How to donate your unwanted Christmas presents

A third of consumers plan to return or give up Christmas gifts, new research has found.

​​Gifts worth £232 million are returned across the UK, the Post Office poll showed.

Young adults aged between 18 and 34 are the most likely to return gifts, dropping to one in 10 for over-55s.

The average value per gift being returned is £74, with those returning typically giving up two gifts.

The most common presents being re-gifted, donated, sold, or returned are clothes and shoes (21%), followed by non-electrical beauty items (18%), and books and stationery (12%).

More than half (54%) said they would not tell the person who gave them their present that they were returning it, with those over 55 most likely to keep quiet about it.

But don't worry, you don’t have to hide them in your loft to collect dust — you can do some good with the gifts that aren't your cup of tea. 

Here's how.

A great thing to do with unwanted Christmas presents is to donate them to charity. You can visit a local charity shop on your high street and it will be more than happy to receive gifts you don’t want to keep. It allows them to then make money for charity by selling them on.

You can also donate children’s toys to your local hospital, gift books to schools or libraries, sports equipment to local sports clubs, and clothing to homeless shelters. You can search for charities in your local area via the Charities Aid Foundation.

Another option is selling unwanted gifts online and putting the money to good use. You can use an online platform such as Vinted, Depop, or eBay to sell unwanted items or upload your gift to the Facebook marketplace to find a local buyer for something you don’t want.

You can also give them to a family member or friend — and even swap them with someone. Of course, you’ll need to be tactful when discussing a present swap and you should propose a swap only if this benefits both of you. 

And if you have any unwanted coats, the annual Take One Leave One (TOLO) campaign has launched. This involves setting up a clothes rail, allowing people to drop off warm clothing that can then be collected by those in need.

Diet plans, bad romance novels, car manuals or de-icers, and cleaning products are the five most unpopular presents you can receive. A poll, conducted by book publisher Wonderbly, found that ties, hankies, potpourri, and soap on a string were also in the top 10 list of disliked gifts.

Full list of unpopular presents:

1. Diet plan

2. Bad romance novels

3. Car manual

4. De-icer

5. Cleaning products

6. A tie

7. New windscreen wipers

8. Soap on a string

9. Hankies

10. Potpourri

11. Joke books

12. Children’s toys

13. New map of Great Britain

14. Movies you’ve already seen

15. Cufflinks

16. Mousepad

17. Sports memorabilia

18. Iron