Christmas in New York City
Christmas Day 2026 is a Friday. Listings below cover December 1 through December 27.
December is the month New York sells itself the hardest, and the music is the best part of it. Radio City runs 230 shows. Every church with a decent organ runs a Messiah. Here is the whole holiday calendar, and which of it is free.
In Manhattan 15 listings
27 datesChristmas Spectacular Starring the Radio City RockettesRadio City Music Hall · Dec 1 – 27›Fri Dec 4Cindy Blackman SantanaBlue Note›Fri Dec 4LPR Presents: Ana Gasteyer Sugar & Booze Holiday SpectacularThe Town Hall›Sat Dec 5Cindy Blackman SantanaBlue Note›Sat Dec 5New York Holiday Swing with Svetlana & The New York CollectiveBlue Note›Sun Dec 6Cindy Blackman SantanaBlue Note›Sun Dec 6Manhattan For The Holidays: Wainwrights Return!The Town Hall›Fri Dec 11Z100's Jingle BallMadison Square Garden›Fri Dec 18Becky Robinson's Holiday SpectacularThe Town Hall›Sun Dec 20A John Waters ChristmasCity Winery›Sun Dec 20The Del Fuegos: Home For The Holidays 2026City Winery›Mon Dec 21A John Waters ChristmasCity Winery›Mon Dec 21The Del Fuegos: Home For The Holidays 2026City Winery›Thu Dec 24The World Famous Harlem Gospel Choir - Christmas Eve ShowSony Hall›Fri Dec 25The World Famous Harlem Gospel Choir - Christmas ShowSony Hall›In Brooklyn 1 listing
Wed Dec 23Hip Hop NutcrackerKings Theatre›Queens, the Bronx and Staten Island 4 listings
Further out, and usually easier to get a ticket to.
Fri Dec 4A Rock'n Holiday SpectacularSt. George Theatre›Fri Dec 11The Christmas ShowSt. George Theatre›Sat Dec 12The Christmas ShowSt. George Theatre›Sun Dec 13The Christmas ShowSt. George Theatre›Radio City, and whether it is worth it
The 2026 Christmas Spectacular runs November 4 through January 4, with 230 performances. That is not a typo and it is the reason the show dominates every holiday search in this city.
It is a 90-minute precision dance show in the most beautiful room in America, and it is aimed squarely at people who have never been. If you have kids, go once. If you have been, the room is still the draw, and Radio City books actual concerts the rest of the year when the Rockettes are not in residence.
Run dates from Playbill, on MSG's own announcement, checked 2026-10-24.
The Messiah problem
Every December, somewhere between a dozen and twenty organisations in New York perform Handel's Messiah, and they are not interchangeable. The sing-along versions hand you a score and expect you to use it. The period-instrument performances are shorter, faster and stranger than the big choral ones, and better. Trinity Church, St. Thomas, the big concert halls and half the borough choral societies all run one. Pick on the ensemble, not on the date.
The same is true of Nutcrackers and of carol services. The free ones in churches are often better sung than the ticketed ones, because the choir is the point rather than the box office.
The tree, briefly
The 2026 Rockefeller Center tree lighting is Wednesday, December 2. The ceremony is televised, the plaza is closed off, and the viewing is worse in person than on a screen. Visiting hours for the rest of the season had not been announced when this was written.
The better move, every year, is to go see the tree on a weekday morning in the second week of December, before 9am, when you can actually stand in front of it. Then walk four blocks to a church running a free lunchtime recital, which several do all month.
Lighting date from Time Out New York, 2026-09-29. Hours were listed as still to be announced at that point.
What is free
More than people expect. Lunchtime recitals in midtown churches run most of December. Many of the carol services are free or pay-what-you-can. Tree lightings in every borough are free and much easier than Rockefeller. The holiday markets have music most weekends. None of this needs a ticket, and the listings above will not capture most of it, because free church music does not get posted to ticketing sites.
Christmas 2027
December 1 through december 27. The listings and everything above land on this same page when the time comes, so there is nothing new to find and nothing to bookmark again.
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