The latest emotional response data from System1’s Test Your Ad platform and Competitive Edge database has revealed the driving forces behind this year’s top-performing Christmas ads: a strong sense of place, compelling storytelling, and inclusive casting.
As the festive season unfolds, this year’s best Christmas ads are winning audiences over with immersive storytelling and the comfort of familiar, relatable characters. Across 2025’s top campaigns, happiness is the dominant emotion, accounting for around 60% of responses, while neutrality drops to just 25%, roughly half the level seen in everyday advertising.
The clear takeaway for brands is that Christmas advertising is doubling down on a “sense of place”, rich storytelling and consistency. Location and context are not just backdrops this year; they are doing real work to deepen the narrative, build consistency and cultural relevance. That shows up in smarter re-airs, tighter cross-channel worlds, and the return of characters viewers already know and love, helping campaigns feel more cohesive, distinctive, and emotionally sticky.
Each year, System1 tests every Christmas ad through its Test Your Ad platform, measuring real consumer emotions to predict commercial impact. Ads are scored on a 1.0-Star to 5.9-Star scale, with just 1% earning the coveted 5-Star rating.
Jon Evans, chief customer officer at System1 and host of the Uncensored CMO podcast said: “This has been a record-breaking year, and honestly, we’re not surprised. Beautiful sets, nostalgia-driven movie moments, and some truly incredible human stories. Brands are leaning into what works with emotion, memory and creativity that sticks. You can clearly see the impact of our research on Compound Creativity, the Cost of Dull and the Left and Right-brain principles from Orlando Wood’s Lemon and Look out. This isn’t luck; it’s research-led strategy paying off in plain sight. The bar is higher than ever and it’s exciting to imagine where it goes next.”
2025 Christmas Leaderboard
The ads are ranked by Star Rating (brand-building potential), with Spike Rating (short-term sales potential) the tiebreaker for ads with the same Star Rating.
Aimee Edwards is a former contributor at B&T, where she reported on media, advertising, and the broader cultural forces shaping both. Her reporting covers the worlds of sport, politics, and entertainment, with a particular focus on how marketing intersects with cultural influence and social impact. Aimee is also a self-published author with a passion for storytelling around mental health, DE&I, sport, and the environment. Prior to joining B&T, she worked as a media researcher, leading projects on media trends and gender representation—most notably a deep dive into the visibility of female voices in sports media.
