Santa tracker 2024: How to see where Father Christmas is on Christmas Eve - using NORAD Santa Tracker

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The reindeer have been fed and the sleigh has been loaded - Santa’s ready to make his magical annual journey.

There’s no need to look to the skies this year to try and catch Santa on his 41-million mile trek around the globe - thanks to a high-tech website.

As children hope they’ve been good enough to warrant a visit from Father Christmas, they’ll be able to see when he’s nearing on the NORAD.

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Santa will be taking to the skies this Christmas Eve - and you can track his progress.Santa will be taking to the skies this Christmas Eve - and you can track his progress.
Santa will be taking to the skies this Christmas Eve - and you can track his progress. | Canva/Getty Images

Of course he only makes his deliveries while you’re sleeping, bit it’s still nice to know he’s on his way.

Here’s what you need to know.

How to use the NORAD Santa tracker

You can track Santa’s progress via the app or on the NORAD website, with parents able to log in anytime after 11am on Christmas Eve.

The tracker shows where Santa is along his 41-million mile route across the globe and you can also see extra stats like how many gifts he’s delivered so far and where he’s heading to next.

His first stop will be the Republic of Kiribati in the central Pacific Ocean, where he visits 390,000 homes per minute at a rate of 6.424 homes per second.

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Next on his list are New Zealand, Australia, Asia, and Africa, before heading to Europe and the UK.

He’ll likely head to Scotland last on his trip around the UK, sweeping northwards up the British Isles, before crossing the Atlantic to the Americas.

What is NORAD?

NORAD stands for the North American Aerospace Defense Command, which is responsible for keeping an eye on activity within US and Canadian airspace - so who better to look out for Santa and his reindeer?

Its headquarters are located at Peterson Space Force Base in El Paso County, near Colorado Springs, Colorado.

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What is the NORAD Santa tracker?

Since 1955, the tracker has enabled families to follow Santa’s progress around the world.

That was the year when a misprinted phone number on an ad encouraging children to call Santa meant that many young people called NORAD instead.

Director of Operations at the time, Colonel Harry Shoup, didn’t upset their festive cheer and had his staff check the radar for where Santa was along his journey.

In the years following, children could called the NORAD hotline in December and see where the jolly red man was.

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Since then, the technique has been refined into a tracker and interactive tool.

This will be the 69th consecutive year they’ve tracked Santa.

What else can you do on the website?

There’s plenty of festive fun to be had on the NORAD website throughout December. It features Santa’s North Pole Village, which includes a holiday countdown, games, a movie theater, holiday music, web store and more. The website is available in nine languages: English, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Chinese and Korean.

Count down the days until Santa’s journey on mobile devices with the official NORAD Tracks Santa app, which is available in the Apple App and Google Play stores.

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