End of Event
We have revealed creator names at the main 2025 collection and the 2025 Madness collection. (Reveals seems to be working as intended - fingers crossed!) The New Year's Resolutions 2026 collection will shortly open for posting. The structured parts of this year's event are over - but you can keep posting recs at yuletide and commenting on works to let their creators know you enjoyed them.

Please comment!

Please check that you have commented on any gifts you received - you can search on your username at the Yuletide 2025 collection, or the Yuletide Madness 2025 collection, or check your own personal AO3 gifts page. We understand not everyone can comment immediately due to late-December commitments or unforeseen events, but please comment when you can to acknowledge the gifts you requested. Comments and kudos on other Yuletide works are also very welcome.

Thank you from mods and team
Thank you to everyone who took part in Yuletide 2025: writers, requesters, betas, pinch hitters, community coordinators, chatters, hippos and the hippo pool.

Thank you from mods to the tagmod team: these are the assistants who research and process tags, proofread announcements, brainstorm author questions, contribute specific fandom knowledge, check stories, and discuss how to solve problems.

We look forward to running Yuletide again in 2026!

And now
There's a reveals post up at the participant community, if you want to chat about your writing process now that you can.

New stories can be posted to the New Year's Resolutions 2026 collection.

Feedback
As always, general feedback is welcome!

This year, we increased the nominations allowance from 4 fandoms to 5 fandoms. Since that worked okay, we anticipate continuing that next year.

We introduced a limited Do-Not-Match system. That was manageable so we're interested in repeating the same process next year - though it's possible it could grow beyond our capacity, so we don't want to guarantee it indefinitely.

We changed the deadline time and the reveals times. Those changes were based on mod availability, and it was really helpful to us to have multiple mods awake at the point of deadline and reveals. We'll need to base future deadline and reveals times on that priority, but since that isn't the only factor making deadlines and reveal times effective, we're interested to hear feedback too.

Next Yuletide, we may review franchise rules to make sure we're being consistent and fair. We may also specifically review rules for music videos.

As requested by a participant, we will also be adding a section to our rules on AO3 listing what you can expect from the mod team’s communications and conduct. We have had an internal Code of Conduct for several years but agree it would be helpful to share a public version.

Again, feedback on these or other topics is also welcome.

Thank you for helping to make Yuletide 2025 a wonderful event.

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Schedule, Rules, & Collection | Contact Mods | Participant DW | Participant LJ | Pinch Hits on DW | Discord | Tag set | Tag set app
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At push of button, this year's Madness collection has 227 works in 183+ fandoms.

Madness collection

Main collection

AO3 wranglers have processed a lot of new fandoms; in the main collection, the 992 that appeared on the fandoms page at reveals have become 1065! Thanks to everyone who has helped make wranglers' jobs easier by using canonical tags, tags from the tag set, or other recommended tags, as appropriate in each case.

If you've written in a new fandom that isn't wrangled yet, we encourage you to use Unspecified Fandom as a tag to help people find your work; many works originally tagged this way now have wrangled fandoms, in which case, you can take the tag off if you wish.


As in the last post:
Commenting
Please comment on your gift(s) to let your writer know you appreciate them. Please also comment on anything else you enjoy!

Recs
Making work recommendations is a tradition. Please see more information at the participant community about where you can post your recs.

Problems
If there is something wrong with your gift or you have another concern, please contact the mods at yuletideadmin@gmail.com.

Anonymity
Yuletide is designed to be an anonymous exchange until January 1. Please don't give away what you've written. When logged in, you can, if you want, reply to comments on your own works, and you will show up as Anonymous Creator until the authors of the collection are revealed.

The Yuletide event concludes at 9pm UTC, 1 January 2026. At that time we will reveal creator names at both the main and Madness collection, and also open the new New Year's Resolution collection.

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Schedule, Rules, & Collection | Contact Mods | Participant DW | Participant LJ | Pinch Hits on DW | Discord | Tag set | Tag set app
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Yuletide 2025 Collection Is Live Here!

Enjoy 1539 works in 992 fandoms! (The number will go up as wranglers canonize fandoms - this will take a little time, though.)

The reveals process takes a little while to work in a collection of this size; if a story in the collection is still a mystery work an hour after opening, please let us know.


Finding works
You can find your own gifts on your AO3 gifts page: https://archiveofourown.org/users/YOUR-NAME-HERE/gifts, or by searching the box at the top of the collection works page for the full name you signed up with, or by checking your email if you get email notifications from AO3. Note: your email notifications may bundle together, and it might look like you only got one gift, when in fact you got more.

You can browse the collection by tags or by fandoms. Some fandoms are new and may not show up immediately (wranglers are working on this) or where you expect them; please check labels such as Original Work, 19th Century Historical RPF, Object and Concept Anthropomorphism, and Unspecified Fandom. More info about Unspecified Fandom here.


Anonymity
Yuletide is an anonymous exchange until creator reveals January 1. Please don't give away what you've written. When logged in, you can, if you want, reply to comments on your own works, and you will show up as Anonymous Creator until the authors of the collection are revealed.


Commenting!
Please comment on your gift(s) to let your writer(s) know you appreciate them. We also recommend commenting far and wide to spread the comment joy around! You may enjoy the challenge of a comment bingo card [update for this year's link!].

AO3 changed default comment settings last year. If you want to make sure people can comment on your gifts when they aren't logged in, you may need to change a setting on your work. More information here, under 'Your comment settings'.


Recs
Making work recommendations is a tradition. Please see more information at the participant community (yuletide) about where you can post your recs.


Madness
For those still writing, the 2025 Yuletide Madness collection will stay open for new stories to be posted for 24 hours. It will close for posting, and open for reading, at 9pm UTC 25 December. If you're looking for prompts, there's a roundup of links here.


Problems
If there is something wrong with your gift or you have another concern, please contact the mods at yuletideadmin@gmail.com.

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Schedule, Rules, & Collection | Contact Mods | Participant DW | Participant LJ | Pinch Hits on DW | Discord | Tag set | Tag set app
Please either comment logged-in or sign a name. Unsigned anonymous comments will be left screened.

We're so close! This year, Yuletide reveals are at 9pm UTC on 24 December - that has changed since last year.

COUNTDOWN TO REVEALS

Tips

Formatting

Getting your story up on AO3 is the main thing. But, now it's there, please check it over again before reveals - especially to see if you've left in any bits you're going to replace like [xxx]. But also please check for legibility - check for text with no gaps between paragraphs, or text with massive gaps between paragraphs. Click/tap for more information...

Issues often arise when posting from Google Docs. You can use this Google doc or this extension to help convert your document to HTML for a better copy/paste experience. The problem with italics and punctuation can also be solved by including the punctuation inside the italics tags.

If your story has no space between paragraphs, check to see if you pasted your story into the HTML tab instead of the Rich Text tab. Paragraph spacing occasionally gets added to places like summaries when you edit them, so you might want to double-check that also!

( Below the cut are examples of spacing that’s too big, too little, and juuuuust right. )

If the spacing in your work is wacky, we recommend editing it to avoid putting off potential readers.

Your comment settings

In recent years, AO3 changed the default settings for comments on your work. If you want to allow comments from guests/readers who aren't logged in, check your work. Click/tap for info...

Before July 2024, the default setting for comments allowed on your work was "Registered users and guests can comment." In July, AO3 changed that so that the default setting is "Only registered users can comment." That means that if you posted your Yuletide work without changing the settings, no one can comment on your work without logging into their account.

If that matches your preferences, that's great. If you'd like to make it possible for anyone who reads your work to comment, please edit your work and change the setting. This setting is directly above the Work Text field.

Tagging and "Unspecified Fandom"

Please tag your work accurately, including warnings. We encourage you to use "Unspecified Fandom", alongside a specific tag, to help users find a fandom that isn't wrangled yet. Please reach out if you're not sure how to tag a new or non-canonical fandom. Click/tap for info...

For warnings, Choose Not to Warn is a valid warning tag. You may wish to use the end notes if there is content that you don't want to spoil with specific tags.

If your fandom is completely new, please use the tag that was approved into the tag set. These tags were formulated to meet archive guidelines and will be more quickly canonized, so that your work can be found from the Fandoms page of the collection. We recommend you also use "Unspecified Fandom", because this will show up in the fandoms list immediately, even if the actual fandom tag isn't wrangled straight away. Please do not tag your work with Unspecified Fandom as the only fandom tag. Instead, tag with both Unspecified Fandom and the actual fandom tag.

If your fandom is a subset of a canonical tag (like an RPF fandom that belongs in Actor RPF, or a season of a Let's Play fandom that has an overarching canonical), we recommend tagging with the parent fandom. Please reach out to mods if you're not sure that's what you should do.

Your author's notes

Please keep these positive. Please don't identify yourself - no social media links! Also, please don't apologize for your work, tell your recipient all about what a tough time you had writing, or otherwise ask your recipient to accept a negative sentiment along with their gift.

Treats!!

Additional works are warmly welcomed for participants signed up to Yuletide* and all additional pinch hitters.

Please check these guidelines for whether to post treats in the main Yuletide collection (closes Dec 24) or the Yuletide Madness collection (closes Dec 25). Unlike in some exchanges, Yuletide's treating period does not continue indefinitely. Please get your treats in before reveals - or you'll need to wait until next year.

Not all users accept treats

Please do not create treats for: Arsenic, BluebirdCT, Budouka, couch1141, theblakery, Witgifu. This list is subject to change, as you can change the setting to accept treats (or not) at any time. Check with mods if unsure.

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Schedule, Rules, & Collection | Contact Mods | Participant DW | Participant LJ | Pinch Hits on DW | Discord | Tag set | Tag set app
Please either comment logged-in or sign a name. Unsigned anonymous comments will be left screened.