How many days until Christmas Eve?

Christmas Eve, 24 December, is the busiest day of the British year for anyone who has left something until the last minute. Supermarkets open early and run at full tilt, high streets fill with people buying the presents they meant to sort out in November, and the trains and motorways carry a large chunk of the country back to wherever home happens to be.

Unlike much of continental Europe, Britain does not usually treat the evening of the 24th as the main event — presents wait for the morning. What the evening does have is its own set of rituals: the Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols broadcast from King's College, Cambridge, in the afternoon, midnight mass for those who go, mince pies and a carrot left out by children, and the last pub session before everything closes for a day and a half.

It is not a bank holiday. Many workplaces finish at lunchtime or close entirely, but legally it is an ordinary working day, and shops that stay open normally stop trading in the late afternoon. Christmas Eve on a Sunday shortens things further still.

Because so much has to be finished before the shutters come down, the hours left on the 23rd and the morning of the 24th genuinely matter. This page counts down to the midnight that begins Christmas Eve, so the number shown is the wait until the day starts rather than until it ends.