Christmas Advertising 2025: 6 Top Ads and Key Lessons

Every December, brands make the same promise to themselves. “This year we’re crafting the perfect Christmas ad people talk about. The one that gets shared, remembered, maybe even forgiven for interrupting the TV schedule”.

Big spends, big feelings, and a thrilling race to be the ad everyone remembers – that’s what Christmas advertising looks like, year after year. And Christmas advertising 2025 was no different!  

Emotional themes, spectacular visuals, and hints of the adoption of AI at a larger scale are already shaping this year’s festive campaigns. Brands around the world have come up with creative strategies to balance warmth and innovation, tradition and new tools in order to create campaigns that stick. 

What’s interesting about Christmas advertising in 2025 isn’t that it’s reinventing the season, but how confidently brands are refining it. Are you ready for some festive cheer and a huge dose of holiday marketing inspiration? Let’s get started! 

6 Christmas Ads Everyone’s Talking About in 2025

So, why is Christmas advertising important? It’s not just about boosting sales but also about brand building and nurturing emotional rapport with the audience. 

Advertising is changing rapidly. But the importance of Christmas advertising, holiday advertising in general, has been remarkably consistent. 

It remains one of the few moments each year when brands gain the freedom to slow down, tell a story, and be remembered for something more than what they sell. What’s changing this year isn’t the role of Christmas advertising in 2025, but how brands use design, storytelling, and new tools to earn attention in a more fragmented, digital-first landscape.

On that note, let’s talk about the ads that won hearts this year. 

1. ASDA: A Very Merry Grinchmas

Rather than launch another abstract emotional vignette, Asda leans into a familiar character, the Grinch, to mirror a very real modern anxiety: the cost of Christmas.

A notable detail here is that, unlike most brands that stick to the common Christmas symbols like Santa Claus, this one builds on the Grinch. Not only does this help differentiate the brand from the rest of the holiday ads, but it also challenges the common perception. 

In the ad, the Grinch starts cynical and disengaged, but as he encounters Asda’s prices and festive range, his mood shifts and he embraces the spirit of the season with humour and warmth. Instead of drastically fighting the character, the narrative keeps the story relatable. 

So, what are a few things that make this one of the best examples of Christmas advertising in 2025? 

• An engaging narrative 
• A fun and memorable jingle 
• Clear and effective message delivery 
• Rich color, detailed sets, and a cinematic touch 

2. Tesco: That’s What Makes It Christmas

Christmas advertising 2025 has been about experimenting with new ideas and brands pushing their creative boundaries. Tesco is a good example. Instead of going with a single Christmas commercial film or a couple of videos, the brand deployed its campaign titled “That’s What Makes It Christmas”, consisting of a set of standalone spots. 

Each of these moves away from the trend of grandeur or celebrity collaboration and keeps things authentic. They celebrate the well-known but less spoken-about emotions around the holiday season – the chaos, the mess, and the raw moments involved in preparing for the holiday in many British households.

Secret Santa gift hunts, pointless disagreements over family dinner, family photo struggles – the campaign depicts some of the most relatable moments, and that’s what makes it special. You can’t help but smile when you get the idea and when it hits close to home. 

So, what makes this one of the best examples of Christmas advertising in 2025? 

• A strong cohesive theme
• Clear and straightforward stories that the audience can connect with 
• The right format (short-form videos) designed for modern, multi-platform viewing
• The use of everyday humor that does not feel exaggerated or staged

3. Dunkin’ — The Little Holiday MUNCHKIN

Dunkin’ has come up with something fun and unique for Christmas advertising in 2025. “The Little Holiday MUNCHKIN” campaign puts the iconic donut hole from the brand, the “MUNCHKIN”, at the center. 

Instead of the usual human-led emotion-driven Christmas advertising in 2025, this one humanizes the MUNCHKIN, creating something refreshing and related to the brand. 

The animated video spot follows the story of the little “MUNCHKINS” that started off overlooked and forgotten, only to later become a holiday favorite treat. A metaphorical representation of the festive moment of being seen and appreciated. 

In addition to the video, the brand has also collaborated with Mindy Kaling and has come up with a cute illustrated children’s storybook titled “The Little Holiday Munchkin”, which makes for a great collectible and appeals to the family audience as well. This has led to a lot of people discussing the brand and sharing videos and photos of the book on social media, building on the momentum of the campaign. 

In addition to the book, the brand has also come up with branded merchandise in the same theme. This holistic approach gives the brand better exposure through diverse channels.

So, why is this a great Christmas advertising 2025 example? 

• It builds on a product-led story for clarity
• An omnichannel approach helps widen the reach 
• A simple and clear narrative ensures that the ad and the campaign on the whole resonate with both children and adults.

4. Home Instead: Home But Not Alone

Pop culture references are fool-proof in holiday advertising, and there have been many brands that chose this approach for Christmas advertising in 2025. The renowned in-home senior care brand Home Instead is one among them. 

The central theme is a well-recognized theme from one of the most popular Christmas movies, Home Alone.

Featuring Macaulay Culkin as Kevin McCallister, the ad creatively twists the tale. This time it isn’t about Kevin being alone at home for Christmas, but rather about a grown-up Kevin being worried about the safety of his mother, who is to be alone at home. 

While integrating a lighthearted theme into it, the ad preserves the vibe of the original movie to be able to effectively connect with fans. 

There’s humor, there’s nostalgia and there’s the effective placement of the brand’s services as the solution to a concern many might experience during the holidays. Together, this blend creates a simple, fun and shareworthy Christmas ad. 

So what makes this simple Christmas ad a worthy contender against the Christmas advertising of 2025 from big brands?

• Clever use of nostalgia to deliver a heartfelt message 
• Featuring a familiar character for instant recognizability 
• A campaign built not just to entertain, but to encourage real conversations about family and care

5. Intermarché: Le Mal Aimé (The Unloved)

Christmas advertising 2025 threw a spotlight on authenticity and craftsmanship, and few campaigns captured that better than Intermarché’s Le Mal Aimé (known in English as The Unloved).

Le Mal Aimé breaks free of the stereotypical Christmas stories and representations and, similar to the ASDA ad that shifts perspectives around the Grinch, flips the narrative to create something heartwarming. 

The film follows a wolf, a character traditionally cast as the villain, who is excluded from the forest’s festive gathering simply because of who he is. Instead of reacting with anger or resentment, he sets out to change how he’s perceived. He learns to cook, carefully prepares a meal using vegetables, and returns to share it with the others.

No fancy dialogues, no heavy brand messaging, no forced sentiments, the story unfolds seamlessly. 

There’s one other reason why this ad is going viral on social media – the human team behind it, in the age of brands like Coca-Cola switching to AI and facing backlash. Reportedly, this short animated clip took a team of 80 people nearly a year to create. 

So, what makes this a brilliant campaign? 

• A central character cast against type to create something engaging. 
• The use of a slow, patient pacing that allows emotion to build naturally
• Hand-crafted animation that prioritises texture, imperfection, and warmth over AI-generated perfection 

6. Aldi: Kevin the Carrot 

Consistency can be a huge plus and Aldi’s Christmas advertising in 2025 is a good example. Over the past few years, Aldi’s Christmas campaigns have consistently featured the character Kevin the Carrot. 

The brand’s consistency and use of creative narratives that preserve the theme while also giving the audience something new to look forward to have helped enhance the popularity of the character over the years. 

For Christmas advertising in 2025 as well, Aldi has launched a campaign featuring Kevin the Carrot and this time he’s tying the knot with Katie. The brand is giving the narrative a happy ending. 

The use of a familiar character means the context, the humour, and the brand associations are already in place. Every new version builds on what came before, rather than starting from scratch.

The characters, colour palette, and animation style are instantly identifiable, which helps the ad stand out even in shorter social formats.

So, what makes this one of the best Christmas ads of 2025? 

• Long-term character building through consistent and simple storytelling 
• New storylines, building on the existing context, appealing to both new audience and existing customers 
• Use of a consistent visual theme for consistency 

Christmas Ads of 2025 That Missed the Mark 

Not all ads created for Christmas 2025 succeeded. In fact, some of the most valuable lessons from Christmas advertising in 2025 come from brands that missed the mark. 

Some high-profile adverts stumbled this year not because of budgets or talent, but from misplaced execution or shifting regulatory realities. We have two such examples to highlight what has changed in Christmas advertising this year. 

McDonald’s AI Christmas ad backlash 

One of the most talked-about missteps of Christmas advertising 2025 came from McDonald’s Netherlands, which released an AI-generated ad for Christmas. 

Coca-Cola did that too and got negative criticism for it, but in the case of McDonald’s Netherlands, the situation was even worse, and so the brand had to pull it. 

The problem in this case was not just the extensive use of AI for creating the ad but its tone-deaf execution. The ad, titled “It’s the most terrible time of the year”, leaned into chaotic seasonal scenes. While Tesco adopted a similar theme, the execution was more optimistic, authentic, and human. In the case of McDonald’s Netherlands, the ad leaned into a more pessimistic tone, which is not ideal for the festive season. 

The audience felt disconnected and critics expressed their hatred online, leading to the brand eventually withdrawing the ad and apologising. 

Changes coming to the advertising rules in the UK 

One crucial thing for advertisers to note in Christmas advertising 2025 is the change in regulations around food advertising. 

The newly enforced rules restrict the advertisement of less healthy food and drink (products high in fat, salt, or sugar). These rules are all set to take full effect on January 5, 2026, but brands are already cautious about their message for the holidays and the representation of their products and services in their commercials. 

These new rules restrict the running of TV ads of less healthy foods before the 9 pm watershed and ban the placement of paid online ads for such foods. Although the enforcement date is just after the holiday season, many advertisers began adjusting their creative early. 

For marketers, this shift is a wake-up call about the importance of aligning ads with evolving legal policies and contexts. When regulation changes, it can reshape not just what you can show, but how audiences interpret your messaging. Just because the holiday season gets busy, you cannot ignore such regulations! 

Addressing a Few Common Questions About Christmas Advertising 

Looking Ahead: Applying These Lessons Beyond Christmas

Christmas advertising in 2025 made something very clear – festive campaigns work best when you treat them as strategic brand moments to connect with your audience. They should not be just another idea during the holiday, just another campaign promoting a product or service. 

The strongest ads this year didn’t rely on a single clichéd formula. They leaned on clear ideas, consistent design systems, and storytelling that respected the audience’s expectations and evolving perceptions of holiday marketing. 

These ads did not chase trends but established a single, clear message and built on it in the most human and authentic way possible. 

Struggling to come up with visuals that match such spectacular holiday ad ideas your team comes up with? Time to collaborate with a creative partner who can help create stunning holiday designs with the flexibility to iterate on your ideas to find what works for your brand. 

Time to sign up for an unlimited design service, like KIMP! 

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