Most Popular Christmas Movies by State: Do You Love White Christmas or Bad Santa?

The holidays are upon me, and that means it’s time to cue up my favorite Christmas movies to get into the spirit of things. And with so much uncertainty surrounding this year’s season, I’ll have all the time I could want to watch my favorite Christmas movies.

Not sure which to watch? Using data from Google Trends and Rotten Tomatoes, we partnered with Mindnet Analytics to take a look at each state’s favorite Christmas movies. In addition, we took a look at overall interest in Christmas movies across states.

Check out the results below.

Interesting Findings

• It’s a Wonderful Life and White Christmas appear the most for traditional Christmas movies, while Gremlins, Die Hard, and Batman Returns are movies you might not expect that appear at the top of many states’ lists
• Gremlins and Bad Santa are tied for the Christmas movie most states are obsessed with, winning in 4 states
• Batman Returns, Die Hard, It’s a Wonderful Life, Love Actually, The Best Man Holiday, Trading Places, and White Christmas all appear at the top of the list for 3 states each
• West Virginia and Utah tie for showing the most interest in holiday movies, followed closely by Indiana, Kentucky, and Idaho
• Washington DC shows the least interest in Christmas movies, followed by Hawaii, Florida, Virginia, California, Georgia, and Louisiana

Favorite Christmas Movie by State

Methodology for Favorite Christmas Movies

First we used the list of the top 50 Christmas movies from Rotten Tomatoes to determine a set of candidate movies that each state might be most obsessed with. We then added top movies from other December holidays such as “Eight Crazy Nights” and “The Black Candle”.

The data used to determine which movie each state is most obsessed with came from Google Trends state-wise search frequencies. For example, if you look at the relative search frequency for “The Apartment” across states you see that people in New York have searched more for this movie than any other state.

This movie is therefore the movie that according to Google Trends data we deemed New York is most “obsessed” with — the state’s favorite movie in relation to other states. It is not necessarily the movie that they searched for more than all other movies, but the movie that residents searched for more than other states did. The same procedure and logic applies to all other movie-state matches in our results.

• Author
• Recent Posts

Follow me

Frank Moraes

Frank was the Senior Content Editor at Hotdog.com and an expert in sports streaming, specializing in out-of-market games and regional sports networks.

A passionate cord-cutter and longtime subscriber to numerous streaming services, Frank has first-hand experience navigating the complexities of sports streaming.

With a PhD in Atmospheric Physics from the Oregon Graduate Institute and a professional background in early streaming technology, Frank combines deep technical insight with practical, real-world knowledge.

His mission at Hotdog.com was straightforward: help sports fans get hassle-free access to the games they love, at the best price, without frustration.

Follow me

Latest posts by Frank Moraes (see all)

• How to Watch Pac-12 College Teams This Year - 08/06/2024
• States That Have Produced Leading Actors and Actresses - 09/06/2022
• US States With the Fastest Internet - 06/21/2022