Christmas Riddles and Brain Teasers With Answers
Here are 60 Christmas riddles and brain teasers with answers, each answer on its own line so you can read the riddle aloud and let everyone guess first. They run from easy Christmas riddles for kids to funny puns, tricky Christmas riddles for adults, logic brain teasers, word-connection puzzles and anagrams.
Most lists online are one long scroll. This one is sorted by what kind of thinking each riddle needs, so you can pick the right set for the table: easy ones while the youngest are still awake, pun riddles for groans, and the brain teasers once the dishes are done. Each of the trickier ones has a short note on why it catches people out.
Christmas Riddles for Kids
These work for roughly ages 5 to 10. Read each one slowly, then give a full minute before you reveal anything.
1. I'm green all year, but in December I come indoors, wear lights and stand in your living room. What am I?
Answer: A Christmas tree.
2. What has a foot but no leg, and gets filled once a year?
Answer: A stocking.
3. What do you call a snowman in July?
Answer: A puddle.
4. What falls all winter but never gets hurt?
Answer: Snow.
5. What has lots of needles but can't sew?
Answer: A Christmas tree.
6. What kind of ball doesn't bounce?
Answer: A snowball. (A glass ornament ball works too.)
7. What goes up a chimney down, but can't come down a chimney up?
Answer: An umbrella. It fits up the chimney when it's closed ("down"), but not when it's open ("up").
8. I come once a year with a sack on my back. I go down and up, but never take the stairs. Who am I?
Answer: Santa Claus, going down and up the chimney.
9. What do snowmen eat for breakfast?
Answer: Snowflakes.
10. What do elves learn in school?
Answer: The elf-abet.
11. I'm wrapped up tight with a bow on my head. Everyone wants to open me, but they have to wait. What am I?
Answer: A present.
12. What do you call a reindeer with no eyes?
Answer: No idea. ("No-eye deer.")
Funny Christmas Riddles
These are pun riddles. Nobody solves them by logic; the fun is the groan when the answer lands. They suit a mixed-age table because the adults enjoy being outraged by them.
13. What do you call a reindeer with no eyes and no legs?
Answer: Still no idea.
14. Why does Santa go down the chimney?
Answer: Because it soots him.
15. What is an elf's favorite kind of music?
Answer: Wrap.
16. What do you call a cat on the beach at Christmas?
Answer: Sandy Claws.
17. What do you call people who are afraid of Santa?
Answer: Claus-trophobic.
18. Why was the Christmas tree bad at knitting?
Answer: It kept dropping its needles.
19. What is a Christmas tree's favorite candy?
Answer: Orna-mints.
20. What do you get when you cross a snowman with a vampire?
Answer: Frostbite.
21. What did the bald man say when he got a comb for Christmas?
Answer: "I'll never part with it."
22. What is the difference between the Christmas alphabet and the ordinary alphabet?
Answer: The Christmas alphabet has Noel. ("No L.")
Christmas Riddles for Adults
These need more than a pun. Each one leans on an assumption you make without noticing, the same trap our hard riddles are built around.
23. Mr. and Mrs. Claus have six daughters, and each daughter has one brother. How many people are in the Claus family?
Answer: Nine: the two parents, six daughters and one son. The daughters all share the same brother.
Why it's tricky: "Each daughter has one brother" sounds like six brothers.
24. What comes at the end of Christmas Day?
Answer: The letter Y.
Why it's tricky: You think about the evening, not the spelling.
25. A man stood outside in the snow on Christmas Eve for three hours without a hat or hood, and not one hair on his head got wet. How?
Answer: He's bald.
Why it's tricky: You picture hair and look for something that kept it dry.
26. One of Santa's reindeer can be seen in the night sky. Which one?
Answer: Comet.
Why it's tricky: You search the sky for a reindeer instead of the list of names for something in the sky.
27. What kind of key can't open a lock but often turns up on the holiday table?
Answer: A turkey.
Why it's tricky: "Key" points you at metal objects.
28. What did Adam say on December 24?
Answer: "It's Christmas, Eve!"
Why it's tricky: You read "Eve" as a date, not a person.
29. An elf worked for twelve days straight without sleep before Christmas, yet he never felt tired. How?
Answer: He worked days and slept at night.
Why it's tricky: "Twelve days straight" sounds like twelve days and nights.
30. Why is Christmas like a day at the office?
Answer: You do all the work, and the guy in the red suit gets the credit.
31. What do you call Santa's helpers?
Answer: Subordinate Clauses.
Why it's tricky: It only works if you remember grammar class.
32. What do you call Santa when he's run out of money?
Answer: Saint Nickel-less.
Christmas Brain Teasers With Answers
These are logic and number problems with a holiday wrapper. The quick answer is usually wrong, so make everyone commit to a number on paper before anyone checks it.
33. In the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas," the singer receives a new set of gifts each day: one gift on day one, three on day two (two turtle doves and a partridge), and so on. How many gifts arrive across all twelve days?
Answer: 364. Day n brings 1 + 2 + ... + n gifts, and those twelve totals add up to 364, one for every day of the year except one.
Why it's tricky: Most people count only the new gifts (78) and forget each day repeats all the earlier ones.
34. Christmas Day falls on a Monday. What day of the week is New Year's Day?
Answer: Monday. January 1 is exactly seven days after December 25.
35. Santa has nine reindeer. Each reindeer has four legs and Santa has two. How many legs are pulling the sleigh?
Answer: 36. Santa rides; he doesn't pull.
Why it's tricky: The question hands you Santa's legs so you'll add them.
36. A woman was born on December 25, yet her birthday is always in summer. How?
Answer: She lives in the Southern Hemisphere, where December is summer.
37. Eight people sit around a round dinner table. Each person pulls one Christmas cracker with the neighbor on their left and one with the neighbor on their right. How many crackers are pulled?
Answer: 8. Every cracker is shared by two people, so 8 people times 2 crackers, divided by 2.
Why it's tricky: 16 comes out first because you count each cracker twice.
38. At a party, every one of 10 guests gives a holiday card to every other guest. How many cards change hands?
Answer: 90. Each guest gives 9 cards, and 10 times 9 is 90. (Unlike handshakes, a card from Ana to Ben and one from Ben to Ana are two cards.)
39. Three boxes under the tree are labeled "Candy Canes," "Gingerbread" and "Mixed." Every label is wrong. You may take out one item from one box without looking inside. How do you relabel all three?
Answer: Take an item from the box labeled "Mixed." Its label is wrong, so it holds only one kind. If you pull a candy cane, it's the candy cane box. The box labeled "Gingerbread" can't be gingerbread and can't be candy canes, so it's mixed. The box labeled "Candy Canes" holds the gingerbread.
Why it's tricky: Picking from either single-item box tells you almost nothing.
40. A drawer holds 6 red gloves and 6 green gloves for the left hand, and the same for the right, all jumbled. In the dark, how many gloves must you take out to be sure of a wearable pair: one left and one right of the same color?
Answer: 13. You could draw all 12 left gloves first. The 13th must be a right glove, and both colors of left glove are already in your hand.
Why it's tricky: With socks, three would do. Gloves add a second condition.
Christmas Word Connections
Each set of three words links to one hidden word, which forms a compound or phrase with all three. For example, cottage, cake and swiss all connect to cheese. Give yourself 30 seconds per set.
41. tree, card, carol
Answer: Christmas (Christmas tree, Christmas card, Christmas carol)
42. ball, flake, man
Answer: Snow (snowball, snowflake, snowman)
43. bread, ale, snap
Answer: Ginger (gingerbread, ginger ale, gingersnap)
44. cane, corn, apple
Answer: Candy (candy cane, candy corn, candy apple)
45. mistle, tip, big
Answer: Toe (mistletoe, tiptoe, big toe)
46. sleigh, door, blue
Answer: Bell (sleigh bell, doorbell, bluebell)
47. nut, fire, Christmas
Answer: Cracker (nutcracker, firecracker, Christmas cracker)
48. fruit, cup, pound
Answer: Cake (fruitcake, cupcake, pound cake)
49. silent, holy, mid
Answer: Night (Silent Night, holy night, midnight)
50. holly, drift, fire
Answer: Wood (Hollywood, driftwood, firewood)
51. wish, black, guest
Answer: List (wish list, blacklist, guest list)
52. pole, star, east
Answer: North (North Pole, North Star, northeast)
The hard part is that each cue word drags in its own obvious partner first: "holly" suggests "berry," not "wood." Solving means letting that first association go and testing the other two words against each new candidate.
Christmas Anagram Riddles
Rearrange the letters of the Christmas word to make a new word that fits the clue.
53. Rearrange NOEL to get a word meaning "by itself."
Answer: LONE.
54. Rearrange STAR to get a group of rodents.
Answer: RATS.
55. Rearrange TINSEL to get a word that describes the night in the carol.
Answer: SILENT. (LISTEN works with the same letters, too.)
56. Rearrange ANGEL to get the space between two lines that meet.
Answer: ANGLE.
57. Rearrange CAROLS to get something that grows on a reef.
Answer: CORALS.
58. Rearrange SANTA to get his opposite.
Answer: SATAN.
Two Last Christmas Riddles
59. I appear once in Santa, twice in snowmen and never in sleigh. What am I?
Answer: The letter N.
60. The more of me there is under the tree, the less you can see of the floor. Then on one morning, I disappear in minutes and leave a mess behind. What am I?
Answer: Wrapping paper.
How to Use These Christmas Riddles
At the dinner table. Read one riddle between courses. Everyone writes an answer on a napkin and reveals at the same time, so the quickest talker doesn't give it away. Give 60 seconds for kids' riddles and 2 minutes for brain teasers.
As a family quiz. Split into two teams, pick ten riddles from mixed sections and score one point per correct answer. Use riddles 33 to 40 as a tiebreaker round.
In a classroom. The kids' riddles and word connections make a 5-minute warm-up before winter break. Put one word-connection set on the board each morning in December and reveal the answer at the end of the day.
For a gift exchange. Tape a riddle to each present. The recipient has to solve it, or get help from the table, before opening it.
When someone's stuck. For the brain teasers, ask them to say what they're assuming out loud ("Santa pulls the sleigh," "each daughter has her own brother"). Dropping one assumption at a time usually breaks the riddle open.
Keep Practicing After the Holidays
A riddle works only once: after you know the answer, it's used up. The word-connection puzzles above are different, because the format keeps working with new words.
They come from the Remote Associates Test, and our Speed Connections drill is built on it. You see three cue words and find the one word that connects them, with up to three guesses per triad, and a correct answer moves you to the next one until the timer runs out. It trains the same move as riddles 41 to 52: dropping a word's first meaning to find one that fits everything. Our guide to the Remote Associates Test explains where the format came from, and the word association game has more ways to play with linked words as a group.
If the adults at your table liked the trick questions, the lateral thinking puzzles are longer scenario riddles that take a few rounds of yes-or-no questions to crack.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good Christmas riddle for adults? Try "Mr. and Mrs. Claus have six daughters, and each daughter has one brother. How many people are in the family?" The answer is nine, because all six daughters share one brother. Riddles 23 to 32 are all pitched at adults.
What are some easy Christmas riddles for kids? "What do you call a snowman in July?" (a puddle) and "What has a foot but no leg, and gets filled once a year?" (a stocking) work for young children. Riddles 1 to 12 are written for roughly ages 5 to 10.
What is the difference between a Christmas riddle and a Christmas brain teaser? A riddle usually turns on language: a pun, a double meaning or a description that fits something unexpected. A brain teaser is a logic or number problem, such as counting the gifts in "The Twelve Days of Christmas." This list includes both.
How many gifts are in "The Twelve Days of Christmas"? 364 in total. Each day repeats all the earlier gifts, so day twelve alone brings 78, and the twelve daily totals add up to 364.
How do you play Christmas riddles as a party game? Read a riddle aloud, give everyone a set time to write an answer privately, then reveal together and score a point for each correct answer. Mixing easy, funny and tricky riddles keeps every age in the game.
Are riddles good for your brain? Riddles practice a specific skill: noticing an assumption or a word's first meaning and switching to another one. Treat them as practice for that skill rather than a general brain upgrade, and add timed exercises with fresh problems if you want to keep training it.
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