A woman was left in floods of tears at work after receiving a Secret Santa gift from a colleague which was mocked as the “worst” Secret Santa gift ever.

The Christmas calamity quickly gained traction online after the woman took to X to share a photo of her gift, which earned her an outpouring of sympathy from several apologetic social media users. The tradition of Secret Santa typically involves anonymous gift exchanges within a defined budget, yet it appears very little effort went into user @chonkychihuahua’s present.

She took to Twitter saying: “Having such a horrible day and my Secret Santa gift just arrived and it’s so terrible I burst into tears when I opened the package.” She later posted a picture of the flimsy A5 journal with just ‘Merry Christmas’ written on it and added: “I’m the lowest paid person here and I still put more effort than this.”

The gift was so bad the woman considered lodging a complaint ( 
Image:
Getty Images)
As her story gained more attention, she considered whether to lodge a complaint, Manchester Evening News reports. She wrote: “Like I get it’s supposed to be about the sentiment but I’m feeling the wrong kind right now.”

Her disappointment with the skimpy journal, which reportedly didn’t even contain 40 pages, sparked a broader debate on the ethos of festive gifting, with one user commenting: “Not even 40 pages. I would’ve been so mad.”

Others took to the comments to share their own similar tales, revealing the disparity often felt between the intention and real impact of the gifts. One person said: “Girl I bought my Secret Santa my favourite book and wrote a hand written letter explaining why I liked it and why I think they’d like it. And I got a pair of socks…”

One user admitted feeling somewhat foolish for overspending on the tradition saying: “I feel incredibly stupid for dishing out £1k on a gift because I don’t know how much you’re supposed to spend.” The festive fail inspired others to share their own less-than-stellar Secret Santa experiences.

One unhappy participant said their Secret Santa “forgot” to buy something entirely, writing: “When we did secret Santa in 12th grade, I received frozen ready-to-cook cheese corn nuggets that my friend grabbed before leaving the house because he forgot that we were doing secret Santa.”

Another expressed some understanding, but was ultimately frustrated by poorly thought-out gifts, commenting: “Honestly I get that, receiving gifts with 0 thought put into them sucks worse than not receiving anything, like what do I do with this waste of space now”.