With under 50 days until Christmas, it’s the perfect time to take a look at one final LEGO® seasonal set. Joining this year’s festive offerings is another set which can form part of your annual Christmas decoration and help countdown to the big day with a little help from Santa, no not the release of Avengers: Doomsday, but Christmas. This fun little set lets you count down the days until December 25th, so here’s a look at Santa’s Holiday Countdown.
Product Details
Set Name: Santa’s Holiday Countdown | Set Number: 40874 | Pieces: 873 | Theme: Seasonal
Number of Bags: Bags x 10 | Instructions: Paper booklet + Builder App | Stickers: sheet x 1 | Characters: N/A
RRP: £54.99 / 59.99€ / $59.99 / 99.99AUD / 84.99CAD
Availability: LEGO Stores & LEGO Online
Counting down to Christmas via the medium of LEGO bricks has been possible thanks to the annual range of Advent Calendars, but 2026 introduces a new option – a manually changeable countdown clock. The method is simple – two discs, housed within a festive chimney, which can be rotated to count days the days until Christmas. Each disc features a set of numbers from 0 to 9. Unfortunately, these are stickers, so getting them aligned is tricky, even more so due to each disc featuring two stickers. Each disc is connected to its own handle so they can be turned independently. I did find one disc would move slightly by just rotating the handle, but it’s easy enough to straighten out the numbers.
Once the numbers are in place, they become nestled in a chimney stack which is decorated with festive flourishes such as snow drifts, icy chunks, a stack of gifts and a holly wreath, which frames the opening where the numbers can be viewed.
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But to make the chimney really festive, a jolly looking Santa is found emerging from it or descending it. Regardless of his journey, I love the way he has been incorporated into the set, with his hands placed on the lip of the chimney built separately from the body; this gives Santa a dynamic pose.
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https://www.flickr.com/photos/bricksfanzflickr/55638922859/in/photostream/
Moving two discs may not seem exciting, and I guess their rotation could have been linked to making other parts of the set move, but that would overcomplicate a simple way to count down to Christmas. It’s a fun decoration with a purpose and something which can easily be stored away and brought out each year. The only criticism would be the stickers. Mostly due to the need to apply them perfectly without them being wonky. Santa’s Holiday Countdown is available now from LEGO.com and LEGO Stores globally.
The LEGO Group provided this set to BricksFanz for this review. However, the thoughts expressed in this review are those of BricksFanz and do not reflect those of the LEGO Group. Providing a set for free does not guarantee a favourable opinion of the set.
