The National Hockey League announced today that the 2026 NHL Draft Lottery will be held on Tuesday, May 5. The Draft Lottery will be conducted at NHL Network’s Secaucus, N.J., studio, with the event broadcast live on Sportsnet.
This year’s NHL Draft Lottery broadcast will once again feature a LIVE drawing of the lottery balls. Viewers will be able to follow along and learn the results at the same time as the Draft Lottery participants. As each lottery ball is drawn, odds change and teams are eliminated. The viewing audience learns which clubs are still in the running in real time.
The 2026 NHL Draft Lottery will determine the order of selection for the first 16 picks in the first round of the 2026 Upper Deck NHL Draft. Participants are all teams that did not qualify for the 2026 Stanley Cup Playoffs (or the teams that have acquired the first-round drafting positions of those non-playoff teams).
The Lottery will be conducted in two phases, the first to determine the first overall pick in the 2026 Upper Deck NHL Draft and the second to determine the second overall pick. There is a limit on the total number of selections (10) a team participating in the Draft Lottery can “move up” in the event it wins one of the Lottery Draws. Thus, only the top 11 seeds will be eligible to receive the first overall Draft pick.
The allocation of odds for the 1st Lottery Draw of the 2026 NHL Draft Lottery is as follows: