Whoopee Cushions and a Toilet Seat: The Royal Family's Christmas Eve Gift Tradition
The family that could buy each other anything gives gag gifts on Christmas Eve instead, including the leather toilet seat Charles still travels with.
Most families save the big reveal for Christmas morning. The royal family does its unwrapping the night before, and by royal decree, more or less, tries hard not to take it too seriously.
It’s one of the more disarming things about how the family marks Christmas: enormous wealth, a fixed and famous protocol for almost everything else, and a gift-giving tradition built entirely around making each other laugh rather than making each other feel spoiled.
Why Christmas Eve, not Christmas Day
The custom of opening presents on Christmas Eve rather than Christmas morning is German in origin, brought into the British court in the 19th century by Queen Victoria and her German-born husband, Prince Albert. It reflects the Continental European Christmas Eve tradition of Bescherung, the gift-giving that happens on the night itself, ahead of Christmas Day’s more formal, church-centred activities.
The custom stuck at the royal court long after it faded from most of British life, where Christmas morning gift-opening became the norm. It’s one of several small but persistent German inheritances in royal Christmas tradition, alongside the Christmas tree itself. Some accounts trace the specific habit of exchanging deliberately silly gifts back roughly a century, to Albert’s own household, which suggests the family’s fondness for a joke present is nearly as old as the Christmas Eve custom itself.
The rule that changes everything: gifts must be silly
What makes the royal version genuinely distinctive isn’t the timing. It’s the tone. Queen Elizabeth II is widely reported to have set an early rule for family gift exchanges: given how much the family already has, presents should be deliberately inexpensive and, ideally, a little ridiculous. Joke gifts, not jewellery. She reportedly loved the custom precisely because she disliked extravagance and overt displays of consumerism, and preferred Christmas Day itself to keep a more sacred, unshowy note, with the silliness reserved for the night before.
It’s a practical answer to an obvious problem too. When money is no object, an expensive gift says nothing about the giver; it’s just proof of a bank balance everyone already knows about. A good joke, on the other hand, takes actual thought.
The toilet seat Charles still travels with
The best-documented example of the tradition working exactly as intended: Princess Anne once gave her brother, King Charles, an upholstered white leather toilet seat as a Christmas gift. Rather than quietly retiring it, Charles reportedly liked it enough that he still travels with it on official trips abroad.
It’s a genuinely funny image, a monarch’s motorcade somewhere on a state visit with his sister’s joke present packed in the luggage, and it says something rather warm about how the family actually gets on behind the formality.
Meghan’s singing hamster, and the cereal killer spoon
Meghan Markle threw herself into the tradition early and enthusiastically. During her first royal Christmas, she reportedly gave the late Queen a singing toy hamster, a gift said to have made the monarch burst out laughing. The same season, Meghan gave Prince William a spoon embossed with the pun “cereal killer,” a small, cheerfully silly gesture toward a family she was still getting to know.
Prince Harry’s own gag-gift history includes a Christmas ornament bearing the Queen’s own face, later recounted fondly in his memoir, and, by some accounts, gifts cheeky enough that a former royal butler has described them as coming close to causing a genuine diplomatic moment at the table. None of it seems to have done any lasting damage; if anything, the stories have become part of the family’s own affectionate lore.
Kate’s “grow your own girlfriend” kit
Catherine, Princess of Wales, has her own entry in royal gag-gift history. Before she married into the family, when Prince Harry was still single, Kate is reported to have given him a “grow your own girlfriend” novelty kit one Christmas, a gift squarely in the family spirit, and one that reportedly went down well with a prince who, at the time, could take a joke about his love life.
Other years have produced whoopee cushions and further joke toilet-seat-style presents, all part of the same running theme: the sillier, the better.
The gift that broke the pattern, in the best way
Not every gift in royal Christmas Eve history has been a joke, and one particular exception says as much about the family as the gag gifts do. When Kate first joined the family, she reportedly gave the late Queen a jar of homemade chutney, made using her own grandmother’s recipe.
It wasn’t funny, and it wasn’t expensive. It was made by hand, and the Queen was said to be genuinely touched by the effort. Next to a lifetime of gag gifts, that says the real point of the tradition was never the jokes. It was giving something money couldn’t just buy.
A tradition that may not survive the next generation
Interestingly, the German-inherited habit of Christmas Eve gift-opening isn’t universally loved within the family. Reports have suggested Kate finds the custom slightly unusual, and that she may end it once she becomes queen consort, in favour of the more familiar British pattern of opening presents on Christmas morning instead.
Whether or not the timing survives, it seems unlikely the family will give up the spirit of the thing. A family that has kept a straight face while accepting a leather toilet seat as a serious gift for years running, and that reportedly still keeps the custom alive under King Charles III today, isn’t likely to start taking Christmas presents too solemnly any time soon.
Why it still matters
There’s something genuinely likeable about a family with effectively unlimited means choosing, deliberately, to make each other laugh instead of impressing each other. It’s one of the rare royal traditions that reads as completely unstaged, the kind of in-joke every real family has, just with slightly more famous participants.
Browse more of our Royal Figures stories for the personalities and relationships behind the institution.
Frequently asked questions
Why does the royal family open presents on Christmas Eve?
The custom is German in origin, introduced to the British royal court by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in the 19th century, reflecting the Continental European tradition of gift-giving on Christmas Eve night rather than Christmas morning.
Why does the royal family give joke gifts at Christmas?
Queen Elizabeth II is widely reported to have set the tone early on, preferring gifts that were deliberately inexpensive and silly rather than lavish, reportedly because she disliked extravagance and wanted Christmas Day itself to keep a more sacred, unshowy character.
What is the most famous royal Christmas gag gift?
Princess Anne once gave King Charles an upholstered white leather toilet seat, which he reportedly liked so much that he still travels with it on official trips.
What gag gift did Meghan Markle give the Queen?
A singing toy hamster, which reportedly made the late Queen burst out laughing. She also gave Prince William a spoon embossed with the pun “cereal killer” during her first royal Christmas.
What did Kate Middleton give Prince Harry for Christmas?
Before her marriage into the family, Kate reportedly gave a then-single Prince Harry a “grow your own girlfriend” novelty kit, a gift very much in keeping with the family’s joke-gift tradition.
Did Kate Middleton ever give a serious Christmas gift?
Yes. When she first joined the family, Kate reportedly gave the late Queen homemade chutney made from her grandmother’s recipe, a personal, non-joke gift the Queen was said to appreciate.
Will the royal family keep opening gifts on Christmas Eve?
Possibly not indefinitely. Reports suggest Catherine, Princess of Wales, finds the custom unusual and may shift the family to opening presents on Christmas morning once she becomes queen consort.
Details of the royal family’s Christmas gift traditions are drawn from widely published royal reporting and historical accounts; described as of 2026.
