Bring holiday cheer into your home with these fun and beautiful sugar cookies. Some are best for decorating, such as the cut-out Santa's Sugar Cookies, some are soft, chewy drop cookies, such as the lemon-kissed Old-Fashioned Sugar Cookies, and others are a little out of the ordinary, like Hawaiian Snowballs! Everyone will find something to love in this collection of our best Christmas Sugar Cookies.

These cut-out sugar cookies will be the star of your holiday treat offerings. You can make them in varying shapes and sizes, and decorate them to reflect the festive season with sprinkles, edible glitter, and colored frosting or royal icing. Remember to sprinkle flour on your cookie cutters to keep the dough from sticking. You can store the cookies in an airtight container for up to a week.

Make a batch of chocolate or vanilla dough and use our fun decorating ideas to create a nearly endless number of charming cookies.

Try one of our cutout cookie variations:
Stained-Glass Snowmen
Sugared Wreaths
Stained-Glass Wreaths
Fluted Wreaths
Cookie Houses
Christmas Trees

Grated lemon zest adds fresh flavor to traditional cut-out sugar cookies. The dough is made in the food processor, so preparation is a breeze.

Make your own menagerie with this sugar cookie recipe. Feel free to experiment with any shaped cutters you like (even intricate ones); freezing the cut cookies before baking will help them keep their shape.

If you desire a classic chewy sugar cookie, this is it. These giant drop cookies are perfect to dunk into a glass of milk. A touch of sour cream gives them a moist texture. The recipe can easily be doubled, and the dough can be frozen, too.

The warmth of ground cinnamon makes these rolled sugar cookies stand out. The cookies can be decorated before baking with colored sprinkles, or decorate after baking, using a paste of confectioners' sugar and water to affix nonpareils or whichever candies you desire.

Cocoa powder gives these big, chewy cookies a deep chocolate flavor. Thanks to the combination of butter and shortening in this recipe, the cookies have a rich flavor and hold their shape well, too.

This basic, all-butter recipe for cut-out sugar cookies can be cut and decorated any way you like. Follow the how-to instructions to create the Christmas-themed cookies shown here, or experiment with your own decorating ideas. The cookies can be stored at room temperature for up to a week.

Crystallized ginger, lemon zest, and fresh mint add excitement to basic sugar cookies. They can be stored in an airtight container for up to 5 days, making them perfect for gift-giving.

Lime juice and zest lend a tropical, tangy twist to this rolled sugar cookie recipe. Simply cut the dough with flower-shaped cookie cutters or any other shapes you like. After baking, sift some confectioners' sugar on top of each cookie for an easy, pretty decoration.

Think of this cookie as a dressed-up snickerdoodle. With a little lemon zest in the mix, some cinnamon sugar on top, and sliced almonds to decorate with, these sugar cookies transform into lovely sand dollars.

These sugar cookies are simple to make, but their taste is intriguing. The recipe calls for unusual ingredients, including olive oil and orange zest, which are sure to delight your taste buds.

If you seek a thin, delicate, and beautiful cookie, look no further. The elegant design is created by carefully cutting out tiny shapes with an aspic cutter to create a doily pattern, after the dough has been rolled out and chilled. These intricate, crisp cookies are perfect for Christmas gift-giving.

This is the perfect cut-out sugar cookie to decorate with holiday cheer. The recipe makes a substantial sugar cookie that acts as a great base to embellish with frosting, royal icing, sprinkles, and candy decorations. Note: This recipe is used to make the charming Santa Cookie.

Basic sugar cookie dough is embellished with some freshly roasted macadamia nuts and dried pineapple for a tropical Hawaiian touch. Rolled into a ball shape and dusted with confectioners' sugar, these cookies look like snowballs.

These big, chewy sugar cookies are made with a simple butter dough that has hints of lemon zest and brown sugar. A double sprinkling of sanding sugar creates a crackly top.