Random Order Generator

🕹️ How to play

1. How to randomize a list of names: Paste your list into the box — one name per line, though commas, semicolons and spaces work too. The counter under the box updates as you type. No list handy? Tap the sample button and eight demo names drop straight in. With fewer than two names the button tells you what is missing instead of doing nothing.
2. How the running order is revealed: Tap the main button and the whole order is drawn at once, then revealed from position 1 downward. The reveal never runs longer than nine seconds; long lists switch to a faster batched tempo automatically. In a hurry, tap skip to jump straight to the full table — the order and its code stay exactly the same.
3. How to save or share the result: When the reveal finishes, the result card shows the title, date, full order, draw code and how many times you have drawn this list. Copy result puts a numbered plain-text version on your clipboard, ready to paste into a group chat, and the card screenshots cleanly. Everything is stored in this browser only, so a reload returns the same draw instead of a new one.
4. How to lock a slot or draw by tiers: After your first draw, open More rules. You can pin one person to the opening slot and one to the closing slot while everything between stays random. For tiered draws — rookies first, veterans later — switch tiers on and separate the groups with a line containing only three dashes, up to four tiers. Locks are always printed on the card and in the copied text.

📖 Rules & variants

How the draw works: every draw is a Fisher-Yates shuffle, so all N! possible orders are equally likely. The complete order is decided and saved the instant you tap the button — the position-by-position reveal is only playback, which is why reloading mid-reveal shows the same order rather than a fresh one.

List rules: line breaks, commas, semicolons, tabs and runs of spaces all separate names. A single name is capped at 24 characters and the list at 200 people; anything beyond that is dropped with a note. Repeated names stay as separate slots with small ① ② markers, because two people really can share a name — merge them with the dedupe action in the counter row if you want.

Lock rules: you can pin one person to position 1 and one to position N; everyone else stays uniformly random. Locking the same person to both ends keeps whichever end you set last, and a lock pointing at someone you deleted simply clears itself. Locks are never silent — they appear on the result card and in the copied text so the room can see the rule.

Tier rules: with tiers on, a line of three or more dashes marks a tier break, up to four tiers; extra breaks fold into the last tier and empty tiers are skipped. Within a tier the order is random, between tiers it follows the order you wrote. A lock beats a tier: the locked person leaves their tier for the end slot, and the card says so.

Draw code and draw count: the code is seven random characters plus a three-character checksum bound to the current list and rules. Enter the same list, the same rules and that code in the replay box to reproduce the identical order; if anything changed, it refuses instead of showing a different order and calling it the same one. Every redraw of the same list increments the draw count — that makes redrawing something you do openly, not something the tool blocks. Clearing browser data resets the count.

Variants: read it backwards so the closing slot stays secret until last; use the lock as an encore slot and leave the rest random; run it twice when someone swaps out and point at the draw count as proof; on a projector turn the phone sideways and the list splits into columns.

Why someone did not move: in a truly random shuffle each person stays put with probability about 1/N, so a ten-name list keeps one person in place on average. Forcing everybody to move would break the equal-probability guarantee, so instead the card tells you exactly how many positions matched last time.

❓ FAQ