8 best Christmas crackers to make your celebrations go off with a bang!

Usually with Christmas cracker gifts, you'll use them during the festive period and then they'll either be thrown away or put in a draw and forgotten about forevermore, with the Lakeland Racing Gonk Christmas Crackers, the toy inside is part of a game so you can reuse it year-after-year.

Each cracker contains a Gonk that can be wound up (along with your usual hat and cracker), and the pack includes a track so you and your guests can race them. It also comes with a pouch that you can pop them in so it's the gift that keeps on giving, just keep in mind that the actual track part is made from cardboard so may not last as long as the actual Gonk toys.

Tried & Tested by Senior Writer, Rosie Floyd.

The fun and interesting shape of these Lakeland Bottle Shaped Christmas Crackers is what immediately caught our eye when looking for the best Christmas crackers. They're shaped like mini Champagne bottles so perfect for grown-up Christmas celebrations.

These crackers are designed to open as if you're popping open a glass of bubbles, which was a little confusing to begin with as it wasn't obvious which bit needed pulling. Once opened, you'll find your usual Christmas crown and cheesy joke along with a festive charm to put around the stem of your wine glass so these crackers will help you to sophisticatedly celebrate Christmas in style.

Tried & Tested by Senior Writer, Rosie Floyd.

You can never have too much chocolate over Christmas and these Hotel Chocolat Mini Chocolate Christmas Crackers will ensure you've got a truly luxurious one to eat after you've finished your dinner (or before - we won't judge). We like that each one is individually wrapped so you can pop it in your pocket and save it for later if you wish. There are 10 in a pack too so great for those with large families.

There is no way of knowing what chocolate is in what cracker, so something to be wary of if you've got a guest coming to Christmas dinner that has a nut allergy as you won't know if you've given them a choccy containing peanuts or hazelnuts until they've opened it.

Tried & Tested by Senior Writer, Rosie Floyd.

There are not just one but two self-care products inside the L'OCCITANE Festive Hand & Body Crackers. You'll get both a hand cream and a shower gel that will help you and your guests feel refreshed and renewed from head to toe. They're sure to put a smile on someone's face this Christmas.

Each cracker is beautifully designed with a different colour of the same pattern to help you know exactly what's inside so you can be sure to give each guest exactly what set they'll like the best. Our only gripe is that there are only four crackers in a pack but if you're having an intimate Christmas dinner, you'll be grand.

Fancy a tipple with your Christmas dinner? These Gin Crackers by Edinburgh Gin will have you sorted. You won't find paper hats or naff jokes in these ones, just an individually wrapped gin liqueur ready for tasting. All you'll need to do is provide the mixer.

There are four included, encasing either a 50ml bottle of Rhubarb and Ginger, Orange Blossom and Mandarin, Elderflower or Plum and Vanilla gin. It's great for gin lovers who want to try new flavours, we just wish there were more crackers per pack.

Your task is to have the best Christmas ever and your time starts now! Fans of the TV show Taskmaster will love having these crackers to open around the dinner table. Each one contains a dinner table task and an after-dinner team task to add some fun and games to the proceedings. There's also your usual hat and joke so you don't miss out on the traditional Christmas shenanigans.

You can take it in turns to be the Taskmaster yourself and rate each other's efforts in a chance to win the paper Taskmaster trophy. In total, there are 37 tasks to take part in so you can continue the fun into Boxing Day too. If your guests have never seen Taskmaster before, it might take them a little while to get into it and understand the name of the game but they'll soon get the hang of it.

With 12 in a pack, there will be more than enough of these Festive Game Christmas Crackers to go around if you're hosting your extended family at Christmas. They're completely 100 per cent plastic-free and recyclable so a great choice for the planet too.

Each cracker contains a hat, hoke and three fun party games, including charade, trivia questions and a 'name 5 things' game. If you've got little ones coming to your Christmas celebrations they might be disappointed by not having a little gift inside but there's more than enough to keep them entertained at Christmas usually. We love the design of these with the cute festive sausage dogs.

To ensure everyone gets the table gift they want this Christmas, consider making your own. Each box comes with a name tag, red and white paper twine, a hot, joke and a table game and then you can fill it with whatever you fancy, such as chocolates, scratch cards, mini bottles of alcohol and more.

The beauty of making your own crackers is that you can really personalise it to each guest around your dinner table and you can make kid-friendly versions as well as ones that are catered more towards adults to ensure they're suitable for the whole family. There are two different sizes included but we think it would be better if they were all the same size to look more uniform around the table (and so there will be no arguments over who has the bigger box!)