Perfume Gifting Statistics 2026: Q4, Sets & Spend

Fragrance is one of the most-gifted categories in retail. Circana reports that 25% of US prestige fragrance sales happen in December alone, and that gift sets account for more than 25% of fourth-quarter prestige fragrance sales.²¹ Roughly one in five US consumers bought fragrance as a holiday gift in 2024.¹ Outside Christmas, US women’s prestige fragrance sales passed $0,5 billion in the three weeks to 17 May 2025, around Mother’s Day.³ In the UK, gift sets made up 16,8% of The Perfume Shop’s full-year 2025 sales.⁸ Each figure below is dated and traced to its source.

What share of perfume sales happen at Christmas?

December is the single biggest month for fragrance. Circana reports that 25% of US prestige fragrance sales occur in December.² December makes up about 60% of fourth-quarter fragrance sales, and the greatest concentration of December spending falls in the week before and the week of Christmas.¹ In Circana’s 2024 holiday outlook, the fourth quarter accounted for over 40% of annual fragrance sales in both prestige and mass retail.⁶

The two Circana figures cross-check. Dividing the December share (25%) by December’s share of the quarter (60%) gives about 42% of the year in the fourth quarter, a Scento analysis that sits inside Circana’s “over 40%”.

The UK follows the same pattern. Circana UK puts nearly half of annual fragrance sales in October to December.⁷ For US prestige fragrance, fourth-quarter sales were expected to exceed $4 billion again in 2025.¹

No panel publishes a fourth-quarter share for fragrance across continental Europe, so the UK figure is the closest European benchmark. Circana’s finding that the week before Christmas and Christmas week carry the most December spending shows how late many shoppers buy, and The Perfume Shop’s single biggest in-store trading day of the 2025 season was 23 December.¹⁸ For anyone giving perfume, the widest choice comes earlier, in November and early December, when stock of popular sets and delivery slots are still easy to find.

How many people give perfume as a gift?

About one in five US consumers bought fragrance as a holiday gift in 2024, according to Circana’s 2025 holiday purchase intentions research.¹ A year earlier, 18% of US consumers planned to give perfume or cologne for the 2024 holidays.⁶

A Statista survey released in October 2025 asked 2182 US holiday shoppers aged 18 and over how likely they were to buy a fragrance as a holiday gift that season.⁹

• 8% had already bought one.
• 21% were very likely to.
• 29% were somewhat likely to.
• 42% were not at all likely to.

Gifting is also how many people come to own perfume. YouGov found in November 2025 that 17% of American perfume users rarely buy perfume for themselves and instead give or receive it as a gift.¹⁰ Our perfume consumer behaviour statistics cover how people buy fragrance for themselves.

Are perfume gift sets popular?

Gift sets are a large part of holiday fragrance demand. In the US, they represent over 25% of prestige fragrance sales in the fourth quarter, according to Circana.¹ In UK prestige beauty, fragrance gift sets were the fastest-growing sets in October 2024, up 20%, according to Circana UK.⁷

The Perfume Shop gives a retailer’s view. Gift sets made up 16,8% of its full-year 2025 sales, up from 15,7% in 2024, and online demand for sets rose 62% at the seasonal peak.⁸

• 202415,7%
• 202516,8%

The Perfume Shop full-year results, January 2026.⁸

Smaller formats are growing fastest. US prestige sales of mini and discovery fragrance sets rose 41% from January to September 2025, according to Circana.⁴ Shoppers want variety before they commit to a full bottle. Our guide to luxury perfume gift sets looks at which sets are worth buying.

The growth of minis and discovery sets fits how perfume is given. A giver rarely knows the recipient’s taste for certain, and a set of small sizes lowers the risk of choosing the wrong scent. It also lets the recipient wear each perfume for a few days before deciding which one deserves a full bottle.

Which perfumes are gifted most?

No global ranking of gifted perfumes exists, so retailer data is the best guide. At The Perfume Shop, a UK fragrance retailer, Dior Sauvage, Carolina Herrera Good Girl and Chanel Coco Mademoiselle led Christmas 2025.⁸ Carolina Herrera La Bomba and Prada Paradigme were among its strongest performers of the season.⁸

The Perfume Shop sold 1.58 million bottles between 30 November and 24 December 2025, up 6% year on year.⁸ That is about 63 000 bottles a day. Its strongest week was 14 to 20 December, and its single biggest in-store trading day was 23 December.⁸

Celebrity scents rarely make these lists. In Klarna’s Black Friday 2025 data, Sweet Tooth by Sabrina Carpenter was the only celebrity fragrance in the beauty top 10.¹⁵

How much do people spend on gifts?

US consumers planned to spend $890.49 per person on the 2025 winter holidays, of which $627.93 was for gifts, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF).¹¹ Beauty was the number-three planned gift category, with a mean planned spend on beauty gifts of $247, according to Circana.⁵ That figure covers all beauty gifts, not a single bottle.

The amount spent on one perfume is far lower. YouGov found that 57% of US perfume users spent under $50 on their last perfume, and only 4% spent $150 or more.¹⁰ Decants and discovery sets let a giver offer niche perfume for less than a full bottle. Our perfume gift guide sorts ideas by recipient and budget.

No large survey yet publishes the average amount spent on a perfume bought as a gift, as opposed to perfume bought for oneself. The YouGov figures describe the last perfume a user bought, whoever it was for, and Circana’s figure covers all beauty gifts together. Both suggest that most fragrance gifts sit well below the price of a full bottle of niche perfume.

Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and Valentine’s Day: fragrance’s other peaks

Christmas is not the only gifting peak. In the three weeks to 17 May 2025, US women’s prestige fragrance sales exceeded $0,5 billion, up 7%, and one in five shoppers gave fragrance for Mother’s Day, according to Circana.³ For Father’s Day 2025, men’s prestige fragrance sales were expected to exceed $230 million.³

The NRF’s 2026 forecasts show how much these occasions are worth across all categories.¹²¹³¹⁴

• Valentine’s Day: $29,1 billion in total, $199.78 per person.
• Mother’s Day: $38 billion in total, $284.25 per person.
• Father’s Day: $27,9 billion in total, $226.58 per person.

These totals cover every kind of gift, from flowers and jewellery to dinners out. No published source yet isolates perfume’s share of Valentine’s Day spending, so the Circana fragrance figures for Mother’s Day and Father’s Day remain the best measure of fragrance demand outside Christmas.

• Winter holidays 2025, gifts only$627.93
• Mother’s Day 2026$284.25
• Father’s Day 2026$226.58
• Valentine’s Day 2026$199.78

NRF consumer surveys, October 2025 to April 2026. The holiday figure counts gifts only; the other three count all spending on the occasion.^11121314

What a perfume gift says differs between countries. Our article on the meaning of perfume as a gift in different cultures explains the customs.

Gift cards versus perfume

Gift cards top holiday wish lists. In 2025, 50% of US consumers named gift cards among the gifts they most wanted, against 23% for personal care and beauty, according to the NRF.¹¹ For Mother’s Day 2026, 55% of shoppers planned to give gift cards.¹³

Germany shows the same preference. Vouchers were the most likely Christmas gift in 2025, with cosmetics, perfume and body care a close second, according to Statista.¹⁶

Perfume is personal, so a fragrance gift card combines the two: the recipient chooses the scent. Scento’s perfume gift card is delivered by email right after payment and can be spent on one-off orders across more than 1000 perfumes, in 2 ml, 5 ml and 8 ml vials, plus a 30 ml bottle decant on most perfumes.

How we compiled this

We took every market figure on this page from the panel release, survey, retailer report or news report named in its footnote, and checked each one on 8 October 2026. Dollar figures are US dollars as published, and growth rates are given as the source states them. Where a figure is a forecast or a plan, we say so.

• “Scento analysis” means a calculation we made from the published figures, such as the fourth-quarter share derived from two Circana figures.
• Some sources are paywalled; we quote only what their public pages state and do not estimate missing shares.

More research like this is collected on our perfume industry statistics hub.

Sources

1. 1Unwrapping Fragrance Trends: What to Expect This Holiday Season, Circana, 2025. circana.com
2. 2Beauty Sales Sparkle in Holiday 2025, Circana, 2025. circana.com
3. 3The Gift of Fragrance, Circana, 2025. circana.com
4. 4US Beauty Industry Sales Accelerate in Q3, Circana, 2025. circana.com
5. 5Fragrance to Remain a Top Gifted Item This Holiday Season, According to Circana, Perfumer & Flavorist, 2025. perfumerflavorist.com
6. 6Circana Predicts Robust Fragrance Sales for Holiday 2024, Happi, 2024. happi.com
7. 7Beauty and Fragrance Gifts Shine Bright for the 2024 Holiday Season, Global Cosmetic Industry, 2024. gcimagazine.com
8. 8The Perfume Shop sells 63k bottles a day over Christmas 2025, Retail Times, 2026. retailtimes.co.uk
9. 9Share of shoppers likely to purchase a fragrance as a holiday gift in the United States in 2025, Statista, 28 October 2025. statista.com
10. 10Among American perfume users, scent and price outweigh brand in fragrance choices, YouGov, 17 November 2025. yougov.com
11. 11Consumers to spend second-highest amount on record, according to NRF holiday survey, National Retail Federation, 2025. nrf.com
12. 12Valentine’s Day Spending Expected to Reach New Records, National Retail Federation, 2026. nrf.com
13. 13Mother’s Day Spending Expected to Hit Record $38 Billion, National Retail Federation, 2026. nrf.com
14. 14Father’s Day data and trends, National Retail Federation, 2026. nrf.com
15. 15Inside Sabrina Carpenter’s plan for global fragrance domination, Glossy, 2026. glossy.co
16. 16Leading Christmas gifts to give in Germany 2025, Statista, 2025. statista.com