Last Minute Xmas Gift Ideas for 2025

We’ve run up to the last weekend before the holidays arrive next week. If you haven’t yet completed your shopping for gifts, you only have a handful of days left before time runs out.

We were surprised at how many shoppers took advantage of our suggestions for last-minute gifts in 2024. So much so we’ve asked the Inventions in Everything team to assemble a list of the kinds of gifts they would seriously give to people they know.

Better still, most of the items on the 2025 list can be acquired for about $25 U.S. dollars or less through Amazon, which means you can shop affordably while avoiding the crush of shoppers you will otherwise face at this late date. Here are the suggestions the IIE team recommends:

Bits and Pieces 10-Step Puzzle Box

Giving gift cards, cash, or lottery tickets has become a staple for the last-minute gift shopper. If that’s you, you can separate yourself from the pack of all the other like-minded last-minute gift shoppers by packaging your gift in Bits and Pieces’ Japanese puzzle box. This particular model requires ten steps for the gift recipient to manipulate the attractive box to receive it.

To be sure, this is really a gift for people who like puzzles and will be happier with the box than they will likely be with whatever gift card you might have placed inside it. While there are several other puzzle boxes out there, the design of this model is what caught our attention. It would not look out of place when kept on a dresser, which gives it an edge over the more rustic-style of puzzle boxes.

Contigo Luxe Stainless Steel Thermal Travel Mug

Thermal travel mugs offer the benefit of being both common and practical. What makes this model stand apart from all the other vacuum-insulated stainless steel travel mugs on the market is its “killer app” feature: it is extremely easy to clean because it is top-rack dishwasher safe!

We’re featuring the stainless steel model of Contigo’s Luxe series as a last-minute gift idea because we think it’s likely the most durable version of the product. There are two other versions that add black or blue coatings, but which consumers who have bought these mugs report can chip. The pure stainless steel version however doesn’t have that as a potential drawback.

QAQcew Magnetic Fidget Pen

This is the kind of gift that makes sense for those who have take notes and who fidget a lot. QAQcew’s Magnetic Fidget Pens are unique writing implements that can be broken apart into segments, which can be reconnected into a variety of figures with magnets, where what you can make with the segments of each is only limited by your imagination. These pens come in black, blue, purple, and rainbow-hued models, which are also compact enough to work as stocking stuffers.

Escape Aromatics National Park Candles

It’s a pretty good bet that at least one of the people you’re shopping for are the kind of people who really enjoy candles and their aromas. If they also happen to enjoy the great outdoors and the kind of wilderness that can only be found in America’s national parks, Escape Aromatics’ soy wax candles incorporate scents that might make them think of the natural wonders of Yosemite, Dry Tortugas, Redwoods, Glacier, Joshua Tree, or Hawai’i Volcanoes.

Before we go any further, we should note that these candles are not meant to represent what these places might smell like if they were burning. The Yosemite model, for example, has the following aromatic profile:

• TOP NOTES: Pine and Green Citrus
• MID NOTES: Jasmine, Rose, and Earthy notes
• BASE NOTES: Vanilla, Cedarwood, and Sweet Spice

If your gift recipient is the kind of person who wants to smell what things would smell like if they’re burning, we have an alternative selection that might work for you….

KFC Firelog

This is another gift whose main selling point is the aromas it creates. However, this is a gift that only makes sense if your target recipient has a wood-burning fireplace, also enjoys fried chicken and has a real sense of humor. If they do, this product is “designed to make your home smell like fried chicken and feel as warm as an Extra Crispy drumstick at the bottom of a KFC bucket of fried chicken”.

If your potential gift recipient lacks any of these three characteristics, you’ll be better off giving them any of the other last-minute gift ideas we’ve featured. A quick note of warning: this particular gift item is selling for $39.99, making it the most costly on this list.

Previously on Political Calculations

All of the items we featured on our 2024 last minute Xmas gift ideas list are still available and, most surprisingly, the Pudlicki Car Cleaning Gel was the most popular among readers.

Meanwhile, the gift ideas for math lovers we presented back on Black Friday are all still out there. Happy shopping!

Image credit: Two black and white boxes with gold bows photo by Javier Miranda on Unsplash.