Free personalised letter from Santa, and how to make your own

Your own letter-from-Santa maker, ready every Christmas

You'll describe the letter maker to a free AI assistant, paste what it writes into a file, and open it in your browser. Then give it more ways of saying things, proper designs and a print button, one step at a time.

• A short form for your child's name, age, town, a good deed, something to work on and a wish
• A letter written from your answers, with a few different wordings and three tones
• Words you can change before you print
• Three or more print designs, drawn by the browser with no picture files
• A clean print that fits one page of A4 or US Letter, or saves as a PDF
• A Nice List certificate and a fold-up envelope to match

Good for: parents and grandparents who want a letter that mentions the real things their child did this year, and anyone who makes letters for a whole family, class or nursery group each December.

What you need

Build it in six steps

Step 1 gives you a simple version that works, and each step after it adds more. The demo at the top of this page is roughly what you'll have once you've done every step. Yours will look a bit different, because the AI writes its own version each time.

1. Ask for the letter maker

   Copy this prompt into your AI assistant:

   Copy this promptCopy

   I don't know how to code. Please make me a "letter from Santa" maker that runs in a web browser, so I can print a personalised letter for a child.
   
   Requirements:
   - ONE single HTML file (HTML, CSS and JavaScript together), no external libraries, no internet needed. I will save it and double-click it.
   - A form on the left with: child's first name, age, town (optional), something good they did this year (I'll write it to finish "I was proud when you..."), something to keep working on (to finish "Keep trying to..."), a wish they've mentioned, and a brother, sister or pet's name (optional).
   - On the right, a preview of the letter on a sheet of paper, updating as I type. Use built-in sentences with the answers slotted in. Do NOT use any AI or online service to write it.
   - The letter starts "Dear [name]," and has a friendly opening from the North Pole, a line about their age, a paragraph praising the good thing, a gentle paragraph about what to keep working on, a line saying the wish is written in Santa's big book (without promising it), a hello to the brother, sister or pet, a line about the town, a warm goodbye, a signature from Santa and a P.S.
   - If an optional box is empty, leave that sentence out so the letter still reads well.
   - Fill the form with a made-up example child so I can see it working straight away.
   
   Please give me the complete file in one code block, then tell me in simple steps how to save and open it.

   Copy the code, paste it into your text editor, and save it as santa-letter.html. Double-click it and change the example answers to see the letter change.

2. Make it sound less like a template

   Children compare letters with their friends and cousins. A few different ways of saying each thing, and a choice of tone, keep every letter fresh.

   Copy this promptCopy

   That works, thank you. Please make the letter feel less like a template:
   - Write three different versions of every sentence (opening, age, good thing, keep working on, wish, brother/sister/pet, town, goodbye, sign-off and P.S.), all warm and in British English.
   - Add three tones I can choose with buttons: "Classic" (cosy and kind), "Funny" (silly jokes about the elves, Rudolph and mince pies) and "Short, for little ones" (very short, simple sentences in big text).
   - A "New wording" button that picks different versions. Typing in the form should NOT change the wording I've chosen, only the details.
   - Put the finished letter in a big text box I can edit before printing. If I've edited it, don't overwrite my changes when I change the form; show a "Start again from my answers" button instead.
   - Fix the small things: capital letter for the name, no full stop doubled up if I type one, and the brother/sister/pet line should say the right thing for a dog, a cat or a baby.
   
   Send me the complete updated file.

   Always ask for the complete file. Replace everything in santa-letter.html, save, and refresh the tab (F5 or Cmd+R).

3. Make it look like it came from the North Pole

   This is the fun part. The browser can draw everything itself, so you don't need any pictures.

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   Please add three print designs I can switch between with buttons that show a tiny preview of each:
   1. "North Pole parchment": old cream paper with darker edges, a letterhead saying "From the desk of Santa Claus, The Workshop, North Pole", and a red wax seal with ribbons in the bottom corner.
   2. "Candy cane": a red and white striped border with a thin green stripe, sprigs of holly in the top corners, and a festive red heading.
   3. "Snowy night": a band across the top with a dark blue starry sky, a big moon with Santa's sleigh and reindeer as a silhouette across it, snowy hills and a little house with a lit window.
   Draw everything with CSS and inline SVG. No image files and nothing downloaded.
   For Santa's signature, use a handwriting font called "Mrs Saint Delafield" from Google Fonts, with "Brush Script MT", cursive as the fallback so it still works offline.
   Draw the letter at real paper size in millimetres, and scale it down to fit the preview, so the preview matches the printout exactly.
   
   Send me the complete updated file.

4. Print it on one clean page

   A letter that spills onto a second page, or prints with the form on it, spoils the magic. This step makes the printout just the letter.

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   Please add a Print button and a proper print stylesheet:
   - When printing, show ONLY the letter, with no form, buttons or page headers. Use @page with margin 0.
   - Add a choice of paper size, "A4" and "US Letter", and set the @page size to match. Pick US Letter automatically if the browser's language is en-US.
   - The letter must always fit on exactly one page. If the words are too long, shrink the text size a little at a time until it fits, and if it still won't fit, show a gentle message asking me to shorten it.
   - Make the colours and backgrounds print, using print-color-adjust: exact.
   - A "Save as PDF" button that shows a short tip ("choose Save as PDF as the printer") and then opens the print window.
   
   Send me the complete updated file.

5. Add a Nice List certificate and an envelope

   Copy this promptCopy

   Please add two optional extra pages, each with a tick box, that print after the letter on pages of their own:
   - A "Nice List Certificate" in the same colours as the chosen design: "This is to certify that [name] has been checked twice and is officially on Santa's Nice List for Christmas [year]", the good thing they did, a gold rosette drawn in SVG, and two signatures, one from Santa and one from the Chief Elf. Shrink the name if it's long so it stays on one line.
   - An envelope to cut out and fold: a rectangle about 152 by 112 mm (big enough for the letter folded in half twice) with four flaps around it, a solid cutting line and dotted fold lines. On the front, "To [name]" in the signature font, the town, a North Pole stamp and a postmark. Put a small wax seal on the tip of the top flap, turned upside down so it's the right way up once folded. Add one line of instructions at the top.
   - Tabs above the preview to switch between the letter, the certificate and the envelope.
   
   Send me the complete updated file.

6. Remember next year, and work on phones

   Nothing should be stored unless you ask. A tick box lets you keep the answers for next Christmas, on your own device only.

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   Please finish it off:
   - By default, save nothing at all. Add a note saying "Nothing you type is saved or sent anywhere."
   - Add a tick box, "Remember my answers for next year". Only when it's ticked, save the answers in localStorage. Unticking it deletes what was saved.
   - Make it work on a phone: the form first, then the design buttons and the preview underneath, nothing scrolling sideways, and buttons big enough to tap.
   - Add three more designs: "Rudolph" (a friendly reindeer face with a glowing red nose and a trail of hoofprints), "Vintage telegram" (a yellowed telegram form with the words typed in capitals and STOP at the end of each sentence), and "Simple" (white paper with a thin gold border and a small gold star).
   
   Send me the complete updated file.

Quick fixes

Twist it into something else

The same form, sentences and print designs work for lots of magical post. Change the first prompt to make:

Real details, kept at home

Plenty of websites will send a letter from Santa, but many ask for an email address or charge for the nicer designs, and they all need your child's name and details. Yours is one small file that keeps everything on your own computer, mentions the things your child really did, and can be reused every year. It's a lovely project to make in an evening once the children are in bed.

What to build next