Christmas Out-of-Office Messages: 12 Templates You Can Copy (2026)

Choose a Christmas out-of-office message below, replace the dates and contact details, and paste it into Gmail. Each template tells senders when you’ll return and where urgent requests should go.

Jump to a template by need:

• Short: 3. Short
• Formal: 1. Formal
• Whole-office closure: 7. Office closed between dates
• Customer support: 5. Customer support
• Internal, for colleagues: 10. Internal
• Multilingual: 11. Multilingual

12 Christmas out-of-office templates

Each template is plain text, so it pastes cleanly into Gmail. Replace everything in square brackets, including in the subject line.

1. Formal

Subject: Out of office until [return date]

Thank you for your email. I'm out of the office from [first day] to [last day] for the Christmas and New Year holidays, and I won't be checking email.

I'll reply after I return on [return date]. If your message can't wait, please contact [colleague name] at [colleague email].

Kind regards,
[Your name]

2. Friendly

Subject: Away for the holidays, back [return date]

Hi, thanks for your message. I'm taking a proper break over Christmas and I'm back on [return date].

I'll work through my inbox in order when I'm back. For anything urgent before then, [colleague name] ([colleague email]) has you covered.

Happy holidays,
[Your name]

3. Short

Subject: Out until [return date]

I'm away for the holidays and back on [return date]. For urgent matters, email [colleague email].

4. With an emergency contact

Subject: Out of office: urgent issues go to [team or on-call name]

I'm out of the office from [first day] to [last day] and not reading email.

For anything that affects [service, site or system], please contact our on-call team at [phone number] or [on-call email]. They're available [hours, time zone]. Everything else gets a reply after [return date].

[Your name]

5. Customer support

Subject: We've received your message

Thanks for contacting [company] support. Our team is on reduced hours from [first day] to [last day], and replies may take up to [number] business days.

For help, visit [help center link]. If your service is down, call [support phone number], staffed [hours, time zone] through the holidays.

The [company] support team

6. Sales or account manager

Subject: Out of office until [return date]

Thanks for getting in touch. I'm away from [first day] to [last day].

Orders placed during this time will be processed from [date]. If you need a quote or a contract signed before year end, please contact [colleague name] at [colleague email] before [cut-off date].

Best,
[Your name]

7. Office closed between dates

Subject: [Company] is closed until [reopening date]

Thank you for your email. Our offices are closed from [closing date] to [last closed day] for the holidays, and we reopen on [reopening date].

We'll reply in the order messages arrived. For [type of emergency], call [phone number].

We wish you a peaceful holiday season.
The [company] team

8. Working reduced hours between Christmas and New Year

Subject: Limited availability until [date]

I'm working reduced hours between Christmas and New Year and checking email on [days] only.

For anything time-sensitive, please contact [colleague name] at [colleague email].

Normal hours resume on [date].

[Your name]

9. On extended leave over the holidays

Subject: On leave until [return month]

I'm on extended leave until [return date] and won't see this email.

[Colleague name] is looking after [project, accounts or area] while I'm away. Please resend your message to [colleague email] so it doesn't wait for my return.

[Your name]

10. Internal: for colleagues

Subject: Off until [return date]

I'm off from [first day] to [last day].

Handover notes for [project] are in [document or folder name]. [Colleague name] can approve [requests, invoices or deploys] while I'm away.

See you in the new year.
[Your name]

11. Multilingual

For clients who write in more than one language. Put the most common language first, and have a native speaker check any language you add.

Subject: Out of office / Fuera de la oficina / Absent du bureau

I'm out of the office until [return date]. For urgent matters, please contact [colleague email].

Estoy fuera de la oficina hasta el [return date]. Para asuntos urgentes, escriba a [colleague email].

Je suis absent(e) jusqu'au [return date]. Pour toute urgence, contactez [colleague email].

12. Light and festive

Subject: Out of office: back after the mince pies

Thanks for your email. I've stepped away from my inbox for the holidays and I'm back on [return date].

If it can't wait, [colleague name] at [colleague email] can help.

Wishing you a restful break and a good start to the new year,
[Your name]

How do you set a Christmas out-of-office in Gmail?

These steps set the reply on your own Gmail account. Google’s Gmail Help gives them for a computer:

1. Open Gmail and click Settings (the gear icon) at the top right, then See all settings.
2. On the General tab, scroll to Vacation responder.
3. Select Vacation responder on.
4. Enter the date range, subject and message.
5. Optionally, tick the box to send the reply only to people in your contacts.
6. Click Save Changes at the bottom of the page.

Gmail’s vacation responder in a Google Workspace account (Settings > General). Captured 5 Nov 2026.

From Google’s help page:

• It runs from 12:00 AM on the first day to 11:59 PM on the last day. So set the last day to the final day you’re away, not your first day back.
• Most people get it once. A sender gets it again if they write after four days while it’s still on (the settings screen says “at most once every 4 days”), or if they write again after you edit the reply, in which case they get the updated version.
• Spam and mailing lists are skipped. Neither gets a reply.
• Your signature is added below the reply. An End now banner at the top of your inbox switches it off early.

In our test organization, the settings screen also showed a checkbox to reply only to people in our organization. Tick it for template 10, so customers never see handover notes.

Sending from a shared address like support@ or info@? If it’s a Google Group, the steps above don’t cover it. Group owners and managers set group replies in Google Groups under Group settings > Email options > Auto replies. Google’s help page for this describes no start or end date, so note when to switch it off. Templates 5 and 7 work there too.

Add a Google Calendar Out of office entry for the same dates too: it has its own decline settings and decline message for meeting invites.

How can admins set an out-of-office for the whole company?

Google documents the vacation responder as a setting each user turns on in their own Gmail. To cover many people at once, you have three routes.

1. Ask everyone. Send the wording from template 7, dates filled in, a week before the closure. It’s free, but the request itself gives you no central record of who did it: you’d have to ask people to confirm, or check their settings yourself.

2. Script it. The Gmail API’s settings.updateVacation method sets a user’s responder, including start and end times and contacts-only or domain-only replies. Gmail API permissions apply per user, so Google’s guidance is a service account with domain-wide authority, allowlisted in the Admin console. GAM7 wraps this in a vacation command. We haven’t run the example below; it’s built from the syntax on the GAM wiki, so test it on one account first:

gam user test.user@example.com vacation on subject "Out of office until 4 January" textfile christmas.txt start 2026-12-24 end 2027-01-04

Set end to the day you reopen, then check the dates in the test user’s Gmail settings. Once it looks right, replace user test.user@example.com with ou_and_children_ns /Staff to cover everyone in that organizational unit and its sub-units.

3. Use a policy. Patronum is a Google Workspace management tool that applies user settings through policies. In the Patronum console, a user’s Settings tab has a Vacation section with a start date, an optional end date and an HTML message editor. Anything you set for one user can be set for many through a policy scoped to all users, an organizational unit or a Google Group, and macros resolve per user when it runs. A saved policy does nothing until you activate it, and policies run hourly by default, so activate it the day before the closure, not at 5 p.m. on Christmas Eve.

For someone who has left rather than gone on holiday, see setting an out-of-office for an employee who left: suspending an account stops new mail, which changes the steps. For other breaks, try our summer out-of-office templates.

Before you switch it on: a quick checklist

• The first and last days are right, and the last day is your final day off. Always set one, so January senders don’t get a Christmas message.
• Every bracketed placeholder is replaced, including a real return date, not just “after the holidays.”
• The colleague you named knows, and isn’t on leave the same week.
• No personal travel details: auto-replies go to strangers too.
• Internal details only go in an organization-only reply.
• Scripted or policy replies were checked on one test account, and the policy is activated.
• Any group address has its own auto reply, and someone is named to switch it off.

Sources

• Set up an out-of-office or vacation reply in Gmail, Gmail Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Show when you’re out of office, Google Calendar Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Manage vacation settings, Gmail API guide, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Set up auto replies for a group, Google Groups Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Method: users.settings.updateVacation, Gmail API reference, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• VacationSettings, Gmail API reference, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Migrate from the Email Settings API (domain-wide authority for settings), Gmail API guide, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Users: Gmail Send As, Signature, Vacation, GAM7 wiki, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Collections of Users, GAM7 wiki, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Configuring vacation (out of office) auto-reply for users, Patronum Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Creating a policy, Patronum Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• Patronum macros and lookup functionality, Patronum Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026
• When will my policy run?, Patronum Help, accessed 5 Nov 2026