As merry as Christmas maybe, some of us just can’t get enough of our holiday dose of horror films. Whether you want to watch a great horror classic or a low budget flick, we’ve got you covered. For those of you who want to get comfy under the blankets with popcorn this Christmas while watching great holiday horror, we’ve gathered our top picks for you. Here is a list of the top 25 Christmas horror movies ranked according to IMDb ratings.
1. Black Christmas (1974)
- Director: Bob Clark
- Writer: Roy Moore
- Cast: Olivia Hussey, John Saxon, Margot Kidder, Andrea Martin
- IMDB Ratings: 7.2/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 71%
- Streaming Platform: MX Player
At the onset of their winter holidays, a group of sorority sisters starts receiving smutty phone calls from anonymous numbers. Initially, one of the girls tries to goad him. But when the mysterious caller starts to threaten her, she backs off. Soon girls start disappearing and eventually found dead. Although word gets around about a killer being on the loose, no one knows who he might be preying on next. Black Christmas is one of the best Christmas horror movies if you want to feel your heart racing.
2. Gremlins (1984)
- Director: Joe Dante
- Writer: Chris Columbus
- Cast: Zach Galligan, Howie Mandal, Phoebe Cates Kline, Dick Miller
- IMDB Ratings: 7.3/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 85%
- Streaming Platform: Youtube
An electronic device salesman wants to buy his son an exclusive gift. When he finally does find one at a place called Chinatown, the shopkeeper seems unwilling to sell him the gift. After much reluctance, he sells him the “Mogwai” on the condition that he must not expose them to light, or water, nor feed them anytime past midnight. However, on being unable to keep his promise, a gang of Gremlins break through the entire city and cause chaos on the eve of Christmas.
3. Krampus (2015)
- Director: Michael Dougherty
- Writers: Todd Casey, Zach Shields, Michael Dougherty
- Cast: Adam Scott, Stefania LaVie Owen, Toni Collette, Emjay Anthony
- IMDB Ratings: 6.2/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 66%
- Streaming Platform: YouTube
According to ancient European folklore, Krampus is warned to be an ugly deadly horned beast who tortures children during the merry time of Christmas. When a dispute breaks out amongst Max’s dysfunctional family, he loses his festive cheer which unleashes the Krampus’ wrath on him. As the fearsome monster’s rage keeps surging, it is up to the Engel family to come together and save each other from their doomed fates.
4. Silent Night, Deadly Night (1984)
- Director: Charles Sellier
- Writer: Michael Hickey
- Cast: Robert Brian Wilson, Lilyan Chauvin, Tara Buckman, Britt Leach
- IMDB Ratings: 5.9/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 43%
- Streaming Platform: VUDU and Youtube
Silent Night, Deadly Night is about a young boy who witnesses both his parents’ gruesome murders at hands of a man in a Santa Claus costume. However, growing up as an orphan surrounded by Catholics, he soon transforms into a killer Santa himself. Although the movie has been around a minute, it still has its own audience who admire the movie’s grisly drama.
5. Tales from the Crypt (1972)
- Director: Freddie Francis
- Writers: William Gaines, Johnny Craig, Al Feldstein
- Cast: Joan Collins, Ralph Richardson, Ian Hendry, Peter Cushing
- IMDB Ratings: 7/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 90%
- Streaming Platform: Tubi & PopcornFlix
A group of tourists visits the ancient Catacombs and gets lost inside them. Inside, they meet the eerie Crypt Keeper, who one by one, tells them all their fates. All the grim stories consist either of murders or some other gruesome death. What if the Crypt Keeper’s words actually came true?
6. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale (2010)
- Director: Jalmari Helander
- Writer: Jalmari Helander, Petri Jokiranta, Sami Parkkinen
- Cast: Jorma Tommila, Tommi Korpela, Onni Tommila, Jonathan Hutchings
- IMDB Ratings: 6.7
- Rotten Tomatoes: 90%
- Streaming Platform: VUDU, Amazon & YouTube
Pietari and his friend Juuso have the idea that neighborhood mountain drilling led to the discovery of Santa Claus’ tomb. However, this Santa is unlike the cheery old man that gifts us presents every Christmas break. In fact, he is a slaughter-house in himself and a real Christmas horror is about to take place. They must find out soon about this sinful Santa before more children disappear and one hell breaks loose. Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale is one of the best Christmas horror movies that you can watch on this joyful occasion of Christmas.
7. Inside (2007)
- Director: Julien Maury, Alexandre Bustillo
- Writer: Alexandre Bustillo, Julien Maury
- Cast: Beatrice Dalle, Natalie Roussel, Alysson Paradis, Dominique Frot
- IMDB Ratings: 6.8/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 85%
- Streaming Platform: NA
Inside (2007) is full of torture, thrill, and gore. A traumatized psychopath tortures a pregnant widow by wielding scissors at her on the eve of Christmas. The sheer barbarity, however, does not hide away the otherwise sentimental message connected to the movie. Inside (2007) is a great horror movie to watch if you want to feel that rush and thrill of suspense.
8. Jack Frost (1997)
- Director: Michael Cooney
- Writer: Michael Cooney, Jeremy Paige
- Cast: Scott MacDonald, Christopher Allport, Shannon Elizabeth, Stephen Mendel
- IMDB Ratings: 4.6
- Rotten Tomatoes: 7%
- Streaming Platform: VUDU & Amazon
A well-reputed serial killer, Jack Frost, has finally been caught and is being driven to get executed. However, on the way, the truck carrying him encounters an unnatural accident. Consequentially, he transforms into a monstrous snowman and soon, starts on his killing spree. Soon bodies start piling up killed in the most grisly manners. Now it is up to the Sheriff, Sam Tiler, to stop Jack Frost before the psychopath turns his killings into a massacre.
9. Silent Night, Deadly Night 2 (1987)
- Director: Lee Harry
- Writers: Lee Harry, Joseph H. Earle
- Cast: Eric Freeman, James Newman, Elizabeth Kaitan, Robert Brian Wilson
- IMDB Ratings: 3.7/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 25%
- Streaming Platform: VUDU & Amazon
Amongst the many Christmas horror movies, the Silent Night, Deadly Night movie series is one of the best. It has murders, blood, thrill, and makes a perfect Christmas time horror watch. After the first of this series, its sequel pretty much goes along the same storyline. The killer Santa Claus’s younger sibling takes after his older brother and continues his wicked legacy of mass murders in Santa suit.
10. The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)
- Director: Henry Selick
- Writer: Caroline Thompson
- Cast: Tim Burton, Ken Page, Danny Elfman, William Hickey
- IMDB Ratings: 8/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 95%
- Streaming Platform:
There are many animated Christmas horror movies, The Nightmare Before Christmas is one of the most entertaining movies that you will not be disappointed watching.
The film follows Jack Skellington, the reputed pumpkin king of Halloweentown, who has grown tired of the same old routine of frightening the real-world people. However, to his surprise, he slips up Christmastown where people lived happy and cheery lives. When he plans to abduct Santa Claus and dominate over the town, he realizes that the best of plans can go south and finds himself in a very difficult situation. Will he succeed though?
11. Scrooge (1951)
- Director: Brian Desmond Hurst
- Writer: Noel Langley
- Cast: Alastair Sim, Michael Hordern, George Cole, Mervyn Johns
- IMDB Ratings: 8.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 85%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
Ebenezer Scrooge is a crude man who does not understand the joy of festivals, especially ones like Christmas. However, he bitterly agrees on leave for his clerk to spend with his wife and family. He ends having a nightmare where he is visited by his deceased wife and told about how he would be visited by other dead people to straighten his cold-hearted penny-pinching self.
12. The Signal (2007)
- Directors: David Bruckner, Dan Bush, Jacob Gentry
- Writers: David Bruckner, Dan Bush, Jacob Gentry
- Cast: David Bruckner, A. J. Bowen, Anessa Ramsey, Dan Bush
- IMDB Ratings: 6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 59%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
Ben and Mya are in love but their relationship is at a dead end as Mya is married and hasn’t been able to find the courage to leave her ghastly husband. When an unexpected haul starts transforming people into mass murderers, the couple ends up together while being on the run.
13. Edward Scissorhands (1990)
- Director: Tim Burton
- Writer: Caroline Thompson
- Cast: Johnny Depp, Dianne Wiest, Winona Ryder, Anthony Michael Hall
- IMDB Ratings: 7.9/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 90%
- Streaming Platform: Disney+ Hotstar
Vincent Prince, a scientist, creates an animated human being and names him Edward. But his master dies before finishing him up, leaving kind and benign Edward with his peculiar appearance and a pair of scissors for hands. However, a kind saleswoman takes pity on him and brings him home where he eventually falls for her teen daughter. Although all seemed well, Edward’s scissor hands got him into more trouble than he could comprehend.
14. Mickey’s Christmas Carol (1983)
- Director: Burny Mattinson
- Writers: Alan Young, Burny Mattinson, Don Griffith, Alan Dinehart, Tony Marino
- Cast: Alen Young, Clarence Nash, Hal Smith, Will Ryan
- IMDB Ratings: 8.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 100%
- Streaming Platform: Disney+
Mickey’s Christmas Carol is Charles Dickens’ novel with a twist of Disney in it. Ebenezer Scrooge thinks Christmas is a sham and despises it. But he is forced to think otherwise when he is visited by the ghost of his former employee to warn him about the three other spirits he will be visited by. Will Ebenezer Scrooge ever alter his Christmas spirits?
15. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
- Director: Victor Fleming
- Writers: Bert Lahr, Jack Haley
- Cast: Judy Garland, Bert Lahr, Ray Bolger, Jack Haley
- IMDB Ratings: 8/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 98%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
The Wizard of Oz is an American fantasy musical movie. When huge tornado tears apart the state of Kansas, Dorothy along with her dog, Toto, are swept away to the mystical land of Oz. There while visiting the wizard, they come across several other handicapped creatures. In order to help them, the wizard asks them to bring him the Wicked Witch’s broom. Overall, the 1939 movie is an entertaining watch for the Christmas season.
16. Dead of Night (1945)
- Directors: Alberto Cavalcanti, Robert Hamer, Basil Dearden, Charles Crichton
- Writers: Angus MacPhail, T. E. B. Clarke, John Baines
- Cast: Michael Redgrave, Sally Anne Howes, Mervyn Johns, Roland Culver
- IMDB Ratings: 7.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 93%
- Streaming Platform: Vimeo
Walter Craig is an architect and he is pretty good at what he does. In order to see his potential client, he drives up to Pilgrim’s Farm but feels oddly familiar with the place. Inside, he comes across a few other people who, though foreign, seem strangely familiar. He convinces himself that he had dreamt about them in the past and shares his thought with the rest of the group. But they too have something to share with him in return. Is it going to be a business trip or does it have more in store for Walter Craig
17. The Phantom Carriage (1921)
- Director: Victor Sjöström
- Writer: Victor Sjöström
- Cast: Tore Svennberg, Victor Sjöström, Astrid Holm, Hilda Borgstrom
- IMDB Ratings: 8.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 100%
- Streaming Platform: Vimeo
The Phantom Carriage is an exquisite classic adaptation of a novel by Selma Lagerlöf, a Nobel Prize winner. Although a horror tale, the story concerns an alcoholic who has had a low-morale life. On New Year’s Eve, the driver of an eerie carriage makes him take a look back at his life. Will he have a shot at redemption?
18. A Christmas Horror Story (2015)
- Directors: Brett Sullivan, Grant Harvey, Steven Hoban
- Writers: Sarah Larsen, Doug Taylor, Pascal Trottier, James Kee, Jason Filiatrault
- Cast: Zoe De Grand Maison, Rob Archer, William Shatner, George Buza
- IMDB Ratings: 5.7/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 83%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
This Christmas season, you are looking for a horror movie to spend indoors with, A Christmas Horror Story might just be the one for you.
As merry as Christmas towns should be, the residents of Bailey Downs have been ushered by a zombie outbreak. Even Santa Claus is under threat as Krampus, malicious spirits, and zombie elves take over the small town. Will anyone make it out of this horrifying fate?
19. The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)
- Director: Brian Henson
- Writer: Jerry Juhl
- Cast: Michael Caine, Steve Whitmire, Dave Goelz, Jerry Nelson
- IMDB Ratings: 7.7
- Rotten Tomatoes: 76%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
Ebenezer Scrooge, a grumpy miserly man, who hates the merriment of Christmas and finds it purposeless is visited by the ghosts of three Christmas spirits – past, present, future. Will the crude man ever make his way to redemption? While the Muppets and Kermit the Frog perform various classics, the Muppet Christmas Carol is one of the best Christmas horror movies to watch.
20. Black Christmas (2006)
- Director: Glen Morgan
- Writers: Glen Morgan, Ray Moore
- Cast: Katie Cassidy, Andrea Martin, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Michelle Trachtenberg
- IMDB Ratings: 4.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 14%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
The holiday spirit of a group of sorority sisters is crushed when they are left stranded on their campus house in the midst of a heavy snowstorm. Lurking inside those walls is a notorious killer who is on for a human hunt. Will they survive or fall prey?
21. The Children (2008)
- Director: Tom Shankland
- Writer: Tom Shankland
- Cast: Stephen Campbell Moore, Rachel Shelly, Hannah Tointon, Eva Birthistile
- IMDB Ratings: 6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 76%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
Amongst the many thriller horror movies available, The Children is one of the best Christmas horror movies to watch. Two families take a trip to a high-end English estate to spend quality time together. However, the children start behaving weirdly and soon transform into psychotic murderers after being infected by a disease.
22. A Christmas Carol (1938)
- Director: Edwin L. Marin
- Writer: Gene Lockhart, Reginald Owen
- Cast: Gene Lockhart, June Lockhart, Reginald Owen, Terry Kilburn
- IMDB Ratings: 7.5/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 100%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
One of the first of A Christmas Carol’s featuring Ebenezer Scrooge’s character as a crude and blighted man who does not share the joys of Christmas. However, he is to be visited by the Christmas spirits- past, present, and future to teach him a lesson so he may earn a shot at merriment.
23. The Day of the Beast (1995)
- Director: Álex de la Iglesia
- Writers: Álex de la Iglesia, Jorge Guerricaechevarría
- Cast: Alex Angulo, Maria Grazia Cucinotta, Santiago Segura, Armando de Razza
- IMDB Ratings: 7.4/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 75%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
A death-metal fan and a clairvoyant, together, help a pastor reach out to the Antichrist of Madrid on the occasion of Christmas. This movie has a dark comical angle to it with shrieks of horror thrown at you every now and then. For a cozy Christmas eve, this is just the movie you better watch.
24. March of the Wooden Soldiers (1934)
- Directors: Charley Rogers, Gus Meins
- Writers: Victor Herbert, Hal Roach, Frank Butler, Nick Grinde
- Cast: Oliver Hardy, Charlotte Henry, Henry Brandon, Felix Knight
- IMDB Ratings: 7.2/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 100%
- Streaming Platform: Youtube, Amazon Prime
March of the Wooden Soldiers is one of the older movies when bogeymen were still a thing. Nevertheless, the movie is still a pretty horrific one and could be a great watch for a Christmas night indoors. Ollie Dee and Stannie Dum live in rented rooms in Toyland in Mother Peep’s shoe. However, when Mother Peep is unable to make pay her mortgage to Silas Barnaby, the devil himself, he blackmails her by threatening to marry Little Bo-Peep. Later, they recruit an army of wooden soldiers to fight Barnaby’s bogeymen, troglodytes.
25. Dead End (2003)
- Director: Jean-Baptiste Andrea
- Writers: Fabrice Canepa, Jean-Baptiste Andrea
- Cast: Lin Shaye, Mick Cain, Alexandra Holden, Ray Wise
- IMDB Ratings: 6.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 75%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime
Although last from the list, the horror film Dead End is one of the best Christmas horror movies to watch during the festive season. If you are up for gore and thrill, this could be a great way to spend your Christmas under covers. When a family takes on a quicker road to a Christmas Eve gathering, they witness a string of ghostly hints indicating trouble ahead. After an almost fatal accident with another car, Frank picks up an eerie hobo along with her newborn. With the new addition to their journey, the number of people in the car gradually begins to wane as a chain of gory and murderous events starts to occur.
Honorable Mentions
- Anna and the Apocalypse
- Christmas Evil
- Wind Chill
- Full Moon
- Zombie Apocalypse
- Home Invasion
The long list of Christmas horror movies has no end as will not be the list of watchers during your Christmas vacation this holiday season. So for those of you looking forward to grabbing a horror flick, we wish you a merry Christmas party!
