Secret Santa generator
Draw Secret Santa names in a minute
Add your group, keep couples apart, and we make the draw. No account, no sign-up, and emails are optional.
- Without your email we cannot send you a new organiser link if you lose this one.
No account, and no sign-up. Each person sees only their own name, and we store a scrambled copy of every link rather than the link itself.
- Give the group a name, so people know what the email is about.
- Add your name, so whoever draws you knows who they have.
- Add at least two people.
How Secret Santa works
Three steps, and the second one is a button.
Add your group
2 to 30 names. Emails are optional.
Draw names
One press makes the random draw. Nobody gets themselves, and your exclusions hold.
Everyone gets a private link
Each person sees only their own. The name is never in the email.
Set the rules your group needs
Keep couples apart, suggest a budget, pick an exchange date, add a note for everyone.
Private by design
Each person sees only their own name. We keep a scrambled copy of every link instead of the link itself, so nobody can look one up later — not even us.
When exclusions collide, it says so
Ask for something impossible and it names which restrictions clash and what to change, instead of just refusing to draw.
Need a gift for the person you drew?
The Gift Finder takes a budget and a couple of things they are into, which is usually all you know about the person you drew. Or read the Secret Santa gift ideas guide.
Secret Santa, explained
How does Secret Santa work?
Everyone in a group is secretly assigned one other person to buy for, so each person gives one gift and receives one gift instead of buying for everybody. The assignment is the whole point: you are not supposed to know who has you. Groups usually agree a spending limit and a date to swap, and that is the entire game.
How to use this generator
Name the group, add between 2 and 30 people, and press Draw names. The draw happens immediately. Everyone who gave an email address gets a link; for anyone who did not, you are given their link to pass on yourself. You keep an organiser link for coming back to the group later.
Secret Santa rules worth agreeing first
Set a spending limit before you draw, so nobody guesses wrong in either direction. Agree whether homemade counts. Decide when and where you are swapping. And settle what happens if somebody drops out — the simplest answer is to run the draw again, which this does without starting over.
Keeping certain people apart
Couples and housemates usually should not draw each other, and you can block any pair in both directions. If the restrictions you set cannot all be satisfied at once, the draw does not simply fail: it names the people whose restrictions collide and what to change so it can work.
Do I need everyone’s email?
No. Emails are optional, and a draw runs perfectly well with none at all — you hand each person their link yourself. Where you do give an address, pressing Draw names sends that person a link to their own private page. The name they drew is never in the email itself, only behind the link.