After NBC’s Friends series began in 1994, the sitcom garnered critical acclaim as well as generations of dedicated fans. The show follows six best friends as they navigate their twenties living together in New York City.
Throughout its ten seasons, the show aired nine Christmas–and Christmas-adjacent–episodes–one each season excluding the tenth. For anyone looking for a humorous way to get in the holiday spirit, these “Friends” episodes are a great choice. With that, here are the series’ nine holiday episodes ranked from best to worst.
- Season 2, Episode 9: ‘The One With Phoebe’s Dad’
After realizing that she has no idea what her father looks like, Phoebe visits her grandmother on Christmas Eve in hopes of getting information. Joey and Chandler accompany her in hopes of getting last-minute Christmas presents as they had put shopping off all season.
When Phoebe’s grandmother gives her the address of her father’s house, the trio drives upstate–but Phoebe is reluctant to enter. She ultimately decides not to go in, and leaves the idea of her father as just that–an idea.
Despite taking place on Christmas Eve, this episode barely touches on the holiday, besides the fact that Joey and Chandler have procrastinated purchasing gifts. It is a great development of Phoebe as a character, though, and has the classic Friends charm.
- Season 5, Episode 10: ‘The One With The Inappropriate Sister’
When Joey gets rejected from an acting role, he turns to writing a screenplay instead, but struggles to find inspiration. Ultimately, he turns to writing about a group of friends living together in New York City…sounds familiar.
Rachel pursues a man named Danny, who has a uniquely close relationship with his sister that the friend group agrees is uncomfortably intimate. This eventually leads to the pair splitting up.
Much like the previous episode, there isn’t an overt Christmas theme–only Phoebe’s holiday job as a bell-ringer for charity. However, the humorous dynamic between Danny and his sister, particularly as the friends watch it play out, is definitely worth the watch.
- Season 8, Episode 11: ‘The One With Ross’s Step Forward’
Rachel deals with pregnancy symptoms and is attracted to every man she meets, which makes for an awkward doctor’s appointment when a young, twenty-something physician replaces her typical OB-GYN.
When Ross’s new girlfriend, Mona, wants to send out holiday cards together, Ross reluctantly says yes. Later on, Mona asks Ross where they are in their relationship and it prompts an uncomfortable string of conversations. When Ross stumbles over his words and ends up accidentally insulting Mona, he gives her a key to his apartment as a way to smooth things over. However, he soon regrets this decision when he realizes that he gave her the only key to his apartment.
This episode shows the true awkwardness and uncertainty of a new relationship, particularly for an already awkward character like Ross, so this episode is perfect for a humorous holiday watch.
- Season 4, Episode 10: ‘The One With The Girl From Poughkeepsie’
When Ross begins dating a woman who lives hours away from New York City, he struggles to find quality time with her.
While adjusting to her new job as head chef in a local restaurant, Monica feels unwelcome by her coworkers and struggles to put her foot down. Joey offers to get a waiter position simply so Monica can fire him, but ends up enjoying the job.
When Rachel confesses that she wants a “fling” with someone, or simply to begin casual dating, Chandler tries to set Rachel up on a date with a coworker of his, ultimately gathering a list of over fifty men who fight over her. When Rachel does end up going on a date, Chandler mistakenly tells his chosen coworker that Rachel is looking for a more serious relationship, which scares him away.
This episode has humorous storylines for all of the friends, which makes it a great watch for both the holidays and not. While this episode isn’t overly Christmas-y, the classic Friends humor makes up for it.
- Season 3, Episode 10: ‘The One Where Rachel Quits’
As the title suggests, Rachel quits her job as a waitress at Central Perk, intending to pursue her fashion career, but she struggles to find a new job.
When Ross breaks a Brown Bird’s (similar to a Girl Scout) leg, he spends the holidays selling cookies to help the injured girl win a trip to space camp. After failing to sell them by going door-to-door, he resorts to selling many boxes to the friends as well as using a newly discovered “cheat code”–NYU students with the “munchies.”
After discovering that the Christmas tree farm throws the old, dying trees into the chipper, Phoebe demands that the group boycott the farm. This causes trouble as Joey is employed at the farm, but he makes it up to her: as a Christmas surprise, Joey brings home all of the brown, dead trees to the apartment as decoration.
Throughout the series, the friends often find themselves in bizarre situations that would almost never happen in real life–this episode is a great example of that. Both Ross’s endeavors as a Brown Bird and Phoebe’s boycott of the Christmas tree farm make for a hilarious watch.
- Season 6, Episode 10: ‘The One With The Routine’
When Joey begins dating a professional dancer named Janine, he lands himself a role on Dick Clark’s “New Year’s Rockin’ Eve” special, along with Ross and Monica. While Joey plans to kiss Janine as the clock strikes midnight, Ross and Monica seek out the camera’s attention, going to lengths to do so. After their “normal” dancing fails, they turn to their sibling dance duet from eighth grade–which indeed lands them a spot at the top of the dancing platform, front and center.
Back home, Rachel and Phoebe coerce Chandler into helping them find where Monica hid their Christmas presents, in hopes of finding a gift that can top hers.
This episode shines a literal spotlight on the sibling dynamic between Monica and Ross, as well as the absurdity that is their iconic dance routine. The pair choreographed it while in middle school, yet they still remembered it and pulled it out just for Rockin’ Eve.
- Season 1, Episode 10: ‘The One With The Monkey’
As New Year’s Eve approaches, the friends make a pact to have a kiss-free New Year party as they are all single. This pact soon fails after Phoebe is asked out by a scientist named David. Chandler also reveals that he invited his ex-girlfriend, Janis, to the party. Joey admits that he met a woman at work, and soon enough everybody has a date to the party–except for Ross. Feeling left out, Ross decides to bring his newly adopted pet monkey to the occasion.
The night goes awry for many of the friends as Phoebe and Chandler break up with their significant others, Monica’s date shows up mourning the loss of his grandmother, Rachel’s boyfriend misses his flight home and can’t make it to the party, and Joey’s date shows up with her two young children. After many shenanigans, the friends ring in the new year kiss-free after all.
This episode was the first holiday special that the series aired, and it features a humorous love plot line for all of the friends, which makes for quite the hilarious watch.
- Season 7, Episode 10: ‘The Holiday Armadillo’
When Ross’s young son Ben joins the friends for the holidays, the friend group bands together to entertain him for his first Christmas away from his mother. For context–Ross and Carol, Ben’s mother, split up in the series’ first season when Carol came out as a lesbian. Ross makes it his mission to teach Ben more about Hanukkah during the holiday season–but his mission goes south when Ben misses the typical Christmas traditions that he has with his mother.
In hopes of finding a Santa suit to surprise his son, Ross visits a local toy store but is unsuccessful. He does, however, come home with an armadillo costume and a bright idea to get his son excited by both Christmas and Hanukkah: A Holiday Armadillo who is half-Jewish, just like Ben. This crazy idea works great–until Chandler shows up dressed as Santa Claus and Joey dresses as Superman.
This episode reigns supreme in my opinion, both as a Christmas special and as a regular episode of the series. It shines a light on Ross and Monica’s Jewish heritage, while simultaneously incorporating the comfort of the typical Friends humor.
- Season 9, Episode 10: ‘The One With Christmas In Tulsa’
When Chandler spends both Christmas and New Year’s Eve away at work in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Monica feels jealous. As he spends Christmas Eve with another woman–a young coworker of his–he reflects on his relationship with Monica and past Christmases that the pair spent together. When he realizes that he cared more about Monica than his job, he comes home for Christmas to surprise her and the gang–quitting his job in the process.
This episode was the last Christmas episode aired on the series, and even though it lacks the humorous dynamic that other episodes have, the relationship dynamic between Monica and Chandler moves it up in my ranking. In my opinion, “Mondler” goes down as one of the best TV couples ever, and this episode puts them front and center.
From top to bottom, the Friends holiday specials go down as some of the funniest episodes, both of the series and to other sitcoms’ holiday features. Between the iconic humor and sarcasm of the series and the comfort of the holiday cheer, any one of these episodes is sure to put you in the holiday spirit.
