Christmas Gift List

How to use the Christmas gift list

1. Add everyone you buy for. One entry per person or household, with a group (family, friends, work or kids), so the office Secret Santa and the neighbours do not get lost among the family.
2. Give each person a budget and jot down ideas as they come up in conversation. The ideas box is for the hint you will have forgotten by December.
3. Add what you buy and what it cost. Each person’s box shows what is spent and what is left; when the spend passes the budget it says “Over budget by” and the amount, in red. The line at the top adds up everyone.
4. Tick as you go: bought, wrapped, given or posted, and thank-you received. The ticks print too, so the paper copy on the fridge says the same as your phone. Children writing their own? Print thank-you cards for each giver.
5. Download the PDF (A4 or US Letter) or a 300 dpi PNG in one of six designs, or switch to Blank to print a list to fill in with a pen.

Questions

Is there a free printable Christmas gift list?

Yes, two kinds. Your own list prints exactly as you filled it in. The blank list is two pages: twelve person boxes (for whom, budget, ideas, three gifts with a cost column, and the four ticks), then a “Stocking fillers” list with columns for the item, who it is for and the cost, and a “Cards to send” list with a tick for each card posted. Both come as a PDF on A4 or US Letter, chosen from your browser’s language and switchable under Paper. There is no sign-up and no watermark.

Can I use it as a Christmas gift tracker instead of Google Sheets or Excel?

That is what it is for. A spreadsheet tracker needs columns, SUM formulas and a conditional format to show who is over budget; here those are built in. Each person’s total is the sum of what you entered for them, the overall total is the sum of everyone, and anyone over budget is marked as soon as the spend passes it: a budget of 50.00 and a spend of 50.01 is over, 50.00 exactly is not. You do not have to choose, though. Download spreadsheet (.csv) saves one row per gift with the columns person, group, budget, idea, bought item, cost, bought, wrapped, given, thank-you and currency. Excel, Google Sheets (File > Import), Numbers and LibreOffice open it directly; it is UTF-8 with a byte-order mark so names like Søren or Zoë and the € sign come out right, amounts are plain numbers such as 18.99 (the currency symbol has its own column, so SUM works), and each person’s budget and ticks are on their first row only, so summing the budget column counts every budget once.

To bring a sheet back, press Import a sheet and choose a .csv, or select the cells in Excel or Sheets, copy, and paste them into the box. Comma, semicolon (the European Excel format, where 19,99 means nineteen ninety-nine) and tab-separated cells are recognised, and the columns are found by their header. You see a preview first: who will be added, who is already on your list (matched by name, ignoring capitals) and will be replaced by the sheet’s version, and every row that cannot be used with the reason, such as a cost of “abc” or a missing name. Nothing changes until you press the import button; people who are not in the sheet stay as they are. Limits: the page keeps the four groups (Family, Friends, Work, Kids), so any other group goes under Family and the preview says so, and nothing is converted between currencies. The CSV holds the gifts; the design, paper and title travel only in the .json export, which stays the complete backup.

How do I make a Christmas budget planner?

Start from the total you can afford, not from the people. If December can take 400, put a budget against everyone and watch the overall line: it shows the sum of the budgets next to the sum of the spending. A common split is to give the closest family most of it, a fixed small amount to each friend and colleague (work Secret Santa usually sets one, often 10 to 20), and keep 10% back for wrapping, cards, postage and the person you forgot. Postage counts: add it as an item on the person it is for, so the totals stay honest.

Where is my list kept, and what happens if I change phone?

In your browser’s local storage, on this device only. Nothing is uploaded, so another phone or browser starts empty, and clearing your browser data or using a private window loses it. Before you change phone, press Export list to save a small .json file; on the new device, open this page and use Import a list. Every field comes back: names, groups, budgets, ideas, gifts, costs and ticks. Clear wipes the saved list from this browser.

What do the amounts accept, and is the maths exact?

Type amounts the way you write them: 19.99, 19,99, £19.99, 1,234.50, 1.234,50 or 1 234,50. A mark followed by one or two digits is read as the decimal point; followed by three digits it is read as a thousands separator, so “1,234” is one thousand two hundred and thirty-four, not one point two. Every amount is stored in whole cents and added as whole numbers, so 19.99 plus 0.01 is exactly 20.00, and two hundred items never come out as 2,000.0000000001. The currency symbol is only a label; nothing is converted.

Which design saves ink?

Ink-saving prints black lines and text only, with no coloured or shaded areas, and marks over-budget with a “!” rather than red. The other five (Holly, Kraft & twine, Nordic night, Candy cane and Gold & cream) use light tinted boxes; Nordic and Kraft have a solid header band, which uses the most ink.

What does it not do?

It does not suggest gifts, look up prices or link to shops, and it never will. Letters outside Western European alphabets print in the PNG but are simplified in the PDF, whose built-in Helvetica font covers Western European letters only.