The NHL Draft Lottery decides the order of the first 16 picks in the first round, and only the 16 teams that miss the playoffs take part. Two draws are held, one for the No. 1 pick and one for No. 2. The team with the fewest regular-season points has an 18.5% chance of winning the first draw, per the NHL's official lottery guide, and a 25.5% chance of ending up with the first overall pick. A team can move up no more than 10 spots, so only the 11 lowest-finishing clubs can win No. 1, and no team can advance by winning a draw more than twice in a five-year period.
Updated for the 2026-27 season.
How does the NHL Draft Lottery work?
The lottery is open to every team that did not qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs, or to the team that holds a non-playoff club's first-round position through a trade, per NHL.com. The 16 participants are seeded from fewest regular-season points to most, and each seed receives a fixed share of lottery combinations.
The drawing itself uses balls numbered 1 through 14. Four are drawn, which produces 1,001 possible four-number combinations. One combination (11-12-13-14) is set aside as a redraw, and the remaining 1,000 are assigned randomly to the 16 teams according to the odds set by the league's Board of Governors, per NHL.com. In 2026, last-place Vancouver held 185 combinations, Chicago 135 and the New York Rangers 115.
The lottery is run in two phases:
- First draw: determines the first overall pick.
- Second draw: determines the second overall pick. The winner of the first draw is removed, and the odds for the remaining teams increase on a proportionate basis, per the NHL's lottery guide. If the first-draw winner's combination comes up again, the draw is repeated.
Since 2025, the drawing has been shown live, so viewers see teams eliminated as each ball is drawn, per the NHL. The 2026 lottery was held at NHL Network's studio in Secaucus, N.J., and broadcast on ESPN, Sportsnet and TVA Sports, per NHL.com.
What are the NHL draft lottery odds?
The odds have been the same every year since 2022. The table below shows each seed's chance of winning the first draw, the number of combinations it receives, and its chance of actually picking first, using the NHL's 2026 lottery guide. The final column applies the 10-spot limit.
| Lottery seed (fewest points = 1) | Combinations | Odds to win 1st draw | Odds of No. 1 pick | Best possible pick |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 185 | 18.5% | 25.5% | 1 |
| 2 | 135 | 13.5% | 13.5% | 1 |
| 3 | 115 | 11.5% | 11.5% | 1 |
| 4 | 95 | 9.5% | 9.5% | 1 |
| 5 | 85 | 8.5% | 8.5% | 1 |
| 6 | 75 | 7.5% | 7.5% | 1 |
| 7 | 65 | 6.5% | 6.5% | 1 |
| 8 | 60 | 6.0% | 6.0% | 1 |
| 9 | 50 | 5.0% | 5.0% | 1 |
| 10 | 35 | 3.5% | 3.5% | 1 |
| 11 | 30 | 3.0% | 3.0% | 1 |
| 12 | 25 | 2.5% | 0.0% | 2 |
| 13 | 20 | 2.0% | 0.0% | 3 |
| 14 | 15 | 1.5% | 0.0% | 4 |
| 15 | 5 | 0.5% | 0.0% | 5 |
| 16 | 5 | 0.5% | 0.0% | 6 |
Odds and combination counts are from the NHL's 2026 Draft Lottery guide and NHL.com. The NHL's all-time odds table lists the same first-draw percentages for every lottery from 2022 to the present. "Best possible pick" is the seed minus 10, the furthest a team can climb.
Why does last place have a 25.5% chance at No. 1?
Seeds 12 through 16 can still win the first draw, but they cannot move up far enough to pick first. When one of them wins, it jumps 10 spots and the first overall pick goes to the last-place team. The Hockey News described the 2025 case this way: if the 12th to 16th seeds won the first draw, last-place San Jose would pick first. That is why the bottom seed's 18.5% first-draw odds become 25.5% odds of picking No. 1: 18.5% plus the combined 7.0% held by seeds 12 through 16.
How far can a team fall?
Because only two picks are drawn, a team can drop no more than two spots. When the NHL cut the lottery from three draws to two starting in 2021, it noted that the last-place club could fall no lower than third overall, instead of fourth. In 2026, last-place Vancouver lost both draws and picked third.
Why can only the bottom 11 teams win the No. 1 pick?
The NHL announced changes to the lottery in March 2021, and among those in effect since 2022 is a limit of 10 on the number of selections a team can move up if it wins a draw. As a result, only the top 11 seeds are eligible to receive the first overall selection, per NHL.com and the league's lottery guide.
The cap has already decided a lottery. In 2025, Utah (then the Utah Hockey Club, now the Mammoth) was the 14th seed and won the second draw, but it could climb only 10 spots and picked fourth, per NHL.com.
Can a team win the NHL draft lottery two years in a row?
Yes, but there is a ceiling. Under the rule announced in 2021, no team can advance in the draft order by reason of winning a lottery draw more than two times within a five-year period, per the NHL's announcement. The limit began with the 2022 lottery, was not retroactive, and covered 2022 through 2026 as the first period.
Two details matter. The wording targets advancing in the order, so the limit is about moving up rather than about holding a spot. And according to the NHL's announcement, the limit applies to the club rather than to a specific pick.
How is the rest of the NHL draft order set?
Picks 3 through 16
After the two draws, the 14 teams not selected in the lottery are assigned the remaining picks among Nos. 1 through 16 in inverse order of regular-season points, per the NHL's lottery guide. In practice, every non-winner keeps its seed order and slides down one spot for each draw winner that started behind it.
Picks 17 through 32
The playoff teams fill the back half of the first round, and that order is not known until the Stanley Cup Final ends. NHL.com described how the 2026 order was set:
- Teams eliminated in the first two playoff rounds that did not win their division were placed in inverse order of regular-season points.
- Division winners eliminated in those rounds followed them (Buffalo in 2026).
- The conference final losers came next, with the team that had fewer regular-season points picking first (Montreal at No. 28 in 2026).
- The Stanley Cup runner-up and then the champion picked last. In 2026, champion Carolina held No. 31, and No. 32 went to Ottawa as part of a modified penalty for the 2021 trade of Evgenii Dadonov.
What happens to traded and protected picks in the lottery?
A traded first-round pick enters the lottery in the original team's seed, under the club that holds it, per the NHL's lottery guide. In 2026, St. Louis held two lottery slots (its own and Detroit's). Toronto's pick carried a top-five condition from a March 7, 2025, trade with Boston: if the pick landed in the top five, Toronto would keep it and instead send Boston its 2027 or 2028 first-round pick, per the NHL's lottery guide. Toronto then won the first draw.
Who won the most recent NHL draft lotteries?
| Year | No. 1 pick (lottery result) | No. 2 pick (lottery result) | First overall selection |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Toronto Maple Leafs (moved from 5th to 1st) | San Jose Sharks (moved from 9th to 2nd) | LW Gavin McKenna, Maple Leafs |
| 2025 | New York Islanders (moved from 10th to 1st) | Utah Hockey Club won 2nd draw (moved from 14th to 4th) | D Matthew Schaefer, Islanders |
| 2024 | San Jose Sharks (kept 1st) | Chicago Blackhawks (kept 2nd) | C Macklin Celebrini, Sharks |
| 2023 | Chicago Blackhawks (moved from 3rd to 1st) | Anaheim Ducks (moved from 1st to 2nd) | C Connor Bedard, Blackhawks |
| 2022 | Montreal Canadiens (kept 1st) | New Jersey Devils (moved from 5th to 2nd) | LW Juraj Slafkovsky, Canadiens |
Results from 2022 through 2025 are from the NHL's all-time lottery results table; 2026 is from NHL.com. In 2025, San Jose had the best odds at 18.5% and picked second, Chicago picked third, and Utah's 10-spot jump stopped at No. 4. Toronto selected Gavin McKenna first overall in 2026, per NHL.com.
The 2026 lottery
The 2026 lottery was held May 5. Toronto, which had the fifth-best odds at 8.5%, won the first draw. San Jose won the second draw with a 5.5% chance, the eighth-best among the teams still eligible, per NHL.com. Vancouver, which finished last, picked third. The 2025 lottery was also held May 5, per the NHL's release that year, and was the first in the event's 30-year history with the drawings shown live.
When and where is the 2027 NHL Draft?
The 2027 draft is scheduled for June 25 and 26, 2027, and the NHL has confirmed it will be decentralized for a third straight year, per TSN. Under that format, all 32 teams stay in their home markets while top prospects and league officials gather at a separate site for the first round. The 2025 hub was UBS Arena on Long Island and the 2026 hub was KeyBank Center in Buffalo. The 2027 lottery date had not been announced when this page was updated.
Related reference pages
Sources
- 2026 NHL Draft Lottery guide: format, odds, all-time odds and results (2026) — NHL Media
- 2026 NHL Draft Lottery set for May 5 (April 18, 2026) — NHL.com
- NHL Draft Lottery drama to play out in real time (May 4, 2026) — NHL.com
- Maple Leafs win Draft Lottery, will have choice of McKenna or Stenberg at No. 1 (May 6, 2026) — NHL.com
- 2026 NHL Draft 1st-round order set (June 24, 2026) — NHL.com
- Islanders win NHL Draft Lottery for 1st time since 2009 (May 6, 2025) — NHL.com
- Islanders, Utah Hockey Club win 2025 NHL Draft Lottery (May 5, 2025) — NHL Media
- McKenna selected No. 1 by Maple Leafs in 2026 NHL Draft (June 2026) — NHL.com
- NHL announces changes to Draft Lottery format (March 2021) — NHL.com
- The NHL draft lottery explained: Everything you need to know (May 10, 2022) — ESPN
- 2025 NHL Draft Lottery day announced: how it works and what are the odds (April 29, 2025) — The Hockey News
- NHL Draft decentralized once again in 2027 (Sept. 8, 2026) — TSN