We live in a miraculous world of one-click retail and zippy shipping speeds, but come holiday season, all of the orderliness we expect from online shopping can be thrown into madness. The closer it gets to Christmas, the trickier it is to get timely delivery.
Clocks are ticking—so Quartz has compiled a list of cutoff dates for guaranteed Dec. 25 delivery that are currently being promised by the US’s biggest online retailers. This one’s for all the last-minute holiday gift-buyers out there.
Amazon
Non-Prime members have until Dec. 19 to place Christmas-guaranteed orders, while Prime members have all the way up until Christmas Eve (Dec. 24)—but only for items that are eligible for same-day or two-hour delivery.
Amazon can be a little complicated. To be safe, Prime members should still make all purchases on Dec. 22 or before.
Best Buy
Wednesday, Dec. 21, before 10:30am central time.
Target
For standard shipping: Dec. 19
Premium: Dec. 22
Express: Dec. 23
Rush: Dec 24
Walmart
For standard shipping: Tuesday, Dec. 20.
Two-day shipping for select toys (free): Wednesday, Dec. 21.
Rush delivery: Thursday, Dec. 22.
Other popular retailers—
Delivery companies
FedEx will get your package delivered by Christmas if you send it before Dec. 22 (Standard Overnight, Priority Overnight, and First Overnight) and for a little extra cash Dec. 23 (SameDay City) and Dec. 25 (SameDay and SameDay City Priority).
For UPS: Dec. 22 (Next Day Air) and Dec. 23 (Next Day Air, Saturday Option).
And for USPS: Dec. 20 (First-Class Mail), Dec. 21. (Priority Mail), Dec. 22 (DDU Drop Ship), and Dec. 23 (Priority Mail Express Service).
In general, for both personal shipping and online retail orders, you can expect prices to go up—sometimes even double—every day during the week leading up to Dec. 25, so it’s a smart idea to lock down your holiday shopping as soon as possible, before things get truly hectic.
And sadly: Free shipping day, Dec. 16, is already past.