What to write in a Christmas card, with 40 examples

You have a stack of cards, a pen and twenty names. Here is how to write something better than "Merry Christmas, love from" in a minute or two each, with forty examples to adapt.

The card is still worth writing

The Christmas card is a British invention. In 1843 Henry Cole, later the first director of what became the V&A, asked his friend the artist John Callcott Horsley to design a card he could send instead of answering every letter by hand. About 1,000 were printed and sold at a shilling each, which was expensive, and the venture was judged a commercial flop. The idea caught on anyway.

It has lasted. The Greeting Card Association reported that the UK public bought around 800 million single cards in 2023, worth £1.51 billion, and that Christmas singles held steady at 11.7 percent of the value of all card sales, before the boxes and packs most of us buy for Christmas are even counted. Most of those cards will be read in a few seconds. A few will be kept. The difference is usually one or two sentences.

Research suggests those sentences matter more than we think. In experiments published in Psychological Science in 2018, Amit Kumar and Nicholas Epley found that people writing notes of thanks underestimated how pleased the recipients would be and overestimated how awkward they would feel. Julian Givi and Jeff Galak, in the Journal of Consumer Psychology in 2017, found that recipients often prefer sentimental gifts more than givers expect. A card is the smallest sentimental gift there is.

A simple formula

Three short sentences is plenty. Sign with the names they know you by, and for a big family or a busy office, add your surname or team so they know which Sam you are.

What to avoid

Forty Christmas card messages

For family

For friends

For colleagues and clients

For people far away, or a hard year

When a card isn't quite enough

Some people deserve more than a card but have everything they need: a parent, a grandparent, a friend overseas. A few longer options cost little and take an evening. Write a proper letter instead of a card, and include one memory from each decade you have known them. Put together a short photo book of the year. Or have a story written with them as the hero: Novellum writes a short novel from a brief about the person, delivered by email on Christmas morning, from $2.99. It is written by AI, and you read page one free first.

Write them a Christmas story

More ideas

Sources

Facts checked on 20 October 2026.

Questions? Write to us. Novellum books are written by AI, for one reader only.