Tumblr Giveaway Ideas: Prizes and Tips That Get More Entries

Tumblr giveaways work differently from giveaways anywhere else. There is no feed algorithm doing the heavy lifting, and no paid boost that fixes a dull prize. A Tumblr giveaway spreads because people reblog it, tag it, and talk about it — or it does not spread at all.

That is good news for small blogs. With the right prize and a simple way to enter, a small blog can outperform a much bigger one with a generic gift card. Match the prize to the people who already follow you, and make entry so easy that reblogging feels like the obvious next step.

TBLR Picker is the Tumblr Comment Picker: Pick Random Giveaway Winners. It picks a random winner from the comments on your Tumblr post, with filters for required words, excluded words, duplicate removal, tag-a-friend entries, minimum comment length, and replies. You can pick multiple winners, export comments and winners to CSV, and start with a free account — no card required, with 3 free draws in total. Creator is $5/month and Growth is $50/year.

This post covers 12 Tumblr giveaway ideas, sorted by who they work best for, plus the formats that get the most entries and the budget mistakes to avoid.

What Makes a Tumblr Giveaway Work

Three things matter more than anything else. First, the prize has to belong on your blog. A fandom blog giving away a random $50 gift card attracts people who do not care about the fandom. They enter, they unfollow, and your next post reaches fewer real followers than before. A prize your actual audience wants — a commission, a zine, a fandom print — attracts people who stay.

Second, entry has to be simple. Reblogging is already a normal Tumblr action, so "reblog and leave a comment" is the lowest-friction entry you can ask for. Every extra step costs you entries. If you want a bonus entry, make it optional, not required.

Third, people need to trust the draw. Say in advance how the winner will be picked, when, and how you will prove it. A random draw from the comments, shown openly, beats "I picked my favourite" every time for a luck-based giveaway. If it is a skill contest instead — best fan art wins — say so clearly, and say how it will be judged. Do not call a judged contest a random giveaway.

Tags do the discovery work on Tumblr. Use fandom, character, and niche tags your audience actually follows, and keep them relevant. Tumblr only indexes the first 20 tags on a post for search, so spend them on specific tags rather than broad ones nobody follows.

Prize Ideas for Artists

Artists run some of the best Tumblr giveaways, because the prize is something only they can make.

1. A custom commission slot. One finished commission — a portrait, a character piece, a pet portrait — is the classic artist giveaway prize. It costs you time rather than money, it shows off your work, and the winner gets something nobody else can buy. Be specific: one character, one background style, delivered by a date you can actually meet.

2. A print or sticker pack. A small pack of prints, stickers, or pins is a great low-cost prize. It is easy to post, it photographs well in the announcement, and runners-up can buy the same pack afterwards. Offer a digital version, such as a wallpaper pack, for winners outside your shipping area.

3. A "draw your request" prize. Offer to draw the winner's request live or in a speedpaint post. The prize is the artwork, but the process post is content too — and it gives your followers a reason to watch the result even if they did not win.

4. An art supply kit. Put together a small kit around your medium: pens, a sketchbook, watercolour pans, or a digital brush pack. This works well for art tutorial blogs, because the prize matches the people who follow you to learn. If you are not sure what to include, the giveaway prize generator will give you a shortlist based on your audience and budget.

Prize Ideas for Writers

Writing blogs have a different advantage: the prize can be entirely digital, so shipping never eats your budget.

5. A custom short story or fic commission. Offer a short story, a fic chapter, or a drabble on a prompt the winner chooses, within a fandom and rating you are comfortable writing. Set a word count and a deadline in the rules so the prize stays manageable.

6. A beta-read or editing pass. If you write craft posts or beta-read for others, a free editing pass on the winner's chapter or short story is a prize your followers genuinely value. It also brings you readers who care about the same fandom you do.

7. A writing resource bundle. A bundle of your own templates, prompt lists, or worldbuilding worksheets — or a licence for a writing tool you already use — works well as a prize for a writing-advice blog. Keep it to resources you have the right to give away.

Prize Ideas for Fandom Blogs

Fandom blogs do not need to make anything. They need a prize the fandom already wants.

8. Fandom merch from an independent artist. A print, a zine, a charm, or a handmade item from an artist in the same fandom beats a generic gift card. It supports another creator, it is instantly recognisable in a reblog, and it signals that your blog is part of the community. Ask the artist first, and credit them in the post.

9. A zine or fanbook copy. If your blog is tied to a zine, a fan event, or a charity anthology, a physical or PDF copy is a natural prize. It is also a good way to clear leftover stock after a launch without discounting it publicly.

10. A themed bundle for a fandom event. Tie the prize to something the fandom is already excited about: a new season, a movie release, a character birthday, or a fandom appreciation week. A small bundle — a print, a sticker, and a digital wallpaper — feels bigger than its cost when the theme is right, and a 7-day fandom week pairs naturally with a 7-day giveaway.

Prize Ideas for Shops and Small Sellers

11. A shop credit or a bestseller bundle. If you sell on Tumblr, give away your bestseller rather than your slowest stock. A bundle of your most popular item plus a small extra costs you less than a gift card of the same value, and the winner's review post is free promotion. State clearly whether shipping is included and which countries you ship to.

12. A follower-milestone bundle. Hit 500, 1,000, or 5,000 followers and celebrate with a giveaway that thanks the people who got you there. Milestone giveaways get more reblogs than ordinary ones because the occasion itself is worth sharing, and they give new followers a reason to stick around after the draw.

Giveaway Formats That Get More Entries

The prize is half the idea. The format is the other half. These four formats work best on Tumblr, and you can combine them with any prize above.

Follower-milestone giveaways. Announce the giveaway when you hit a round number, and keep the entry window short — three to seven days. The milestone gives people a reason to reblog now rather than later.

Launch giveaways. Launching a shop, a zine, a fic, or a new series? A giveaway on launch day turns your announcement post into something people share. Keep the prize tied to the launch so the entries come from people interested in what you launched.

Holiday and seasonal giveaways. Halloween, the winter holidays, Valentine's Day, and fandom-specific dates all work, because people are already browsing and in a giving mood. Start a week early so the post has time to circulate before the date itself.

Collaboration giveaways. Team up with one or two blogs in the same fandom or niche. Each blog contributes a small prize, and each blog reblogs the giveaway to its own followers. Agree in advance who picks the winner, who pays for shipping, and who announces it.

Two more formats are worth knowing. A flash giveaway — 24 hours, one small prize — creates urgency and works well for digital prizes. A creative-submission giveaway — best caption, best fan art, best GIF set — gets fewer entries but much better ones, and the entries themselves become content you can share later with permission. Judge creative entries openly and say how you judged them; do not pretend a judged contest was a random draw.

How to Get More Entries Without Breaking Tumblr's Rules

More entries are only useful if they come from real people who might stay. Keep the entry action to things Tumblr users already do: reblog, comment, and follow your blog. A comment entry also gives you something a reblog alone does not — a list of entrants you can actually draw from. That is how a comment picker works: the comments are the entries, and the draw picks from them.

Make the post easy to reblog. One strong image of the prize, the prize name in the first line, the deadline with its time zone, and nothing else above the fold. Long rules belong below the prize, or on a linked rules page — not in the first paragraph.

Use tags your audience follows, and do not tag fandoms your giveaway has nothing to do with. Tag-spamming unrelated fandoms gets your post ignored or reported, and it brings in entrants who will never follow you.

Do not ask people to pay to enter, and do not promise entries in exchange for money. A luck-based giveaway that requires a purchase is a different legal animal in many countries, and Tumblr users will call it out fast. Keep entry free, keep the rules short and honest, and say who can enter — your country, worldwide, or a named list of regions — before anyone reblogs.

Reblog your own giveaway post once, midway through the entry window, with a short reminder. More than that starts to look like spam on your followers' dashboards.

Choosing a Prize That Fits Your Budget

A giveaway that costs more than it returns is not a growth tactic, it is a hobby expense. Work out the real cost before you announce anything.

Add up the prize cost, packaging, and shipping — including international shipping if the giveaway is open worldwide. A $20 prize can easily become a $60 giveaway once shipping is included, and that is the number to judge it by, not the prize alone. If international shipping would break the budget, offer a digital alternative for winners outside your shipping area, and say so in the rules.

Then decide what a good result looks like. Are you after followers, notes on a post, sales, or feedback on a new product? A giveaway aimed at followers should be judged on how many new followers are still there a month later, not on how many entered. If you want a rough sense of whether the prize is worth it, the giveaway ROI calculator lets you compare the cost against the entries and followers you expect.

A good rule of thumb: the prize should cost no more than you would happily spend on a promoted post for the same goal — and for most small Tumblr blogs, a prize in the $10 to $50 range, or a commission slot, works better than a single expensive item. One $100 prize gets one winner and a spike of entries. Three $30 prizes get three winners, three announcement posts, and three people talking about your blog.

If you are planning a bigger giveaway, read the how to do a giveaway on Tumblr guide first. It walks through the prize, budget, rules, and announcement in order, so you do not discover the shipping cost after you have already promised the prize.

How to Pick the Winner Fairly

The draw is where most Tumblr giveaways lose trust, so make it boring and visible. Close entries at the exact time you promised, collect the comments, remove duplicates and entries that broke the rules, and draw at random.

A comment picker does the random part for you: it pulls in the public comments on your post, applies your filters — required words, excluded words, duplicates removed, minimum length, replies included or not — and picks a winner you can show. Record the draw, or screenshot the result, and share it in your announcement post. If someone questions the result, you have something to point to.

Pick a backup winner at the same time, in case the first winner does not reply within the window you set — 48 hours is a common choice. Say the reply window in the rules so nobody is surprised when you move on. Then announce the winner in a new post, tag them if they are happy to be tagged, and close the loop publicly. A giveaway that ends with a visible winner gets more entries next time, because people saw that someone actually won.

If you want the full method, including how to handle duplicates and what to do when a winner does not reply, read pick a giveaway winner fairly.

Final Word

The best Tumblr giveaway idea is not the most expensive one, and it is not the most complicated one. It is the prize your own followers already want, offered in a format they already understand, with a draw they can trust.

Start small. Pick one idea from this list that fits your blog, set a budget you are comfortable with, write rules you can keep, and run it for a week. Then look at what happened: how many entries, how many new followers stayed, and whether anyone bought something afterwards. That tells you what to give away next time — and that is how a one-off giveaway becomes a regular reason for people to follow you.