How much to spend on each child.

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We have 4 children two teens and and 8 and 12yr old.
I'd say we've always gone a bit overboard and I've explained this year that we will be cutting back (more the older ones), but can I just ask, how much do people generally spend per child for Xmas?

I think we spend about £1500 on Christmas in total each year.

£200 for a couple of nice days out / theatre trips plus bits like football club party etc
£300 on food inc food bank donation and hosting on Xmas Eve
£60 Christmas Eve box
£800 presents (4 DC plus 4 adults, around £100 per DC plus a family present around £200, £50 each per adult)
£100 stockings
£40 school (set of books per DC's class)

The key answer is 'what you can afford'. Never go into debt to pay for gifts.

Nope my kids get these things only at xmas, we don't buy them throughout the year as we a very low income.

I just cant see any possible way you get into the teen years without your kids having aquired these things over the 12+ previous xmases unless you only buy tat you throw away that doesnt grow with them (from about 8+ kids grow mostly out of toys and into technology).

That why adults dont need much either, the older you get the more you already aquired what you need... unless your just updating for the sake of it or throwing things away.

I mean if someone wants to spend £1k on their 13 year old then fine thats there business entirely good on them being able to buy a brand new Iphone and PS5, Im not knocking parents for what they are spending but the attitude of saying teens are 'expensive' and you HAVE to spend lots more on them is simply incorrect its still a choice too.

No of course you don’t have to spend thousands of pounds on your teenagers. I didn’t when DD was a teen. She’s a young woman now. But what you appeared to be struggling to understand was why people spent more on a teen than a baby. And of course there are many plausible reasons for people to have a higher budget for a teen than a baby whether they are on a low, middle or high income.

Spending on my kid’s Christmas £750 each I have 3 kids

Ours varies from year to year for dd. This year is a bit higher than normal and in all will be about £220. She gets stocking gifts and one main (or two smaller mains depending on what it is).

We don’t have a budget, we try and keep the number of presents even for each child. This year I have been keeping a tally though, like everyone else I’m trying to keep costs down, this is what I’ve spent so far..

DD1 6yrs - £134.58 - This includes main presents bought in the Amazon prime day sales. I will probably only pick up a few more Christmas themed stocking fillers now.

DD2 9yrs - £16.98 on 5 presents bought in sales. Her main presents are 2 experiences costing £90, I also have a £30 game ready to order, will get some Xmas themed stocking fillers.

DD3 11yrs - £23.95 - on 7 presents, again £90 will be spent on 2 experiences and will even up for Christmas themed stocking fillers.

I will bulk out each pile with things like pjs, oodies and clothes.

im going to have to try really hard not to keep buying as I do get carried away each year,

Ive budgeted £500 for my DS this year. We save for Xmas all year round

£50 per child. We are very vocal as a family about reducing waste, reusing, second hand etc. rarely buy new gifts.

I'm planning on £50 for the younger ones and £100 cash for the older ones, and a stocking each. Not stressing about buying presents that won't be played with and a waste of money this year.

I've got three little girls, come Christmas they'll be 6, nearly 4 and 2. I'm spending between £80-£100 on each of them, I'm an all-year-round bargain hunter so I'm pretty good at making it stretch!

It varies so much for us. What I can buy for £100 for my toddler, wouldn't buy 1 Lego set for my 13yr old. Because of this, I no longer worry about spending the same amount per child, but instead try to ensure they have the same number of gifts to open.

Mine are adults now but we’ve never set a budget and we’ve never price matched ( 6 yr age gap ) , some years we’ve spent a few thousand other years we’ve spent a few hundred , it depends what they would like .

It's impossible to answer this. It depends on age and income. We used to spend £100 per dc when they were little and we earned less, and managed quite well with second hand bits.

We now spend more, maybe £300-400 per dc (which I will probably get shot for admitting), but we earn a lot more, and the dc are older and want more expensive things.

In my family Christmas presents are generally fairly cheap anyway. - big presents are reserved for birthdays

A typical child will get their sack (pillowcase) of small things from santa in the morning (lots of very cheap stuff maybe £20 overall) - hung on the bedpost or on the foot of the bed

Then one main present from each other person under the tree. Probably £25 or so from each parent, about £10 value from siblings (and they will have got their siblings something similar) and whatever the grandparents want to spend.
Kids also get their parents and grandparents small presents too (but naturally when younger present for mum is bought with dads money, and vice versa when older they just get a bonus pocket money amount to buy all their presents with)

We've reigned it in massively this year and only spent around £5,000 on our 16 month old.

Is that all!? Bit tight! 😂

We spent around £1,500 on each child from age 15+ to when they leave home. DS is 22 and this is his first Christmas he's not home so budget for him has dropped to £850 but out of that I buy for his girlfriend. We never buy things for them throughout the year, except their birthdays. Their annual clothes budget gets split between Xmas and birthday too, so that's part of the £1,500 budget. Along with laptops, games, consoles, TV, mobile, bedroom furniture etc. Some parents buy those things regardless, we never did. Everyone does Christmas differently and that's okay. Our son's first Xmas we spent £10 on him for 1 x toy.

£1500 per child?

Some people don't even earn that money in a month, let alone spunk £3k+ on Christmas.

I've spent about £100 total on dd aged 13. She gets stuff from family members. I could afford more, but tend to spend on things like theatre tickets during the year which I rather than give as presents.

I don't have a budget they're older now, give me a list each and I get as much of it as I can, I'm ashamed to say if there's something on there I don't like like a horrible pair of trainers i don't get them 🤣🤣🙈🙈

Some people earn that in a day, some save for it all year ... it's all relative. I've never gone into debt for Christmas, they have 1 other relative that buys them a present at Christmas. We also donate plenty to local charities, I volunteer at a local charity, we do respite fostering for teenagers and at the end of the day, it's our choice. They don't get brand new cars or the latest smartphone but many do. Both of our children work part time jobs whilst at University and my husband & I love their excitement still re Christmas. 🥰

But to call people tight because they aren't spending £1500 per child is poor form.

Not really sure, haven’t added it all up. Probably around £350-400 per child, but that does include some quite expensive bits for their hobbies that I probably would have had to buy at some point anyway. It also includes a family experience that we’ve wanted to do for ages so that’ll be part of their present too.