Christmas Countdown
A live countdown to Christmas Day, ticking down in your own time zone. Once Christmas has been and gone, it rolls straight on to next year by itself.
Loading the live countdown…
How many days until Christmas?
The clock above reads your device's own date and time, then counts down to midnight at the start of December 25. That means the number you see is correct wherever you are, whether that is New York, London, Toronto, Sydney or Berlin, without picking a country first. The seconds tick in real time, so you can leave the page open and watch it run.
Because the date is calculated rather than stored, this page never goes stale. The moment Christmas Day ends, the countdown resets and starts counting toward the following December 25 on its own. On Christmas Day itself you get a short greeting along with the countdown to next year.
Planning backwards from December 25
Most of the Christmas jobs people forget are the ones with their own quiet deadlines. Working back from the big day usually looks something like this:
- Eight weeks out: agree who is buying for whom. If you are doing a gift exchange, run the Secret Santa generator early so everybody has time to shop.
- Six weeks out: set the overall spending limit with the Christmas gift budget calculator, before the sales tempt you into overspending.
- Four weeks out: post cards and parcels overseas. Surface mail deadlines are earlier than most people expect.
- Three weeks out: put the tree up. The Christmas lights calculator tells you how many sets you need before you start unravelling last year's tangle.
- One week out: order fresh food, and check roasting times with the turkey cooking time calculator.
- Christmas Eve: get the bird out of the freezer in good time. A large frozen turkey can need three or four days in the refrigerator to thaw safely.
Christmas dates around the world
December 25 is the main day of celebration in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and most of Europe. In Germany, the Netherlands and much of Scandinavia the main family meal is on Christmas Eve, December 24, while the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Ireland keep December 26 as Boxing Day or St Stephen's Day. The countdown above always targets December 25, which is the date most gift and travel deadlines are built around.
Christmas falls on a different weekday most years because a normal year is 365 days, one more than 52 whole weeks, so the date moves forward one weekday each year and two after a leap year. The countdown shows you which day of the week it lands on next.
Frequently asked questions
How many days until Christmas?
The live counter at the top of this page shows the exact number of days, hours, minutes and seconds until December 25, calculated from the clock on your own device.
Does the countdown work for next year too?
Yes. As soon as Christmas Day has passed the countdown automatically targets December 25 of the following year. No part of the date is fixed in the page, so it keeps working indefinitely.
Which time zone does the countdown use?
Your own. The countdown reads the local time from your phone, tablet or computer and counts to midnight at the start of Christmas Day in that time zone.
What happens on Christmas Day itself?
The page shows a short Christmas greeting and switches the counter to next year, so it always has something to count toward.
How many sleeps until Christmas?
The sleeps figure under the counter is the number of whole days left, which is the version most children mean when they ask.