The Best Christmas Songs of All Time
A song makes this list only if it says Christmas, Santa or the Nativity out loud, so Sleigh Ride sits this one out and the order is yours. Now vote. Seven rankings: Paste 2025 (ranked fifty only), Global's Heart 2025 and Smooth 2023 as one, Billboard staff (dated 2024), The Guardian 2019, Pitchfork 2016, undated USA TODAY, and undated, unranked Esquire. The Nativity means its story: the birth, its people, its place. Entries give each song's tally of eligible rankings, none predating the recording. Three eligible rankings earn a seat; songs named by at least half of theirs go upper tier, the rest lower, and votes order each. Each song appears once, in its most-named recording; ties go to higher RIAA certification, or for carols the highest-placed, and an unbroken tie or no Spotify copy means out. Of an act's takes, one a ranking dates wins, else the first release. Links use the original album or single; where Spotify carries a recording only in a later mix or on a later carrier, the entry says so.
Darlene Love — Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) (1963) is #1 on “The Best Christmas Songs of All Time”.
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Darlene Love — Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) (1963)
Darlene Love's 1963 Philles recording is named by 7 of 7 eligible rankings and every one means her take; Pitchfork ranks it first of fifty, Billboard second of a hundred, and Billboard's staff also file U2's cover lower down. It did not sell on release and first entered the Hot 100 in 2018. She sang it on David Letterman's show each December from 1994 to 2014. Linked from Phil Spector's 1963 Christmas album, track eleven.
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Wham! — Last Christmas (1984)
George Michael wrote and produced Last Christmas and performed every part on it, and Band Aid's single held it at number 2 in Britain in December 1984. It finally reached number 1 there on 1 January 2021. USA TODAY ranks it third of fifty, and the full set of 7 eligible rankings names it, 7 of 7. The 1985 Pudding Mix, with re-recorded vocals, sits on the same Spotify release; this plays the 1984 title track.
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Mariah Carey — All I Want for Christmas Is You (1994)
Mariah Carey and Walter Afanasieff wrote and produced it, and Afanasieff scrapped a live-band take and programmed the instruments himself. Out as a single on 29 October 1994, it first topped the Hot 100 in December 2019. Every eligible ranking except Paste names it, 6 of 7, since Paste's counted fifty leaves it out, while the Guardian and Billboard both rank it first. From the 1994 Merry Christmas album, not the 2011 duet.
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The Pogues feat. Kirsty MacColl — Fairytale of New York (1987)
An Irish immigrant sleeping off a binge in a New York drunk tank on Christmas Eve is the premise, and that night passes the lyric test. All the eligible rankings but USA TODAY's name it, 6 of 7, with Paste and the Guardian each placing it second. Its single release was 23 November 1987; Spotify's copy of it is titled Edit, so this plays the album cut on the expanded If I Should Fall from Grace with God.
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The Waitresses — Christmas Wrapping (1981)
Chris Butler pieced Christmas Wrapping together from unused riffs one August and finished the words in a taxi on the way to the session. A full 7 of 7 eligible rankings name it, the Guardian highest at fourth. It first came out on ZE Records' 1981 various-artists album A Christmas Record; Spotify has the later 2004 CD reissue of that album, which carries the original five-minute cut, not the shorter single edit.
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Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band — Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town (1975)
Taped live on 12 December 1975 at C.W. Post College, it borrows its chorus refrain from the Crystals' 1963 version. Across four recordings the song gets 7 of 7 eligible rankings: Springsteen's on four lists, the Jackson 5's on three, so plurality decides. It first appeared on a 1981 Sesame Street album and later backed My Hometown. Spotify's later one-track single prints the venue and date in the title.
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Bing Crosby — White Christmas (1947)
Crosby cut it in 18 minutes on 29 May 1942, wore the master out and re-recorded it on 19 March 1947, and Billboard's staff date their entry 1947, which settles which Crosby; Wikipedia calls it the take radio plays. USA TODAY, Global, Esquire and Billboard mean him; Paste and Billboard also name the Drifters, the Guardian Otis Redding, Pitchfork Bob Marley, for 7 of 7 in all. Spotify's track, labelled 1947 Version, sits on a later compilation titled White Christmas.
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Joni Mitchell — River (1971)
River is set at Christmas rather than about it, and that setting is what clears the lyric test, while the piano borrows heavily from the tune of Jingle Bells. Only USA TODAY leaves it off, so 6 of 7 eligible rankings name it, from fifth on Paste down to twenty-second on the Guardian. Blue, the 1971 album, supplies the link, not the French-horn session take on the 2021 Blue 50 EP.
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Nat King Cole — The Christmas Song (1961)
Cole recorded it four times: with the trio in June 1946, with strings that August, again in 1953 and in stereo in 1961. Billboard's staff list dates its entry 1961, so that take is linked, the one Wikipedia calls the most familiar. Paste skips the song; the other six do, 6 of 7, four of them meaning Cole. The copy is on the 2018 expanded edition of his Christmas Song album, where a plain-titled track is a different recording.
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Pretenders — 2000 Miles (1983)
Chrissie Hynde's band released it on 18 November 1983, a year after guitarist James Honeyman-Scott died, and it is about missing someone at Christmastime, which is the lyric this list needs; Britain took it to 15 that December. USA TODAY and Esquire are the two eligible rankings without it, so 5 of 7. Spotify's plain track comes from Learning to Crawl, the later 1984 album, in its US issue, not the 2007 or 2018 remasters.
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Elvis Presley — Blue Christmas (1957)
Doye O'Dell recorded it first, in 1948, and Presley cut his on 5 September 1957 for Elvis' Christmas Album, with Millie Kirkham's soprano riding over the Jordanaires. The song has 5 of 7 eligible rankings; USA TODAY names the band Heart's version instead, so Elvis takes it four lists to one, Pitchfork placing him ninth. That 1957 album track is linked, not the 2008 duet with Martina McBride.
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Vince Guaraldi Trio — Christmas Time Is Here (1965)
Lee Mendelson wrote the words in about ten minutes, and the children's choir of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in San Rafael sang them. Pitchfork ranks it second, and USA TODAY, Paste, Esquire and Billboard join in for 5 of 7 eligible. The 1965 album A Charlie Brown Christmas holds an instrumental and a vocal under one plain title; this is the 2:44 vocal, on Spotify's later issue with one track added, not the six-minute instrumental.
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John Lennon & Yoko Ono — Happy Xmas (War Is Over) (1971)
Thirty children from the Harlem Community Choir sang their part on 31 October 1971, and the title goes back to the couple's 1969 billboard campaign. America got the single that December; Britain waited until 1972 over a publishing dispute. Lennon and Ono hold all 5 of the 7 eligible rankings that name it, though Esquire adds Celine Dion's cover. The original mix turned up on Spotify on the 2015 compilation Classic Rock Christmas, hence that link.
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The Beach Boys — Little Saint Nick (1963)
The single was released on 9 December 1963, and the 1964 Christmas Album opens on an alternate mix of the same take, whose stereo pressing drops the sleigh bells. Esquire and the Guardian are the holdouts among the 7 eligible rankings, which leaves it named by 5 of 7. Linked: that album's mono mix, track one on Spotify's later two-programme issue of the 1964 LP.
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Bing Crosby & David Bowie — Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy (1977)
Taped on 11 September 1977 for Bing Crosby's Merrie Olde Christmas, it pairs the drummer boy's walk to the Nativity with a Peace on Earth counterpoint written in just over an hour, and RCA issued it as a single only in November 1982. Paste and the Guardian pass; 5 of 7 eligible rankings name it, USA TODAY at fifth. The one-track single Spotify issued later carries the 1977 performance, not the 2019 orchestral overdub.
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Eartha Kitt — Santa Baby (1953)
Joan Javits and Philip Springer wrote it, and Kitt recorded it with Henri René's orchestra in New York in October 1953. The song is named by 5 of 7 eligible rankings: Esquire picks Madonna's cover, USA TODAY, the Guardian, Pitchfork and Billboard pick Kitt. She cut a faster version for Kapp in 1960, and a 2020 EP adds a Royal Philharmonic overdub, so the René recording comes from the 2002 compilation Heavenly Eartha.
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Donny Hathaway — This Christmas (1970)
Hathaway wrote it with Nadine McKinnor, and Atco released the single on 9 December 1970 to little notice; its only chart entry that decade was eleventh on Billboard's Christmas singles chart in 1972, and the Hot 100 waited until December 2020. Paste and Global leave it out, the Guardian has it seventh, 5 of 7 eligible in total. On Spotify it is a bonus track added to a later issue of his 1971 self-titled LP.
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Paul McCartney — Wonderful Christmastime (1979)
McCartney made it alone during the McCartney II sessions, playing the instruments himself, and the single, out on 16 November 1979, reached number 6 in Britain in January 1980. Neither the Guardian nor Pitchfork lists it; 5 of 7 eligible rankings do, USA TODAY highest at tenth. The single ran about 3:45 against a 4:18 unedited take, and Spotify's track, titled Edited Version / Remastered 2011, comes from a later McCartney II reissue.
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Run-D.M.C. — Christmas in Hollis (1987)
Run-D.M.C. turned down the request at first and agreed once Bill Adler suggested the concept; the track samples Clarence Carter's Back Door Santa, also on this list, and turned up in Die Hard a year later. Billboard's staff rank it eighth, and with Esquire, the Guardian and Pitchfork that is 4 of 7 eligible. A&M's 1987 compilation A Very Special Christmas is the original carrier and the source, not the expanded Tougher Than Leather.
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José Feliciano — Feliz Navidad (1970)
Feliciano wrote and recorded it in 1970, a Spanish greeting followed by an English verse, and RCA Victor put the single out on 9 November that year; in 2020 it made the Hot 100's top ten for the first time. USA TODAY, Global, Esquire and Billboard back it, 4 of 7 eligible, Billboard at seventh. Spotify's later issue of his Feliz Navidad album, dated 2002 by the service, carries the track.
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Judy Garland — Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (1944)
Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane wrote it for Meet Me in St. Louis, and Garland, her co-star and the director pushed Martin to lift a gloomier first draft. The song is on 4 of 7 eligible rankings; Garland is the pick of three, two Sinatra recordings get one each, and USA TODAY puts her at number one. Her Decca take, issued in a 2 November 1944 Decca set, came out first and is linked, not the film's soundtrack take.
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Otis Redding — Merry Christmas Baby (1968)
Johnny Moore's Three Blazers cut it first in 1947 with Charles Brown singing, and Billboard's staff also lists a Charles Brown recording. Paste, Esquire, Pitchfork and Billboard name the song, 4 of 7 eligible, and all four mean Redding's version, so plurality decides; Pitchfork has it twenty-third. His 1968 Atco single, White Christmas on the flip, is linked, not a 2013 duet credited to him.
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Slade — Merry Xmas Everybody (1973)
Noddy Holder and Jim Lea built the chorus from a song Holder had discarded in 1967, and the band recorded it in late summer 1973 at the Record Plant in New York, partway through a US tour, and that December it gave them their sixth and last British number 1. The Guardian's eighth place joins USA TODAY, Global and Esquire for a count of 4 of 7 eligible. The 1973 single plays here, not a live version.
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Brenda Lee — Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree (1958)
Lee was 13 when she recorded it on 19 October 1958, Owen Bradley producing and Boots Randolph on saxophone. Sales were slow until she became a star, Home Alone revived it in 1990, and in December 2023 it went to number 1 on the Hot 100. Its tally is 4 of 7 eligible: USA TODAY, Global, Pitchfork, and Billboard at sixth. The link comes from her later 1964 LP, which holds the 1958 recording, not the 1991 re-record.
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Gene Autry — Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1949)
Johnny Marks turned his brother-in-law Robert May's story into the song, and Santa asking Rudolph to lead the sleigh is what qualifies it. Autry recorded it on 27 June 1949, reaching number 1 that Christmas. The song draws 4 of 7 eligible rankings, split two and two: USA TODAY and Billboard for Autry, Esquire and the Guardian for the Temptations, and Autry's RIAA gold award breaks the tie. A later Columbia/Legacy EP is the source, not his 1957 re-recording.
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Elton John — Step Into Christmas (1973)
Elton John and Bernie Taupin wrote it, Gus Dudgeon produced, and it was cut at Morgan Studios on 11 November 1973. Released twelve days later, the 1973 single peaked at number 24 in Britain, and the song reached 7 there in 2025. Billboard puts it forty-fifth, and Paste, Global and Esquire also list it, 4 of 7 eligible. Spotify's copy sits on an expanded issue of the 1973 single and is titled Remastered 2017.
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Taylor Swift — Christmas Tree Farm (2019)
Swift grew up on Pine Ridge Farm, a Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania, and wrote, recorded and released this in under six days, producing with Jimmy Napes. It came out on 6 December 2019, a day after the Guardian's ranking and three years after Pitchfork's, so neither could name it: USA TODAY, Global and Esquire make 3 of its 5 eligible. The original single is linked, not the live or Old Timey versions.
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Prince — Another Lonely Christmas (1984)
Prince put it on the flip of I Would Die 4 U: a man mourning a lover who died on a past Christmas Day, a story he later said was invented. He played it live once, in St. Paul on 26 December 1984. Pitchfork's thirteenth place, with Paste and Billboard, gives it 3 of 7 eligible. Spotify keeps the B-side on its issue of that 1984 single, and this plays from there.
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Clarence Carter — Back Door Santa (1968)
Carter wrote it with Marcus Daniel, Rick Hall produced, and Atlantic issued it in 1968, the year Atco's Soul Christmas compilation picked it up; Run-D.M.C. later sampled it. Its count is 3 of 7 eligible, all from the Guardian, Pitchfork and Billboard. Spotify's copy on his later 1969 Atlantic album Testifyin' is linked, and it runs 2:16 where the single and compilation copies run 2:08.
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Band Aid — Do They Know It's Christmas? (1984)
Bob Geldof and Midge Ure wrote it for Ethiopian famine relief, and it was recorded in a single day at Sarm West in November 1984 with Ure producing; British buyers took a million copies in its opening week. USA TODAY has it eighteenth, and Global and Billboard bring it to 3 of 7 eligible. Spotify titles the track 1984 Version, and the 1989, 2004, 2014 and 2024 remakes are separate records.
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The Kinks — Father Christmas (1977)
Ray Davies sings it as a mall Santa mugged by poor kids who want money, and jobs for their parents, instead of toys. Arista released it on 25 November 1977. Pitchfork places it twenty-fifth and Billboard and Esquire also carry it, 3 of 7 eligible. The copy comes from Arista's 1986 compilation Come Dancing with the Kinks, not the 2023 remix single.
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Annie Lennox — God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen (2010)
The carol, in print by about 1760, tells of Christ born on Christmas Day, which passes the Nativity test. USA TODAY, Esquire and the Guardian name it, 3 of 7 eligible, in four recordings with one vote each, so the carol tie-break applies: USA TODAY's forty-third place for Lennox beats the Guardian's forty-fifth for Dio and Iommi. Track two of her 2010 album A Christmas Cornucopia, also its second single.
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Dolly Parton — Hard Candy Christmas (1982)
Carol Hall wrote it for The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, and in the 1982 film Parton, as Miss Mona, sings the refrains with the girls behind her. The title recalls the cheap candy poor families once gave at Christmas, and her single reached number 8 on the country chart in January 1983. On the count it has 3 of 7 eligible, from Esquire, Pitchfork (forty-third) and Billboard. Linked from the soundtrack album, where Spotify credits Hall beside Parton.
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The Jackson 5 — I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus (1970)
Jimmy Boyd's 1952 original went to number 1, but USA TODAY, Esquire and Billboard, the 3 of 7 eligible rankings that name the song, all mean the Jackson 5's version from their 1970 Christmas Album. USA TODAY has it fifteenth. It reached the Hot 100 in January 2024, at 43. Their original 1970 album is the source, not the shorter copy on A Motown Christmas.
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Wizzard — I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday (1973)
Roy Wood wrote and produced it with a Stockland Green school choir, and the December 1973 Harvest single stalled at number 4 in Britain. Pitchfork names that 1973 release; Wikipedia says the tapes could not be found for a 1981 reissue, so the band re-recorded it. The Guardian ninth, Pitchfork fifteenth and Global's list make 3 of 7 eligible. Spotify carries the 1973 take as a 2005 remaster, a bonus track on Wizzard Brew credited to Roy Wood.
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Merle Haggard — If We Make It Through December (1973)
A factory worker laid off just before Christmas is the subject, and that is the lyric that qualifies it. Released on 27 October 1973, it held number 1 on the country chart for four weeks into January 1974. Paste (eleventh) and Billboard pick Haggard and Esquire the Pistol Annies' cover, so the song has 3 of 7 eligible. The 1974 Capitol album named after the song, a later carrier, opens with this copy.
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Ramones — Merry Christmas (I Don't Want to Fight Tonight) (1987)
Joey Ramone wrote it, and it first came out in November 1987 as the B-side of I Wanna Live. With Pitchfork at twentieth, Billboard at fiftieth and Esquire unranked, it holds 3 of 7 eligible. It plays from the later 1989 album Brain Drain, where Jean Beauvoir and Daniel Rey produced it while Bill Laswell handled most of the record.
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Carpenters — Merry Christmas Darling (1970)
Frank Pooler wrote the words in the 1940s; the Carpenters' single came out on 22 November 1970 and topped Billboard's Christmas singles chart that year. Karen re-recorded her vocal in 1978 for Christmas Portrait, but singles kept the 1970 mix. Paste ranks it twenty-eighth and Billboard forty-first, and Global's list has it too: 3 of 7 eligible. The 1970 single version sits on the compilation The Essential Collection, titled Single Version by Spotify, and that copy is linked.
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Chuck Berry — Run Rudolph Run (1958)
Berry wrote it, though the credit went to Johnny Marks and M. Brodie, and the 1958 Chess single sets Santa talking with the children, which clears the lyric test. The song has 3 of 7 eligible; Pitchfork (fourth) and Billboard mean Berry, while USA TODAY chose Sheryl Crow's cover. His original is on Spotify via the 1988 box set The Chess Box, a compilation.
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James Brown — Santa Claus Go Straight to the Ghetto (1968)
James Brown opened A Soulful Christmas with it, the album King Records released in November 1968, his second Christmas album. Paste has it fifteenth, Pitchfork thirty-second and Billboard sixty-fifth, which makes 3 of 7 eligible. That 1968 album is the carrier used, rather than the Funky Christmas compilation, whose copy runs two seconds longer.
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Stevie Wonder — Someday at Christmas (1966)
Ron Miller and Bryan Wells wrote it, and Wonder's single was issued on 22 November 1966, a year before the album named after it. USA TODAY at thirty-first, Billboard at sixty-fourth and Esquire account for its 3 of 7 eligible. Spotify files the 2004 expanded edition of that 1967 album as a compilation, and that is where this copy lives; an alternate mix on The Complete Motown Singles is not the one used.
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Kelly Clarkson — Underneath the Tree (2013)
Clarkson wrote it with Greg Kurstin, who produced, for Wrapped in Red, her first Christmas album, and a lonely Christmas Day is the lament that qualifies it. Adult contemporary radio got it on 5 November 2013, and it climbed to number 7 on the Hot 100 during December 2025. Billboard's twenty-sixth place plus Global and Esquire comes to 3 of 7 eligible. Wrapped in Red in its standard form supplies the track.
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Stevie Wonder — What Christmas Means to Me (1967)
Anna Gordy Gaye, George Gordy and Allen Story wrote it, and Wonder recorded it in 1967 for Someday at Christmas, the album that also holds his other entry here. It scores 3 of 7 eligible: Paste at twentieth, Billboard at twenty-fourth, Pitchfork at forty-first. Cher brought him in to sing it with her on her 2023 album Christmas. The track comes from his 1967 album's 2004 expanded reissue.
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