--- title: "Where to Hide Christmas Presents (and the List, Too)" description: "Where to hide Christmas presents so kids won't find them, plus how to hide the gift list: Amazon orders, Alexa alerts, lock screens and order emails." url: "https://santawishlist.app/blog/where-to-hide-christmas-presents" author: "Joey Bolohan" published: "2026-10-25" updated: "2026-10-25" --- # Where to Hide Christmas Presents (and the List, Too) Where to hide Christmas presents comes down to one rule: pick places your kids never open, because the closet everyone uses is the first place they look. You know the moment. Your 6-year-old points at a box in the toy aisle and says "I want THAT." Two weeks later it is in your cart, and now you have two things to hide: the box, and every trace of the order. This guide covers both, from real hiding spots to the Amazon, Alexa, phone and email leaks that give gifts away. ## TL;DR - The usual spots get found: in a 2021 Neighbor survey of 1,000 Americans, 49.9% had had a hidden gift found, and the bedroom closet was both the top hiding spot and the top place people search. - Car trunks feel clever but are not: 21% of early gift finds happened in a trunk, second only to the bedroom closet. - Use boring places kids never open: a box labeled "tax records," an adult suitcase, or a grandparent's house for big items. - The gift list leaks more than the boxes: give each adult their own Amazon login, turn off Alexa item titles, hide lock screen previews and filter order emails. - Store anything with button batteries or magnets up high. The CPSC says a swallowed button battery can burn through a child's throat in as little as two hours. ## Where to hide Christmas presents: what most parents do (and where kids look) When parents choose where to hide Christmas presents, most pick the bedroom closet, the spare room, the coat closet, under the bed or in the car trunk. Those are also the places kids search first. According to a 2021 Neighbor survey of 1,000 Americans aged 16 and up, run by Pollfish, 53% hide gifts in a bedroom closet, and 25% say a bedroom closet is the first place they would look. | Spot | Hide gifts there | Search there first | Where early finds happened | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Bedroom closet | 53% | 25% | 26% | | Spare room | 31.5% | 6% | 10% | | Coat closet | 26% | 9% | 9% | | Under the bed | 26% | 22% | 8% | | Car trunk | 25% | 15% | 21% | | Someone else's house | 14% | not listed | not listed | The same Neighbor survey split almost evenly: 49.9% had had a gift found and 50.1% never had. The car trunk is the trap. Only 15% of snoopers check it first, yet 21% of early finds happened there, because a trunk gets opened for groceries, sports bags and school projects all month long. Under the bed is the opposite problem: 22% of people look there first. **49.9%**: of people in the 2021 Neighbor survey had had a hidden gift found early (Fox News) ## Where to hide Christmas presents from kids: the best places The best answer to where to hide Christmas presents is a spot with three traits. Your kids have no reason to open them, the spot is out of their reach, and it does not look like it is hiding anything. A dull label, an adult's suitcase or a relative's house beats any closet, because kids skip whatever looks like grown-up paperwork or grown-up stuff. ### Spots kids never open - A box labeled something dull: "Tax records 2019," "Cords" or "Baby clothes, 0 to 3 months." - An adult suitcase, zipped and pushed to the back of your own closet. - A plain storage bin behind off-season clothes on your top shelf. - An empty detergent box on the shelf above the washer. - A cooler or camping bin in the garage. Nobody camps in December. ### Spots outside the house - A grandparent's or neighbor's house, the safest choice for bikes and play kitchens. Agree on a pickup night well before Christmas Eve. If grandparents are also buying, see [our guide to gifts from grandparents](/blog/gifts-from-grandparents). - Your workplace, if you have a locker or office closet and it is allowed. ### Match the spot to your kid's age - Ages 3 to 5: height is enough. A high shelf in a room they do not play in works. - Ages 6 to 8: they open things now. Use labeled boxes and closed bins, not open shelves. - Ages 9 to 10: assume they are searching on purpose. Move gifts out of the house, or wrap them the day they arrive in plain paper with a tag to an adult. A box "for Grandpa" gets ignored. ## How to hide Christmas delivery boxes from kids Hiding Christmas delivery boxes matters as much as hiding the toys, because a stack of boxes on the porch tells a kid that something is coming. They do not need to see the toy to start doing the math. The fix is to change where boxes land, get to them first, and make sure the outside of the box says nothing. - Change the delivery spot: ship to your work address, a parcel locker, store pickup, or a relative who is home during the day. - Get to the porch first. Bring boxes in before school pickup. - Break boxes down right away and peel off the shipping label. A flat box in the recycling bin can still show a picture of the toy. - Watch for printed boxes. Some toys ship in their own branded carton with no plain outer box. Choose gift wrap or a plain box at checkout when the store offers it. - Wrap or rebox the gift the day it arrives. A wrapped box with a fake tag is much harder to guess than a box shaped like a dollhouse. ## How to hide Amazon orders and Alexa alerts from kids To hide Amazon orders from kids, give each adult a separate Amazon login through Amazon Family and turn off Alexa's item titles. Kids find gifts on screens more than in closets now. According to a 2025 Pew Research Center survey of 3,054 US parents of children 12 and under, 68% say their child uses a tablet, 61% a smartphone and about 4 in 10 a voice assistant like Alexa or Siri. Amazon Family (formerly Amazon Household) lets two adults and up to four children share Prime benefits while each person keeps a separate sign-on. Amazon says adult orders stay private from everyone else in the home. If the family tablet is signed in to one shared account, though, anyone holding it can see the whole order history. > **Archiving an order is not hiding it** > > Archiving only moves an Amazon order off the default "Your Orders" list. It still shows under Archived Orders, and Amazon does not let you delete order history. Use archiving to tidy up, not to fool a 9-year-old who knows where to tap. 1. **Open the Alexa app**: Use the phone that controls your Echo devices. 2. **Go to Amazon Shopping notifications**: Tap More, then Settings, then Notifications, then Amazon Shopping. 3. **Turn off item titles**: Switch off the option that lets Alexa say or show item titles, per Amazon's own instructions. 4. **Switch off delivery alerts too**: On the same screen, turning off delivery notifications stops the Echo from announcing arrivals at all. Remember that anyone can still ask Alexa where a package is. ## How to hide shipping alerts and order emails on shared devices Shipping alerts and order confirmation emails give away more Christmas gifts than most parents expect. A notification can pop up on a locked phone sitting on the counter, and an order email is a full gift list with photos. The fix is two settings: hide lock screen previews, and filter store emails out of the inbox. ### Lock screen previews on iPhone On iPhone, go to Settings, then Notifications, then Show Previews, and change it from Always to When Unlocked or Never. You can also set this per app, so do it for Amazon, Target, Walmart and your email app. ### Order emails in Gmail If your kids use your email on the family iPad, create a Gmail filter for messages from the stores you shop with. Set it to skip the inbox and apply a label like "Receipts." The emails are still in All Mail and in search, so a filter keeps them out of plain sight. It is not a lock. ## How to keep your Christmas gift list private The safest way to keep a Christmas gift list private is to store it on your phone behind your passcode or Face ID, not on the fridge or in a shared notes app. Most parents keep a running list of what each kid asked for and what is already bought. That list is often the easiest thing in the house to find. According to Apple Support, iPhones on iOS 16 or later can lock a note in Apple Notes with your phone passcode and open it with Face ID or Touch ID. A few limits apply: shared notes, tagged notes and notes synced from Gmail or Yahoo cannot be locked. If you choose a separate Notes password and forget it, Apple cannot recover those notes. The harder part is capturing the item in the first place. A photo of the box with the price tag in the shot beats a note that says "the purple thing." Santa Wishlist was built for that aisle moment. Your kid says "I want THAT," you snap a photo and send it to Santa, and Santa writes back by name in seconds (the replies are written by AI). Quietly, the elves add the item to a hidden list for that child, with the photo, name, estimated price and store when it can tell, locked behind your PIN or Face ID. Each item has a "got it" checkbox, and you can export a plain text copy for grandparents. The list lives on your phone only, so a partner gets the export, not a shared live list. See [how it works](/how-it-works) or more on [kids' Christmas lists](/christmas-list). **Turn every "I want that" into a photo to Santa and a private gift list behind your Face ID. First 10 messages are free.** [Get Santa Wishlist](/get) ## Which Christmas presents to hide up high: button batteries and magnets Christmas presents with button batteries or small loose magnets should be hidden somewhere young children cannot reach, like a high shelf in an adult closet. That rules out under the bed and low bins in the playroom. A hiding spot is also a storage spot for weeks, so think about who could get into it. According to the US Consumer Product Safety Commission, a swallowed button battery "can burn through a child's throat or esophagus in as little as two hours." Remotes, light-up toys, musical greeting cards, battery packs that come apart and magnet building sets all count. If you think a child swallowed a battery, act right away: - National Battery Ingestion Hotline: 800-498-8666 - Poison Help: 800-222-1222 For more on keeping the season calm and safe, read about [Santa Wishlist safety](/safety) and [keeping the Christmas magic alive](/blog/keep-christmas-magic-alive). ## FAQ ### Where do most parents hide Christmas presents? The bedroom closet is the most common spot, used by 53% of people in a 2021 Neighbor survey of 1,000 Americans. Next come the spare room, the coat closet, under the bed and the car trunk. Because these spots are so common, they are also where people search first: 25% check the bedroom closet and 22% check under the bed. Source: [Fox News: Americans hide Christmas presents in a few obvious places](https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/americans-hide-christmas-presents-obvious-places) ### Is the car trunk a good place to hide presents? Not really. In the Neighbor survey, 25% of people hide gifts in a trunk, and 21% of early gift finds happened there, second only to the bedroom closet. Trunks get opened for groceries and sports gear all month, so gifts get spotted by accident. Source: [Fox News: Americans hide Christmas presents in a few obvious places](https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/americans-hide-christmas-presents-obvious-places) ### Can my kids see my Amazon orders? Yes, if they use a device signed in to your Amazon account, because anyone on that login can see its order history. Amazon recommends Amazon Family, where each adult has a separate sign-on and adult orders stay private from others in the home. Source: [About Amazon: How to hide your Amazon orders](https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/retail/how-to-hide-amazon-orders) ### Does archiving an Amazon order hide it? No. Archiving only removes an order from the default Your Orders list. It still appears under Archived Orders, and Amazon does not let you delete order history. A separate adult login through Amazon Family is the reliable fix. ### How do I stop Alexa from announcing what I ordered? In the Alexa app, go to More, Settings, Notifications, Amazon Shopping, and turn off the option that says or shows item titles. To be safe, also switch off delivery notifications on the same screen so the Echo does not announce arrivals. Source: [About Amazon: How to hide your Amazon orders](https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/retail/how-to-hide-amazon-orders) ### Where should I hide gifts that have button batteries? Somewhere small children cannot reach, like a high shelf in an adult closet, not under a bed or in a low bin. The CPSC warns a swallowed button battery can burn through a child's throat or esophagus in as little as two hours. Call the National Battery Ingestion Hotline at 800-498-8666 right away if you suspect one was swallowed. Source: [CPSC: Button Cell and Coin Battery Information Center](https://www.cpsc.gov/Safety-Education/Safety-Education-Centers/Button-Cell-Coin-Battery-Information-Center) ### How do I keep my Christmas gift list private on my phone? On an iPhone with iOS 16 or later, lock the note in Apple Notes so it opens only with your passcode, Face ID or Touch ID. Shared notes and tagged notes cannot be locked. Also set notification previews to When Unlocked so shipping alerts do not show on your lock screen. Source: [Apple Support: Lock notes on iPhone or iPad](https://support.apple.com/en-us/102537) ## Further reading - [Fox News: Americans hide Christmas presents in a few obvious places (Neighbor survey, 2021)](https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/americans-hide-christmas-presents-obvious-places) - [About Amazon: How to hide your Amazon orders](https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/retail/how-to-hide-amazon-orders) - [Pew Research Center: How Parents Manage Screen Time for Kids (2025)](https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2025/10/08/how-parents-manage-screen-time-for-kids/) - [Apple Support: How to lock or unlock notes on your iPhone or iPad](https://support.apple.com/en-us/102537) - [CPSC: Button Cell and Coin Battery Information Center](https://www.cpsc.gov/Safety-Education/Safety-Education-Centers/Button-Cell-Coin-Battery-Information-Center)