抽奖 (chōu jiǎng) literally means 'to draw (chōu) a prize (jiǎng)' and functions primarily as a verb meaning to participate in or conduct a lottery-style drawing for prizes. The character 抽 conveys the action of selecting something at random—like pulling a ticket from a box—while 奖 refers specifically to a reward, bonus, or prize. Together, they describe the process of randomly selecting winners from a group of participants.

This term is widely used in everyday contexts: shopping malls may hold promotional lotteries, online platforms run 'comment-to-win' draws, and companies give employees chance-based bonuses. It can refer both to the act of drawing (e.g., the host draws the winner) and to participating (e.g., you enter to win). While it can occasionally appear as a noun ('a lottery'), its core grammatical role is verbal—and it’s almost always used in the context of organized, often public or commercial, prize distributions.