Where to get a letter from Santa this year

There are more ways to get a letter from Santa than most parents expect: some free, some lovely, some closed by the second week of December. Here's the honest tour of every kind of option, fastest first. (Full disclosure: option one is us.)

1. Jolly Santa Letters: instant, free, print at home

Make a personalized letter online (festive stationery, hand-penned Santa handwriting, your child's details woven in) and print it at home minutes later, free. Because nothing ships, there's no deadline: it works the same on December 2 and December 24. Keepsake upgrades are optional: a matching envelope and Official Nice List certificate for $4.99, or a letter written by Santa’s helpers with the $12.99 Santa’s Workshop pack.

Best for: tonight, the last-minute letter from Santa crowd, and anyone who'd rather not pay for postage and waiting.

2. The write-it-yourself postmark: genuine stamping, nearly free

The classic: write Santa's reply yourself, mail it off through a postmark program with postage, and it comes back stamped from the North Pole. The postmark is genuine and the price is only postage, but you do the writing, and prepared replies need to be in the mail before the program’s current cutoff, allowing time for the round trip. Timing lives in our deadlines guide.

Best for: postmark collectors who have time for the round trip.

3. Letters to Santa: the giving direction

Worth knowing about, though it's the other direction: seasonal letter-adoption programs publish children's letters to Santa so generous adopters can answer them with gifts. They don't send your child a letter from Santa: they're how your family can play Santa for someone else's.

Best for: families who want to give, not receive.

4. Mail-order letter services: printed and posted for you

A whole cottage industry mails printed letters to your door, from plain personalized letters to boxed sets with extras such as certificates or reindeer food. Prices, quality, personalization, delivery areas, and cutoffs vary widely. Check the current total with shipping and the delivery estimate for your address before you pay.

Best for: a mailed keepsake without lifting a pen, ordered early.

5. Santa video and call apps: screens, not paper

The app stores do personalized Santa videos and calls brilliantly; letters aren't the main event there. If you want paper in a stocking, pair a screen moment with a printed letter from elsewhere on this list. (Prefer the phone to ring at your house? A personal call from Santa is an optional $7.99 purchase here. It plays a personalized, prerecorded message.)

Best for: a screen moment alongside (not instead of) a keepsake letter.

6. Handmade shops: made to order and variable

Independent sellers on handmade marketplaces offer printable letters, mailed letters, and larger gift packages. Check the current price, read recent reviews, confirm personalization is included, and mind each shop's own deadline.

Best for: a specific aesthetic you've fallen for, with time to vet the shop.

7. Free printable templates: the do-it-yourself route

Design sites and printables blogs offer free letter templates: you download a design, write the words yourself, and wrestle the layout. Free and immediate, but the wording, fonts, and printing are all on you. (If you'd rather skip the wrestling, option one fills in the words for you, also free.)

Best for: confident DIYers who enjoy the crafting as much as the result.

Choosing at a glance

Prices and cutoffs vary by service, destination, and season. Check the current instructions and delivery estimate before you order. See the steps for each route in how to get a letter from Santa.

Where to post a letter to Santa (the other direction)

Looking for where to send your child’s own letter to Santa? That is the opposite journey from the rest of this page, and that one goes through the mail. Many national postal services run a seasonal Santa address or reply program: check the current season’s instructions for the address, the postage, and whether a reply comes back. Some are write-it-yourself, where you supply Santa’s reply (option two above); some are the gift-adoption kind (option three), which do not send a letter back. Timing matters most, so read when to mail a letter to Santa before you post. And if a reply is what you are really after, option one prints one tonight.

Common questions