Here are 101 funny, clean Christmas jokes for kids, grown-ups and everyone groaning in between. They're sorted into Santa, reindeer, elf and snowman jokes, dad jokes and puns, knock-knocks and a few for the office party. Tap a joke to see the punchline, or press the joke machine for a random one with a drumroll.
Updated by the Hey Santa elves
Pick a kind of joke, press the big red button and wait for the drumroll.
101 jokes are loaded and the drummer is ready.
Pick Knock-knock and you get to say "Who's there?" yourself.
Short, silly and safe for the youngest listener at the table. Read the question out loud, wait a beat and let them guess. Most children start to understand jokes with double meanings at about 6 or 7, so puns land best from first grade up. Younger kids laugh at the silly picture instead, a cat on the beach or a mummy in wrapping paper, and that counts too.
Sandy Claws.
It kept dropping its needles.
Merry Christmas to ewe!
Don't worry, I've got you covered.
He was feeling a little crummy.
Orna-mints.
A mistle-toad.
All the wrapping.
I'm just hanging around.
Because it's in Decem-brrr.
A cookie sheet.
It was already stuffed.
It had a one-of-a-kind act.
They were the brightest in the class.
Chimneys, cookies and one very long night of work. The elves tell these when Santa is out of earshot. He has heard every one of them, and the story goes that he still laughs at the karate one.
Because it soots him.
Santa Pause.
He has a black belt.
A hoe, hoe, hoe.
He keeps a log.
Santa Jaws.
Looks like rain, dear.
Nothing. It was on the house.
Saint Nickel-less.
Santa walking backward.
Ready, set, ho!
Peanut butter and jolly.
He wanted to see time fly.
In the 1823 poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas," Santa's sleigh had eight reindeer: Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Dunder and Blixem. The last two names came from an old Dutch exclamation meaning thunder and lightning, and later printings changed them to Donder and Blitzen. Rudolph arrived in 1939, in a booklet Robert L. May wrote for the Montgomery Ward store chain. Meet all of Santa's reindeer, then try these on them.
Horn-aments.
Rude-olph.
Because every single buck is deer to him.
This one's going to sleigh you.
A cari-boo.
He didn't want to be recognized.
Dancer. Prancer says it's a tie.
Anything you like. He can't hear you.
Truth or deer.
Oh, deer!
He always makes a dash for it.
Elves build the toys, wrap the gifts and, according to North Pole legend, tell the worst puns in the Arctic. Find your elf name first, then tell these in character. One of them is about the candy cane line; for the real story behind the stripes, read the history of the candy cane.
The elf-abet.
Their hats have bells on them.
He has a real gift for it.
Wrap.
Elf-ies.
Elfish.
Their gnome-work.
They elf themselves.
Tape it easy.
It was driving him round the bend.
They're always wrapped up in their work.
Snowman jokes hold up in any weather, which is more than snowmen can say. Every one of these is clean and carrot-approved.
Iceberg-ers.
A puddle.
Chill-dren.
In a snowbank.
On an icicle.
A meltdown.
Do you smell carrots?
They know how to break the ice.
Sun-day.
He was feeling a little flaky.
Because Frost bites.
They stay cool under pressure.
A dad joke is a clean joke whose punchline is usually a pun you can see coming from across the room. Merriam-Webster added "dad joke" to its dictionary in September 2019 and says these jokes are usually judged "endearingly corny or unfunny." You don't need to be a dad to tell these Christmas puns. You just need to wait for the groan.
You can't beat it.
Its days are numbered.
It's Christmas, Eve!
Spruce Lee.
It had the drumsticks.
It was a dim idea.
It was being knotty.
Nice gnawing you.
Fir-well. I'll be pining for you.
They got 24 days.
He wanted cold, hard cash.
But it just doesn't work.
It needed a trim.
One person knocks, the other asks "Who's there?", and the pun lands on the second "who." Knock-knock jokes became a craze across the United States in 1936, when newspapers called them the new favorite parlor game. They work best out loud, so try them in the car, at dinner or in the joke machine above, which lets you say "Who's there?" yourself.
Mary Christmas, and a happy New Year!
Snow use. I forgot my key again.
Elf me carry these presents. They're heavy!
Doughnut open anything until Christmas morning!
Hannah partridge in a pear tree!
Freeze a jolly good fellow!
Rabbit up nicely. It's a present!
Alaska Santa if there's room on the sleigh.
Tree more sleeps until Christmas!
Hmm. Your Santa impression needs some work.
Water you doing up so late? It's Christmas Eve. Go to sleep!
HO HO HO!
Yule find out on Christmas morning.
Pizza on Earth!
Wry, clean jokes for the office party and dinner with the in-laws. You can tell any of them in front of your boss. Whether your boss laughs is another matter.
Best performance review I've had all year.
Now I just have to remember where I hid them.
The three saddest words a grown-up can read at 6 a.m. on Christmas morning.
"I know you, but not that well."
They bought something from "customers also viewed."
I've been in the family for nine years.
This year I started on December 23, which is very early for me.
It's recycling with nicer paper.
At this point it's just Regular Santa.
Second place.
I can't get to the post office before it closes.
It's the 40-message group chat to pick a date for the gift exchange.
Then someone comes home with a nine-foot tree.
Timing does most of the work. Say the setup clearly, then stop and count two beats in your head. That pause is your drumroll. It gives the listener a moment to guess, and the guess is half the fun.
Want a whole evening of it? Pair the jokes with Christmas trivia questions and let the losing team tell the next joke.
Some of the blame goes to a London candy maker. Tom Smith sold sweets and wedding cakes in Clerkenwell in the 1840s. On a trip to Paris he saw French bonbons, sugared almonds twisted in paper, and back home he started tucking small love mottos inside the wrappers. London's V&A museum says he patented his first cracker device in 1847 and, in the 1860s, perfected the snap that bangs when two people pull a cracker.
Later, writers were hired to compose snappy lines for crackers. A box of Tom Smith crackers from 1927 came with headdresses, musical toys, fake jewelry and "quips and jokes." Crackers still hold a paper hat, a small gift and a joke today.
The rest comes down to who is listening. A Christmas joke has to work for a 6-year-old and a grandparent at the same table, so it has to be clean and quick. Clean and quick usually means a pun. So corny is the point.
Santa likes a good joke. On a live video call with Santa, he listens and answers out loud, so you can try your best one from this page and hear what he makes of it. Then ask him for one of his. He keeps his jokes short and clean, like these.
Kids can tell him the snowman joke they've practiced all week. Grown-ups can test the office-party material on someone who has heard every Christmas joke there is. The call runs in your browser on a phone, tablet or computer with no app, and you need a microphone, not a camera. It's $1 a minute.
This Santa is an AI video character who talks in real time. Here's how an AI Santa works, and here's how a call with Santa works from start to finish.
It depends on who is listening. For kids, the elves' favorite is "Why are elves terrible at hide-and-seek? Their hats have bells on them." For grown-ups, try "I wore my normal sweater to an ugly sweater party. Second place." Press the joke machine a few times to find your own.
One-liners need no setup and suit a meeting or a card: "Never trust an advent calendar. Its days are numbered." Every joke in the grown-ups section is clean and safe to tell in front of your boss.
A short pun fits best. "What do sheep say in December? Merry Christmas to ewe!" works well next to a sheep doodle. Use Save as a card in the joke machine to turn any joke into a picture you can print or send.
Yes, once they know their line is "Who's there?" Start with a simple one, like Snow. Snow who? Snow use, I forgot my key. The joke machine lets kids press the "Who's there?" button themselves.
Yes. Santa listens and answers live, so tell him one and then ask for one back. He tells short, clean Christmas jokes. Start a call with Santa on a phone, tablet or computer.
Please do. Copy any joke from the joke machine, save it as a picture card, or send a link. Each joke has its own link, so the person you send it to lands right on it.
Live videoA live video call with Santa, right in your browser. Kids and grown-ups both call. $1 a minute.
Call Santa
Christmas trivia64 Christmas trivia questions and answers, plus a quiz game.
Elf name generatorFind your Christmas elf name and your job in Santa's workshop.AI SantaWhat an AI Santa is, how he works, and sample answers to try.
Candy cane historyWho invented the candy cane, how it's made, and stripe your own.