Christmas gifts for colleagues: 12 ideas and what to spend

Buying for a work colleague is its own strange category of shopping. You know what they drink and roughly nothing else. You have a budget you haven't agreed with anyone. And unlike family, you'll have to sit near them in January.

Here's what to buy, what people actually spend, and the one bit of the tax question that applies to you (spoiler: almost none of it).

Quick answer: most UK offices land between £10 and £20 for a colleague at Christmas, and £5 to £15 for Secret Santa. Buy consumable over decorative, because a colleague you don't know well has nowhere to put an ornament. And if you're buying with your own money, it's a personal gift between two people, so there's no tax and nothing to report, whatever you spend.

What do you actually spend on a colleague?

There's no rule, which is exactly why everyone finds it stressful. The working norms in UK offices:

• A named colleague you work with closely: £10 to £20
• Secret Santa: £5 to £15, set by whoever is organising it
• Your manager: the same as anyone else, or nothing. A gift up the chain can read awkwardly, and a card from the team is usually better
• The whole team: something shared. A tin of biscuits on the desk beats twelve individual afterthoughts

Two unwritten rules worth knowing. Don't significantly outspend the group, because it makes everyone else's gift look thin. And don't make it personal enough to be a comment. A colleague you've spoken to eleven times doesn't want a gift that implies you've been paying close attention.

If your team is doing a proper draw, our office Secret Santa guide covers the rules, the budget and how to draw names without anyone peeking.

12 Christmas gifts for colleagues

Grouped by the colleague, because that's genuinely how this decision gets made. These are all brands on Huggg, and the Huggg 2026 festive range previews from late September with more added weekly.

For the one who runs on coffee

1. Oddkin Christmas coffee. Seasonal beans for the person who arrives with a flask and a grievance about the office machine
2. A coffee shop gift card. Costa, Starbucks, Caffè Nero or Greggs. Unglamorous and quietly one of the most used things on this list

For the one with a sweet tooth

1. Biscuiteers iced biscuits. Hand-iced, properly festive, and they get eaten rather than displayed
2. Hotel Chocolat. The safe answer, and safe is underrated when you've known someone since April
3. Jack and Beyond mince pies. For the colleague who has strong and public opinions about mince pies

For the one who's always cold

1. KOSI London Christmas socks. The joke gift that's also genuinely useful in a British office in December
2. Drowsy sleep masks in festive packaging, for the one who mentions being tired most days

For the one who has been flat out

1. Lumie sunrise alarm. This was the third most-chosen gift across Huggg last Christmas, ahead of every chocolate option, which says something about what people want by December
2. Scentered festive aromatherapy. Small, calming, and it doesn't need shelf space

For the one you don't know at all

1. Virgin Wines. Wine was the single most-chosen gift on Huggg last Christmas, and by some distance
2. Botivo, if you aren't sure they drink. A proper non-alcoholic aperitif rather than a consolation prize
3. A Huggg Gift with Choice. You set the budget, they pick their own thing from 10,000+ options. The honest answer when you genuinely have no idea, and nobody can tell what you spent

The colleague you don't know well is the hard one

Most gift lists skip this and it's the one everybody is actually stuck on.

Two things help. Buy consumable, not decorative, because something to eat or drink disappears politely and an ornament becomes an obligation. And buy for the version of them you've seen at work, not the whole person. You know they live on tea and complain about the walk from the car park. That's enough to go on.

The Huggg redemption data makes the same point from the other direction. Across 477 UK companies gifting last Christmas, recipients chose from 673 different products and 84% picked something outside the ten most popular items. If nobody can reliably guess for their own team, you aren't going to guess for the person two desks over. Letting them choose isn't a cop-out, it's the accurate answer.

Do you pay tax on a Christmas gift from a colleague?

No. This is worth saying plainly, because the whole "Christmas gifts at work" conversation online is really about employers, and the rules get blurred together.

If you buy a colleague a gift with your own money, it's a personal gift between two individuals. It isn't an employment benefit, there's no reporting, no P11D, no £50 limit. Spend what you like.

The £50 trivial benefits threshold people quote applies when the company pays. That matters if your employer is funding the Secret Santa or sending a team gift, and our guide to employee gifts and tax covers it. It has nothing to do with the tenner you spent on biscuits.

This is general information rather than formal tax advice, so check anything specific with your accountant or HMRC.

When you aren't in the same building

Half of this problem used to solve itself when everyone was in one office and you could leave something on a desk.

If your team is spread across homes, sites and shifts, the practical options are a gift that arrives digitally, or collecting a home address from someone you may not know well enough to ask. Most people would rather not ask.

With Huggg the gift is a link, so you send it over Slack, Teams, email or WhatsApp and the recipient adds their own delivery details if they pick something physical. No address list, no awkward message, no parcel sitting in an empty office over the shutdown.

A note on timing

The genuinely time-critical things are advent calendars and anything that needs posting. Advent calendars are no use arriving in December, and Hotel Chocolat's advent stock comes off sale on 20 November.

Everything else, you have more room than you think. But if you're also the person sorting the gifts for the wider team, that's a bigger job and it wants starting now. Our corporate Christmas gift ideas guide has the planning side.

Frequently asked questions

How much should you spend on a colleague at Christmas?

Between £10 and £20 for a colleague you work with closely, and £5 to £15 for Secret Santa. The more useful rule is to match whatever the rest of your team is spending, because significantly outspending the group makes everyone else's gift look thin.

What's a good Christmas gift for a colleague you don't know well?

Something consumable rather than decorative: coffee, chocolate, biscuits, wine or a non-alcoholic alternative. A colleague you barely know has nowhere to put an ornament, but nobody has ever resented being given something nice to eat.

Do you have to pay tax on a Christmas gift from a colleague?

No. A gift bought by one colleague for another with their own money is a personal gift between individuals, not an employment benefit, so there's no tax and nothing to report. The £50 trivial benefits limit only applies when the employer pays.

What should you get a colleague who doesn't drink?

Botivo and similar non-alcoholic aperitifs are a genuine gift rather than a consolation prize. Coffee, tea, chocolate and wellbeing gifts all work too. If you're unsure whether someone drinks, a Huggg Gift with Choice lets them pick and avoids the question entirely.

How do you send a Christmas gift to a remote colleague?

Send it digitally rather than asking for a home address. With Huggg the gift is a link you can send over Slack, Teams, email or WhatsApp, and the recipient adds their own delivery details if they choose something physical.

Keep it small and keep it genuine

The best colleague gift isn't the cleverest one. It's the one that says you noticed they exist, didn't cost them anything to receive, and doesn't need explaining.

Huggg is used by over 2,000 UK businesses for exactly this, with 10,000+ gift options across 700+ brands and nothing for your recipient to log into. If you're the one sorting gifts for the whole team as well, talk to us and we'll help you plan it.