verification side.

Common questions

How do I prove a YouTube giveaway draw was fair?

Publish the seed alongside the winner. Every draw here is generated from a seed, and re-running the same seed against the same video produces exactly the same winners, so any entrant can check the result themselves.

Can I stop one person entering a giveaway many times?

Yes. One entry per channel is on by default, so a viewer who comments twenty times counts once. Their earliest qualifying comment is the one kept.

Can I require entrants to comment a specific word?

Yes. Set a required keyword and a minimum word count, and comments that do not meet both conditions are excluded before the draw.

Does the comment picker need a YouTube API key?

No. It reads up to 500 comments free with no signup. Supplying your own YouTube Data API key raises the ceiling to 1,000, which matters for videos with very large comment sections.

Are replies counted as giveaway entries?

No. Replies are excluded by default, because a reply is usually a conversation rather than an entry.

Is this allowed under YouTube's rules?

Reading public comments through the official API is fine. The rules you need to read are the ones about the contest itself — YouTube requires that you run it lawfully and make clear it is not sponsored by YouTube. That is covered in what YouTube comment automation covers and in the write-up on what gets channels banned.