Data study, June 4, 2026. We pulled every running Broadway and Off-Broadway show in our database and audited its lottery, rush, and cheap-seat programs — every link verified by our daily sync. Nobody else publishes this table, which is exactly why we did.
The headline numbers
- 102 shows are running right now (30 Broadway, 72 Off-Broadway).
- 65 of them — 64% — have a lottery, rush, or under-35 program. The “Broadway is only for tourists with $300” thing is a myth with good PR.
- Rush tickets run $25–$178, median $43. The $70 outlier knows who it is.
- Published lottery prices run $10–$79, plus Hamilton‘s famous $10 Ham4Ham — still the best deal in the city that isn’t a dollar slice.
- 37 running shows offer nothing. No lottery, no rush, no mercy. Chicago, we see you. You’ve been running since 1996; you can spare a row.
Who actually runs Broadway’s cheap seats
Three platforms control almost all of it. Across the 54 shows with programs:
- TodayTix — 39 programs (digital lotteries and rush, all in the app)
- Telecharge — 14 programs (the Shubert houses; see our Telecharge lottery guide)
- Broadway Direct — 8 programs (the Nederlander houses: Lion King, Aladdin, MJ the Musical, Six, and friends)
- The long tail: Roundabout’s HipTix and rush, Lucky Seat, and two shows still using SocialToaster, a platform named like a breakfast appliance.
Practical upshot: install the TodayTix app, make a Telecharge account, make a Broadway Direct account, and you can enter roughly 90% of every lottery in New York from the couch. Full how-to in How to Win Every Broadway Lottery in 2026.
What are your actual odds?
Producers don’t publish entry counts, so anyone quoting exact odds is improvising. What’s been reported: at peak demand Hamilton drew an estimated 10,000 entries for 46 lottery seats — roughly 1-in-200 to 1-in-400 depending on how many people asked for pairs. Industry estimates for popular lotteries hover around 3–5%. Two things move your odds more than anything: enter every eligible performance (matinees skew emptier), and target shows below the tourist radar — the lottery for a play in previews is a different universe than Wicked on a Saturday night.
The full table: every running show, October 2026
Sorted by Broadway first, then alphabetical. Prices shown where the program publishes one. Links go straight to the entry page — we keep these current daily on our Broadway lottery hub.
The hall of no
Running shows with no lottery, no rush, nothing: Chicago, Masquerade, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Celebrity Autobiography, Jim Henson’s Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock LIVE, Can I Be Frank?, A Walk on the Moon, Small, A Night of Chekhov, A Woman Among Women, Jerome, and Thornton Wilder’s The Emporium. Some are small Off-Broadway houses where every seat counts. Some are Chicago.
Methodology
Data comes from our internal database of every running Broadway and Off-Broadway production (Off-Broadway scope: houses over 100 seats), audited daily against Playbill, TodayTix, Telecharge, and Broadway Direct. Snapshot date: October 19, 2026. Counts will drift as shows open and close — the lottery hub is the living version. If you’re a journalist or researcher and want the raw table, email us; we like spreadsheets more than we should.
Planning a whole trip around a show? There’s plenty more to do — see what’s on in NYC this summer beyond Broadway, then sort out dinner and getting there.
Keep reading
- The cheapest Broadway lotteries right now, ranked by price
- The Off-Broadway Lotteries Nobody Enters
- Free Shakespeare in the Park 2026: All Four Ways In
- Broadway Week Is Back: All 25 Shows, and When the Lottery Still Beats Half Price
