Christmas scavenger hunt: clues you can print and run tonight

A Christmas scavenger hunt works because it turns the part of the day kids dread, waiting, into the part they remember. This page is one complete hunt you can run tonight: twelve riddle cards that lead around your house to a mug of hot chocolate and the last gift, with the hiding spots and answers folded away for you. Below it are a printable find-it list, versions for ages 3 to 5 and 10 to 13, a hunt for adults, a Christmas lights hunt for the car, prize ideas and the setup that stops it falling flat.

Everything here is original and free to print. You need paper, a pen and about twenty minutes to hide the cards. No app, no shopping trip, and no clue that depends on a chimney: every answer is something most homes have.

• Set it up
• The full hunt
• By age
• Printable list
• For adults
• Lights hunt
• Prizes
• On phones

How to set up a Christmas scavenger hunt in 20 minutes

1. Choose the prize and where it waits. The hunt below ends in the kitchen, but any last stop works. Decide it first, then write backwards from it.
2. Write each riddle on its own card. Index cards, or a sheet of paper cut in twelve. Number them in the corner and write the answer in pencil on the back of the one before it, so you never lose track of which card sits where.
3. Hide the cards in order, then walk the trail yourself. It takes three minutes and finds the card the dog moved.
4. Hand the first card over and say the rules once. Walk, don't run. Everyone reads the clue out loud. Put every card back where you found it, unless the card says to take it.
5. Keep a one-word hint for every clue. "Green" or "cold" or "paper" is usually enough. A hunt a child can't finish is worse than one that's too easy.
6. Never score speed. The point is the trail, not a stopwatch. Kids who race trip over cats and toys, and the slowest reader should never come last.

Safety, in one line each: nothing above shoulder height and nothing that needs a chair, nothing near a hot stove or an open fire, no candles lit near cards, and any clue can be skipped with a hint from you.

The full hunt: Hot Chocolate Trail

Twelve riddle cards for ages 6 to 9, about 25 minutes for a pair of kids. The answer to each riddle is where you hide the next card. Card 1 you hand over. Each card has a letter in bold: the kids write it down, and after card 12 the letters spell the prize.

Print the 12 cards

Answers and where to hide each card (for the host only)

1. The Christmas tree. Hide card 2 under the lowest branch.
2. A Christmas stocking. Hide card 3 inside it.
3. The wreath on the inside of the front door. Hide card 4 behind it.
4. A cookie tin. Hide card 5 under the lid.
5. An empty wrapping paper tube. Hide card 6 rolled up inside.
6. The string lights, or their storage box. Hide card 7 in the box.
7. A snow globe. Hide card 8 underneath it. No snow globe? Use any Christmas decoration on a shelf.
8. The refrigerator. Hide card 9 behind the milk. Tape it to the back of the carton if you want it to stay put.
9. Tape. Hide card 10 in the junk drawer, with the tape.
10. A book. Hide card 11 in a Christmas book, or any book on the pile.
11. The blanket on the couch. Hide card 12 in its folds.
12. The kitchen, where the prize and a pan of hot chocolate wait. The twelve letters spell HOT CHOCOLATE.

If your home lacks a spot, keep the riddle and swap the answer: any lidded container for the cookie tin, any shelf ornament for the snow globe.

When the kids reach the kitchen and read HOT CHOCOLATE aloud, the hunt has its own ending: the mugs are already out. Put the last gift beside them, or hand it over at the table.

Christmas scavenger hunt ideas by age

The trail above is pitched at 6 to 9. Here is how to shift it for everyone else, with real examples, not just "make it harder".

Ages 3 to 5	Six cards, not twelve, and no reading: draw the answer on each card (a tree, a stocking, a wreath, a tin, the fridge, a mug). A grown-up goes with them and the card is the picture. Skip the letters and give a sticker at every stop. Keep every spot at floor level and keep it under ten minutes.
Ages 6 to 9	The hunt above as written. If a child reads slowly, let a sibling read the riddle and the slower reader find the spot.
Ages 10 to 13	Swap the plain riddles for codes. Write the answer in numbers, where A is 1 and Z is 26: 20-18-5-5 is TREE, 19-20-15-3-11-9-14-7 is STOCKING, 2-15-15-11-19-8-5-12-6 is BOOKSHELF. Or write each answer backwards (ENIL is LINE). Keep the HOT CHOCOLATE letters as the final puzzle, and hide the first letter somewhere they have to work out themselves.
Teens	Skip the paper trail and run it as a team photo hunt with the list below: two teams, 45 minutes, a photo per find, and the room votes on the best one. Add a trade-up item: start with a candy cane and see what each team can fairly swap it for.
Mixed ages	Pair each young child with an older one, give each pair a different color of card, and run two trails with the same clues in a different order so the pairs never follow each other.

Printable Christmas scavenger hunt list: find it, tick it

A list hunt needs no hiding at all. Hand out the list, set a timer for 30 minutes, and teams find or photograph as many as they can. One point an item, two for anything the room votes best. Everything on it is indoors and easy to find in December.

Print the list

Christmas scavenger hunt for adults

Adults don't want a treasure trail for ten-year-olds, but they will happily work a hunt with dry clues and a gift at the end. Two versions that work at a house party or a family gathering.

Gift swap hunt

Instead of passing parcels around the circle, hide each gift and give every guest a riddle about where theirs is. Write one clue per person, about something they would only get if they know the house: "Two cold ones are waiting for you where the milk lives" for the refrigerator, "Don't sit down, your gift is under the thing you sit on" for the couch cushion, "It's with the thing that has the last word at every meal" for the salt shaker. Put names on the cards, so nobody takes the wrong gift.

Team photo hunt

Teams of three or four, 45 minutes, phones out. Ten items that need a team, not a person, with a point for each and two for the funniest:

1. The whole team in one frame as the cast of a Christmas movie poster.
2. The ugliest sweater at the party, with the wearer's permission.
3. A gift bow, worn as a hat, on a person who didn't plan on it.
4. The oldest ornament in the house, and the story behind it.
5. A nativity or a snow scene with something in it that doesn't belong.
6. A Christmas song title written in the steam on a window, or in flour on a plate.
7. Someone from another team who will say their best "Ho ho ho" on camera.
8. Three things that make a sound when shaken.
9. A pyramid of three wrapped gifts, no one touching it except to place the top one.
10. A selfie of the whole team with the tree behind you.

Hosting for work? A list hunt inside the office suits it, and our office scavenger hunt list is already written. For a Christmas quiz that runs on phones, see Christmas trivia questions and answers.

A Christmas lights scavenger hunt for the car or a walk

The easiest hunt of the season needs no hiding and no clues. Take a drive or a walk after dark through the neighborhood, hand out the list and let everyone spot what's on the houses. A passenger writes the tally. The driver doesn't take part, and on foot, stay on the sidewalk.

1. A house with only white lights.
2. A house with only one color of lights.
3. An inflatable of any kind.
4. A reindeer, lit up.
5. A star on top of a tree.
6. A wreath on a door.
7. A nativity scene.
8. Candy cane markers lining a path.
9. A house with lights on a bush, not the roof.
10. A snowman in any form.
11. Lights that blink or change color.
12. A tree you can see through a window.

Score a point per spot, and two for the best house of the night. No one gets out of the car for a closer look, and no one steps onto a lawn: you are looking, not visiting.

Christmas scavenger hunt prizes that aren't just candy

• The trail's own ending. A mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows at the last stop, which is what the Hot Chocolate Trail gives. It costs a few cents a kid.
• A new ornament each. Hide one at the last stop with the child's name on it. It goes on the tree this year and comes out every year after.
• Something to do together. A card that says "Pick the movie tonight" or "Stay up 30 minutes later" or "Choose tomorrow's breakfast".
• A chocolate coin per card. Each child finds one at every stop, so there is no "last place" and no one empties the trail.
• For adults: a small gift-wrapped treat at the final spot, or the pick of the next gift in a swap.

Give every team a prize. The point of a Christmas hunt is that it's shared, not won.

When the hunt is over: Christmas puzzles on your phone

If the clue-solving was the best bit, there is more of it every day and it is all free. The riddle of the day sets three new riddles every morning, easy to hard, answered on a brass cylinder lock you spin. The daily puzzles add a word grid, a whodunit, a daily quiz and more. For riddles to write into your own cards, there are 60 riddles with answers, and for the general version of this page, scavenger hunt ideas with clues ready to use.

Our advent case, The Missing Star of Cicada Cove, is built to open one door a day from December 1, 2026: a puzzle behind each door, with free hints and a mystery to solve by Christmas Eve.

For the evening after the kids are in bed, play a game on everyone's phones, with nothing to download: Who Knows Ya Best? has family and mates packs for the question "how well do you know me", and Which Would Ya? is a free this or that game for 2 to 20 phones. More in party games on your phones.

Updated 4 November 2026.