This post was originally published October 30, 2015. It was updated with new information on March 22, 2019 and April 30, 2021.
My colleague Miguel Guhlin and I were working on the ISTE Certified Educator training and we needed a random selector tool. Of course, Miguel pipes up and had just the right wheel spinner. This joint effort spawned a blog and the hunt for even more spinners.
For more on shape spinners, check out this blog entry.
FREE is the key word for all seven spinners!
Wheel Decide
Created by: Wheel Decide LLC
Beachball colored wheel with a spinner click sound.
The Steps:
- Visit: https://wheeldecide.com/.
- Scroll down the page and enter your choices (The max is 100.).
- Title your wheel.
- Click (Apply Wheel Changes).
- That’s it. You have your wheel.
- If you want to save the wheel, copy the URL and save it.
Red flag: If you scroll down to the very bottom of Wheel Decide, there are some pre-made wheels that are adult themed: What Wine to Drink?, Tarot Cards, and What Domestic Beer to Drink (US)?
Random Name Picker Spinner
Created by: Classroom Tools
Multiple colors with a spinner click sound and applause
The Steps:
- Visit: https://www.classtools.net/random-name-picker/.
- Below the Spinner, you will find Edit/Save.
- Enter your information.
- Press Submit (your spinner is visible immediately).
- Or better yet, save your spinner for future use with the following steps:
- Click Save this List.
- Provide a password.
- Save the unique address to access your spinner.
Extra! You can opt to remove each option immediately.
Flippity Random Name Picker
Created by: Flippity.net
Rainbow-colored spinner
The Steps:
- Visit: http://flippity.net/.
- Find the Flippity Random Name Picker.
- Make a copy of the template.
- Enter your information.
- Label your roster.
- Go to File, Publish to the Web.
- Click Publish.
- Click on the Get the Link Here tab (at the bottom).
- Bookmark the page to return in the future.
Extra! You can also display your information in the form of: lineup, group, team, or seating arrangement.
Spin Wheel
Created by: Lylesoft LLC
Pastel colored wheel with spinner sounds
The Steps:
- Visit https://www.randomnamepicker.net/spin-wheel.
- Click on Name Sets.
- Delete the list of existing names: James, Mary, John, etc.
- Enter your information.
- Click Save and Close.
- Select Reset Name.
- Click Play.
Extra! You can opt to remove each option immediately.
Red Flag: I could never get this spinner to save multiple sets, so I think you might have to create an account.
Wheel of Names
Created by: Martin Omander, Google Developer Relations
Red, blue, green, and yellow wheel with spinner click sounds and applause
The Steps:
- Visit https://wheelofnames.com/.
- Enter your information to the right of the spinner.
- Click on the spinner to activate.
Extra! You can opt to remove each option immediately. One other bonus is that this wheel allows you to add images for options.
Picker Wheel
Created by: Tyson Lim
Various hues of yellow and green wheel with spinner clicking sounds and upbeat music to announce selection
The Steps:
- Visit https://pickerwheel.com/
- Enter your information to the right of the spinner.
- Enter in the yellow “Input here” one-by-one.
- Or click on the peach-colored button to add a whole list.
- Click on the spinner’s middle button.
Extra! Works in three modes: normal mode, elimination mode, and accumulation mode.
It is a PWA application which means you can work offline and can be installed as a desktop, iOS or Android app without surfing through a browser.
Wheel Generator
Created by: WheelGenerator.com
Five muted toned wheel spinner with spinner clicking sounds. The winner is announced in a text box with whistles, whoops, and clapping.
The Steps:
I certainly hope one of these seven fancy wheels will spin you right. If you happen to have another wheel spinner that would be an awesome addition, please email me at preimers@tcea.org. Happy spinning!
Updated on November 22, 2019. This blog originally only had five spinners, but thanks to Tyson Lim we now have SIX SPINNERS!
Updated on April 30, 2021. How exciting! Another developer has reached out to me with another option – bringing the count of free wheel spinners to SEVEN!
44 comments
Thanks for finally writing about >An Online Wheel Spinner
for Every Occasion o TechNotes Blog <Loved it!
Very interesting info!Perfect just what I was searching for!
That is the best list of wheels I ever find , thanks for sharing this.
Please add my yes/no spinner https://igenerator.net/yes-no-decision-maker/wheel-spinner/
Do you know of a double spinner where you can edit both wheels?
I haven’t come across one yet. But I’ll keep my eye out.
Indeed, more spinners on one page would be amazing for teaching languages! Havent you come across it anywhere yet, Peggy? 🙂
Not yet, Jitka – but I’ll keep my eye out!
i would love this. Allows for game where subject and action are 2 separate spinners.
Thank you for these great spinners! I would like to have 3 spinners on the same page so that we could make 3 digits numbers (2nd grade).
I agree – would be a great tool! I’ll keep looking.
Great idea, I will use this.
I think that this app is amazing because its really fun and i think that i would use it everyday
Is there a spinner that tracks the number of times it has been spinned?
That sounds like a good feature to add. Unfortunately, I do not know one.
Wheel decide works really well. After using it for a few weeks I’ve found that there is typically 1 choice that is never chosen and it seems to have favorites in a day. I often will get the same choice 4 times in a day. Strange.
Anyone know of a spinner where you can paste images into it? I need a spinner with shapes
You can paste images on spinners on wordwall.net (it’s free for the first five activities you create).
Thank you for sharing! really appreciate it.
You are most welcome.
This should be on this list https://wheelspinner.co
Hi Jen, Sorry I missed this. My colleague, Miguel wrote the following blog on Shape Spinners: https://blog.tcea.org/shape-spinners-to-the-rescue/
You can also try
https://randompickerwheel.com/yes-or-no
Is there a way to rig the results for a gender reveal?
A unique use of a spinner, for sure. Not to my knowledge can you rig any of the spinners to land on a certain space.
This is an amazing piece of writing and such type of wheels and online spinners are really helpful for us all.
Why don’t you try a spinner that gives a random animal? It would be quite fun when it comes to picking up the pet animal.
Where’s the spinning wheel there’s only steps and other stuff
I have included the URL for each spinner – look for the line that contains visit.
wonderful!
Awesome work buddy keep it up.
I looove it! Thank you so much for sharing this with us!
It’s the best spinner I’ve ever found.
This helped me a lot i can not even remember how i teached without this like wow.😊
This is quite interesting. Can be very useful for events / workshops with your teams or even for students in a class.
I found one that I think should also be on the list. It looks a bit more modern than the others you’ve shared and the creators seem quite responsive to feature requests 🙂 https://randomspinwheel.com/
Thank you for this additional wheel spinner! The “can you find the carrot” spinner is quite fun.
Haha, agreed! If you have great ideas or feature requests for spinners, let them know through their contact form. I know they want to focus more on teaching rather than “fun” wheels.
I hope some educators take them up on the offer. Thanks again for posting – a great addition.
Informative Blog and good work Peggy. I am working on a yes or no wheel. Much learning blog.
yesornowheell.com/t
Does anyone have a spinner that you can imbed? As instructional coaches, my colleage and I are building some interactive numeracy activites within myViewboard. However, there is no spinner and the dice are only 6-sided. We need a 10-sided dice or 10-piece spinner that we can imbed in the myViewboard software so that it is interactive. Any suggestions as we’ve spent a lot of time already trying to recreate and find them. Thanks
Here is another wheel spinner to add to the list: HeySpinner.com. This spinner is a free online platform that allows users to create custom spinner wheels and then save them to their accounts. One of the key features of HeySpinner is that users can load their saved wheels from any device with internet access, making it a spinner that can be accessed from different locations.
We can actually use this to design a new game. Wow! Thanks for the inspiration
Really good, thx.