Holiday stress is common, and it usually comes from a handful of predictable places: money, gifts, a calendar that's too full, family expectations and the pressure to make everything special. In a 2023 US survey for the American Psychological Association, 89 percent of adults said something typically stresses them during the holiday season. What helps most is rarely doing more. It's lowering the bar in a few places, deciding on limits before the season starts and building small pauses into busy days.
Below: what the survey found, practical tips for each common cause, how to handle family gatherings, what to do when you miss someone, and a 3-minute pause for the busiest days.
Holiday stress statistics: what a 2023 survey found
The American Psychological Association (APA) asked The Harris Poll to survey 2,061 US adults online from November 14 to 16, 2023. "Holiday season" meant the traditional US season from November to January. These are the results for the most common causes of stress:
| What typically causes stress during the holidays | Share of adults |
|---|---|
| Anything at all | 89% |
| Money: not having enough, or spending too much | 58% |
| Finding the right gifts | 40% |
| Missing family or loved ones | 38% |
| Having too much to do | 32% |
| Feeling pressure to make the holidays special | 30% |
| Not being able to be with family or loved ones | 25% |
| Experiencing or anticipating family conflict | 22% |
| Feeling left out or excluded | 20% |
A few more results put this in perspective: 41 percent said their stress goes up during the holidays compared with the rest of the year, 52 percent said it stays the same. Most people see both sides: 84 percent agreed the holidays create a sense of togetherness, and 72 percent that they can feel bittersweet.
The survey is from the US, and we haven't verified comparable figures for other countries, so treat the numbers as one snapshot, not as a universal rate.
Holiday stress management: tips by cause
Money and gifts
- Set one budget before you shop, for the whole season, and split it between gifts, food and travel.
- Agree on rules with family or friends: a price limit, a gift exchange where everyone buys for one person, or "only for the kids".
- Give time instead of things where it fits: a walk together, a cooked meal, help with a task.
Too much to do
- Write everything down, then cross out a third. Ask: "Would anyone really miss this?"
- Choose "good enough" on purpose for a few things, like store-bought cookies or simpler decorations.
- Put pauses in the calendar, not only events. An evening with nothing planned is a plan.
The pressure to make it special
The APA survey found that 30 percent feel pressure to make the holidays special, and 36 percent agreed the holidays can feel like a competition. It helps to pick the one or two traditions that matter most to you and let the rest be ordinary. A holiday doesn't have to be perfect to be good.
Travel and hosting
- Plan buffer time on travel days, and expect delays rather than hoping there won't be any.
- Share the hosting: one person cooks, one sets the table, one cleans up.
- Keep one small routine from home, like a short walk in the morning or a few minutes alone before bed.
Staying calm with family during the holidays
Family time is one of the best and one of the hardest parts of the season. In the APA survey, 22 percent said family conflict, or expecting it, typically stresses them. A few things tend to help:
- Decide in advance which topics you won't discuss, and have one friendly sentence ready: "Let's talk about that another time."
- Plan short breaks: a walk, helping in the kitchen, stepping outside for fresh air.
- Arrive and leave with a plan, for example a set time you'll head home.
- Lower your expectations of others. People rarely change over one holiday dinner.
- Before you walk in, take three slow breaths with a longer out-breath. Our guide to breathing exercises for stress has more.
When you miss someone at Christmas
Missing loved ones was the third most common source of holiday stress in the survey, at 38 percent. Whether someone has died, moved away or is no longer part of your life, the holidays can make the gap feel bigger. It can help to:
- Name them. Light a candle, cook their dish, tell a story about them.
- Keep some traditions and change others, especially the ones that hurt most right now.
- Say yes to company, and also to time alone, whichever you need on a given day.
- Allow mixed feelings. You can enjoy a moment and be sad in the same evening.
If you're also hard on yourself for not feeling festive, our guide to self-compassion fits well here.
A 3-minute holiday pause
We wrote this short pause for the busiest days: before guests arrive, in a crowded store, or after a tense conversation.
- Stop and feel your feet. Wherever you are, notice the floor under your shoes. (one breath)
- Breathe out longer. Three times: in through the nose, then a slow, long breath out.
- Name it. Silently: "This is a lot right now." Nothing more.
- One good-enough thing. Ask: "What's the one thing that matters next?" Let the rest wait.
- One small comfort. A glass of water, a minute outside, a text to a friend.
For moments when stress hits hard and fast, our guide on how to calm down quickly has more, and how to stay calm under pressure helps you build a calmer routine for the whole season.
Holiday stress and mental health
Holiday stress isn't a diagnosis, and feeling tired, tense or a little low around the holidays is common. But the season can also make existing problems heavier, and not every hard feeling is "just the holidays". If low mood lasts most of the day, every day, for more than two weeks, the NHS advises seeing a GP. If stress feels like too much to cope with, or things you try yourself don't help, that's also a reason to talk to a doctor.
Winter and Advent sessions in the app
AI Meditation: Sleep & Calm has a few seasonal sessions that appear on the app's home screen at this time of year:
- Advent, Advent: A Reflective Journey Through the Pre-Christmas Season is a calm visualization around Advent traditions: the Advent wreath and candles, the Advent calendar, the scent of cookies, St. Nicholas Day and the Christmas market. It's built around Christian Advent customs. It appears on the home screen from December 1 to 24, and the app estimates it at about 15 to 23 minutes.
- The First Snow: A Winter Pause follows the first snowflakes of the year, a winter walk and a return to a warm place. It appears from November 15 to the end of February, about 11 to 21 minutes.
- Winter Evening by the Fireplace: Warmth and Calm is a cozy evening visualization with a blanket, tea and a crackling fire. It appears in December, January and February, about 10 to 20 minutes.
For the busy moments in between, there's Acute Stress SOS and Overwhelm SOS: Becoming Steady Again, both short, and Understanding Stress and Overload if you'd like to understand why the season wears you out. You choose a length within each session's range before you start. The voices are AI voices. The app is in English and German. See how the app works, try it for free, no account needed.
Your health
This app is a wellness app and does not replace medical advice. If stress or low mood around the holidays last for weeks or make daily life hard, talk to a doctor. The NHS page on stress explains when to see a GP and where to get urgent help.
Sources
All pages accessed on September 25, 2026.
- American Psychological Association: 2023 Holiday Stress Survey Data Topline (December 2023). Online survey by The Harris Poll, November 14 to 16, 2023, 2,061 US adults, credible interval plus or minus 2.7 percentage points. All percentages on this page are from this report.
- NHS: Symptoms of depression in adults (page last reviewed July 5, 2023). "See a GP if you experience symptoms of depression for most of the day, every day, for more than 2 weeks."
- NHS: Get help with stress (page last reviewed March 6, 2026). When to see a GP.
- App sessions: "Advent, Advent: A Reflective Journey Through the Pre-Christmas Season", "The First Snow: A Winter Pause", "Winter Evening by the Fireplace: Warmth and Calm", "Acute Stress SOS", "Overwhelm SOS: Becoming Steady Again", "Understanding Stress and Overload", AI Meditation: Sleep & Calm, descriptions from the session files, duration ranges from the app's own estimator and home-screen dates from the app's season rules (
date_rangeand season tags in the session files,MeditationSessionManager.kt,ExploreScreen.kt), as read on September 25, 2026.
