As the holidays approach, and six years from our first article on the topic, Brick Architect’s annual LEGO Advent Calendar MEGA Reviews remain strong. It is time to build all 120 tiny models across the five 2025 Advent calendars we are reviewing and share our thoughts.

The back side of each advent calendar folds down to reveal a building area and 24 numbered doors. (Star Wars shown here.)

The goal of this Mega Review is to share our thoughts while not spoiling the entire Advent calendar. As usual, we have selected our two favorite minifigures (or minidolls) along with four of our favorite builds for each Advent calendar!

Pricing and availability

2025’s Advent Calendars were released on September 1 and will retire at the end of the year.

The last few years we have seen LEGO experiment with new themes and this year is no different. 2025 marks the first year where we see the brand new Minecraft Advent calendar hit the shelves, taking the place of the Marvel Advent calendar we saw in previous years. With this addition, we have a total of six themes, four of which are licensed and two unlicensed, giving you a large selection to pick from. Licensed sets can be purchased for $44.99 (34.99€ / £29.99) and unlicensed sets for $34.99 (26.99€ / £21.99), a slight increase in unlicensed set prices over last year’s price.

Looking Back?

While reading if you want to compare this year’s Advent calendars to those of past years you can do so. Our previous mega reviews can be found below!

• Review: 2024 LEGO Advent Calendars
• Review: 2023 LEGO Advent Calendars
• Review: 2022 LEGO Advent Calendars
• Review: 2021 LEGO Advent Calendars
• Review: 2020 LEGO Advent Calendars
• Review: 2019 LEGO Advent Calendars

#21280 LEGO Minecraft Advent Calendar

Review by Koen Van Der Hoeven

#21280 LEGO Minecraft Advent Calendar is the newest of the Advent calendar themes, replacing the Marvel theme of previous years. Priced at $44.99 (34.99€ / £29.99) and coming with 300 pieces, the set comes to a staggering 15.0c (11.7c / 10.0p) per-piece at the MSRP price, making it a very expensive advent calendar for its pricing, something that is unfortunately becoming more common.

#21280 LEGO Minecraft Advent Calendar

Initial Impressions

As this is a new theme it is difficult to compare it to previous sets. What is great though is that LEGO is not afraid to spice up the themes and introduce new themes that may capture a new audience. As last year’s Marvel Advent calendar was one of the worst I have ever built, this new one is a welcome change in my eyes. First released in 2009, Minecraft has taken the world by a storm with LEGO releasing their first minifigure-scale sets by late 2014. Over a decade later we see this theme make its way into this Advent calendar. While I am not familiar with modern Minecraft, I have many fond memories of playing Minecraft back in the late 2000s and early 2010s so building this brought back a great wave of nostalgia.

Top 4 Mini Builds

Although minifigure scale minecraft sets are the norm nowadays, Minecraft saw its first inclusion into the LEGO world through 2012’s Micro World sets that came through the CUUSOO program (now LEGO ideas). This set pays homage to the earliest Minecraft sets released as many of the doors comprise of Micro World scale builds. The remainder of the builds are minifigure scale and capture the festive spirit in Minecraft form. There are a ton of amazing options to pick from but in this section I will review my top 4 favorite builds.

The mini-builds are pretty substantial, including some small scenes.

• Christmas Sheep – Albeit simple, the Minecraft sheep is so iconic in the game, providing important resources for the playable character. These sheep come in a myriad of colors and LEGO captures the colors of the sheep with a festive spirit in this set through the introduction of both a Green and Red sheep. This color of Minecraft sheep in LEGO form is unique to just this set at this point in time, making it desirable and fun.
• Nether Portal – The Nether Portal is one of the most iconic structures in Minecraft. With its and 26Black colors, this tiny scene is immediately recognizable. The build officially comes with one mini-build figure, however due to it using simple 1×1 parts you can actually build two, the extra just from the spare parts. This small addition while not intentional helps accentuate this structure.
• Winter Chalet – The Winter Chalet is small but don’t let it deceive you. Built using SNOT (Studs Not On Top) construction, this tiny chalet captures your imagination effectively, packed with vibrant shapes and colors. The 1White snow crown on the roof helps capture the peaceful winter aesthetic, and closes the build off perfectly. Even though there are no mini-build figures included, the extras in the other builds can easily be placed in this model.
• Winter Tree – Although it looks very simple I love the winter tree. The tree captures the Minecraft aesthetic effectively, even capturing the colors of the different colored blocks of the snowy biome with snow, ice and water blocks. Minecraft translates to LEGO so effectively given its blocky nature and the scale of the tile based figures to the tree and blocks is perfect. A tiny build but a fun one! Just like the Nether Portal, this build includes two figures, the second built using spare parts.

Minifigures

LEGO pulled out all the punches when deciding on the Minifigures to include in the brand new Minecraft Advent Calendar lineup with the plethora of good options making it tricky to pick a favorite. Not only do the minifigures comes with … minifigures … but they also come with great complimentary mini builds or accessories to highlight the themes and setting the minifigure inhabit. Nonetheless two stood out from the others and deserve the mention they do in this article.

Steve (left) and Santa Villager (right).

• Steve in a snowman sweater – The main playable character in the Minecraft games is Steve and the Advent calendar includes this character beautifully. Donning a brand new torso, the snowman on the sweater captures the Minecraft aesthetic beautifully. As if the torso itself was not enough, the character also includes a Diamond Pickaxe and Diamond Helmet, two iconic objects from the game. To continue the theme of abundance of detail, the set also includes an enchanting table, an iconic item from the games but has not been seen in LEGO form since 2017, this time even including a brand new enchanting book print. All in all, an amazing array of pieces.
• Santa Villager – Given the holiday themes, one of the spotlight included minifigures is the iconic Villager in a Santa Outfit. The Santa Villager is brand new and unique to this set, including three brand new pieces. The colors and shapes capture the Minecraft aesthetic beautifully, with a holiday flair. To accompany this minifigure and continue the festive spirit this door includes two additional minecraft inspired mini builds; these being a pail of milk and a furnace with cookies. Using the common Minecraft furnace piece the designers captured the Minecraft look and feel while paying homage to leaving milk and cookies on the fireplace for Santa’s visit.

Conclusion

All I can say is WOW. When compared to the Not Recommended (1/5) I gave last years’ #76293 LEGO Marvel Advent Calendar the replacement is a welcome addition. Everything from the builds to the minifigures are great, with very few if any duds included. It was difficult to pick my favorite minifigure or mini builds, something that does not happen often in these reviews. It is important to acknowledge that this Advent calendar is likely to be a hit or miss depending on the audience as having knowledge of the source material is important to fully grasp the details included.

While it may be nostalgia kicking in, or just the fact that the set is great, I give #21280 LEGO Minecraft Advent Calendar a strongly deserved Recommended (4/5 Stars), especially for those who are a fan of the Minecraft theme. The biggest downfall is the value. Most of the pieces included are small and despite some unique prints it can be difficult to justify full price value. If the set was even 15% cheaper I would have bumped it up a rating. Despite this price point, the set itself is great and the fact that it is sold out already in many places is a likely indicator of its success.

#42668 LEGO Friends Advent Calendar

Review by Tom Alphin

#42668 LEGO Friends Advent Calendar is $34.99 (26.99€ / £19.99 / 39.99 CAD / 59.99 AUD) and contains 237 pieces.

#42668 LEGO Friends Advent Calendar

Initial Impressions

The front of the box shows a single holiday scene in a 3d rendered animated style featuring five friends surrounded by five animals and a bunch of wrapped presents. Along the bottom edge you see just two actual minidolls, and a few mini-builds and animal figs. I am slightly concerned since we only see two minidolls on the front edge and three on the back that we won’t get all five of the characters on the front of the box. At just 237 pieces (versus last year’s palty 272 pieces), I worry that this is going to feel a bit thin.

Top 4 Mini Builds

The mini-builds felt small, except for the couch and tree.

• Lizard Habitat – The tiny lizard mould looks great in 191Flame Yellowish OrangeBright Light Orange with a smiling print on the front. The tiny habitat is not very exciting, but I did appreciate that it uses 18° 2×1×⅔ Slope (Part 5404), which was a new part for 2024.
• Tiny Fireplace – While it is cute, I wanted to highlight this model as an example of shrinking each mini build to the bare minimum. In previous advent calendars, fireplaces were 4-studs wide and had a bit more height. This just feels small and cheap.
• Couch with Lamp – The most stylish model in the set, I enjoyed the mid-century meets the seventies vibes that this lounging couch with a built-in lamp conveys. It is also just one of two min-models in the entire set with more than 10 pieces.
• Christmas Tree – With a whopping 26 pieces (sarcasm), this is by far the most complex and parts-intensive mini build in the whole set. The technique which uses a pair of 1×2×1⅔ Brick, Studs 3-Sides (Part 67329) for the bottom half of the tree is different than anything I’ve seen in a previous advent calendar. It still can’t make up for the lacklustre offering throughout the rest of the set.

Minifigures

The set contains 5 minifigures, and each one includes a sleeping bag. This gives a modest storytelling theme to connect the figures included in the set.

Leo (left) and Nova (right).

• Leo with sleeping bag – The Minidolls are all dressed in pyjamas for a sleepover. I like his shirt featuring a Gingerbread Man and Woman holding a candy cane. Each of the five minidolls comes with a sleeping bag — Leo’s is 191Flame Yellowish OrangeBright Light Orange.
• Nova with sleeping bag – Nova’s torso also has a cool printed pattern. This one features a smiling video game controller wearing a santa hat. The printing for the controller has a metallic finish which isn’t very common. Her sleeping bag is 324Medium Lavender.

Conclusion

After building all of the models in one session, I feel like I haven’t accomplished much. On reflection, that’s because there isn’t all that much building happening in this set. By my count, only two of the mini-builds contain more than 10 pieces! Even when we do end up building something, it tends to be on a 3-stud wide base instead of a 4-stud wide base which has been most common in past advent calendars.

Even at the lower price for unlicensed theme advent calendars ($35 instead of $45), this year’s advent calendar is a pretty poor showing. Thankfully, you do get minidolls of all five figures featured on the front of the box, but there isn’t anything all that substantial for them to interact with. There’s also five animals which are very cute and will appeal to many young builders. This lacklustre offering only manages our 2/5 star (Acceptable) rating because you get a lot of minidolls and animals. That said, there are a number of great LEGO Friends sets at this price point which would offer a much richer building experience.

#43273 LEGO Disney Advent Calendar

Review by Amy Alphin

#43273 LEGO Disney Advent Calendar is $44.99 (34.99€ / £29.99 / 59.99 CAD / 59.99 AUD) and contains 231 pieces.

#43273 LEGO Disney Advent Calendar

Initial Impressions

This year, the Disney Advent Calendar is whisking us away to frosty Arendell, home of Elsa, Anna, Kristoff, Sven, and everyone’s favorite snowman, Olaf! The entire box and play area are beautifully designed to evoke a frozen night under the aurora. The play area has a path marked with multi-colored snowflakes, (including a possibly ill-planned yellow snowflake), so presumably there will be some sort of game to be played once the builds have been completed. I’m hopeful this Advent Calendar is engaging as the setting!

Top 4 Mini Builds

The mini builds varied in size and complexity.

• Gingerbread House – This small gingerbread house has a similar architectural form to some of the Stave Churches throughout Norway, which makes sense for the Scandinavian setting. Despite this historical architectural form, the one printed part in the middle has more contemporary touches like bunting on either sides and a clock in the middle.
• Fireplace – The fireplace is simple yet effective, with flames in the middle and SNOT elements near the top. It is pictured here with the wreath and stockings which actually come in the next numbered door.
• Seesaw – This small seesaw comes with just a single animal, but it’s a very cute kitten. We get another similarly sized animal figure in an earlier bag which can ride on the seesaw with the kitten.
• Ice Fountain – This is a really cheerful frozen fountain which uses the hexagonal snowflake piece to good effect. 42Transparent Light BlueTrans-Light Blue parts are put to good use here.

Microdolls

The set only includes three dolls, and they are all the smaller ‘microdoll’ size with oversized heads, no posability, and hands that can only hold tiny parts with a ‘stem’ connector. There’s also Olaf, which is not strictly a microdoll, but is very small since it uses a printed minifigure head for its diminutive body.

Olaf (left) and Kristoff (right).

• Olaf – Never to be taken seriously, this version of Olaf looks especially unhinged with his signature toothy grin and carrot nose on top of a tiny body. He comes with Cocoa (a new two-color mould) and the Candy Cane which debuted with #40806 Gingerbread AT-AT Walker
• Kristoff – I like his printed outfit which has a cozy jacket pattern and dark blue detailing. Included in this bag are some food, presumably to feed his reindeer Sven.

Conclusion

This Advent Calendar is full of fun, thematically-strong builds. I like how a few of the builds actually work together to make a slightly larger model. The builds are cute, invite play and have instructions that are easy to follow. However, I don’t like the use of microdolls as opposed to minidolls. The microdolls’ heads are way out of proportion for “adults”, and cause lots of instability. Olaf is the cutest of the microdolls, but his head is so huge and heavy, its hard to get him to stand up.

While the microdolls are ok for display, their proportions make them very difficult to play with. It is also unclear why a game space was used in the play area of this Advent Calendar. There is a top spinner, but the colors on spinners don’t match those on the play area. Overall, this is a good set for the dolls and minisets that are included, although it could do without the addition of the “board game”. It is unfortunately very expensive for what you are getting: 231 pieces including just four microdolls for $45 is arguably the worst value of all of this year’s offerings. On the balance, it still offers a good experience for younger builders who love Frozen and earns a 3/5 star (Good) rating despite the poor value. It would be a really good choice for a young builder’s first LEGO Advent Calendar.

#60475 LEGO City Advent Calendar

Review by Koen Van Der Hoeven

City has always been a staple when it comes to Advent calendars and #60475 LEGO City Advent Calendar is no different. As an unlicensed set this Advent calendar is cheapest priced at $34.99 (26.99€ / £19.99) and comes with 186 pieces. The set comes to 16.9c (14.2c / 10.2p) piece at the MSRP price. Although the price of the Advent Calendar rose this year, the number of pieces dropped which was a shame!

#60475 LEGO City Advent Calendar

Initial Impressions

While LEGO tries to keep things fresh, there is often a lot of repetition across the City Advent calendars over the years. For this review I will be reviewing this as a standalone and not making any assumptions over previous Advent calendar ownership. The biggest standout of this Advent calendar are the minifigures, this year seeing an incredible assortment. The mini builds themselves are fun little city themed builds, whether it be accessories or vehicles, fun to play around with. Although already mentioned, one of the downfalls is price. While this can be attributed to inflation and can get a pass, what could not get a pass for me is lack of quality control. I let this slide last year but this is the second year of Advent calendars in a row where I have received errors in the build with duplicate builds in doors. LEGO is normally really great with providing replacement parts, but for a set like an Advent calendar, where a door is built each day, making these mistakes is inexcusable and can dampen the energy. One can argue that the poorer value in Advent calendars is made up for with the Advent calendar experience, but if you want a good experience LEGO needs to be strict with quality control. I may have likely just had extremely bad luck, but browsing online I have noticed that this is unfortunately a rather common theme this year and is worth calling out on and could impact the experience.

Top 4 Mini Builds

With the City theme expanding in scope we see what makes up City in the Advent calendar follow suit. We see a number of common City related builds, but this time also see space themes take a more central stage, with a few doors having space themed builds. One thing that City advent calendars sometimes lack is the emphasis on seasonal scenes, instead focusing on mini builds of common vehicles which could be included anywhere. As with previous years, some doors are disappointing, including only an accessory. As LEGO celebrates brick built creativity I opted to only include brick built models, as an accessory even if cool does not warrant its own door in my opinion.

Diverse mini-builds are commonplace in the City Advent calendar.

• Holiday rain – The Holiday Train is always a fun inclusion in the City Advent calendar. Although repetitive if you have built more than one City Advent calendar before, to new builders this is always a joy. The creativity at play to build something awesome with so few pieces highlights the level of detail LEGO allows you to build with. The creative usage of parts and the vibrant colors make the train a must have in the top 4 list.
• Robot – This mini build was an odd inclusion and almost felt out of place, but the more I looked at it the more I liked it. Despite being small this comes with a large number of parts, each used creatively to bring the brick built robot to life.
• Bulldozer – You can’t have a City themed Advent calendar without a construction build, and the bulldozer is a LEGO staple. The bright color and tiny stature makes this a fun little build and a perfect “toy” for your LEGO minifigures. The size of all the vehicles in this Advent calendar really emulate the “toy truck” scale, allowing your minifigures to unravel their own gifts for the holidays to play with the mini builds … pretty meta.
• Winter Sled/Snack Trolley – This build is an odd one to include in this list and was not done because of it being a top build, but instead because it took the place of what in my opinion could have been a top 4 mini build. When opening the door to build the snack trolley I instead was greeted with a duplicate Winter Sled build. The snack trolley is packed with fun treats and vibrant colors, while the sled itself is rather tame. As there was no snack trolley to build I had to base it off the image in the instructions, and will instead highlight the build I got in its place.

Minifigures

The minifigures deserve a Must Have (5/5) rating, but a LEGO set is not defined by its minifigures. The lineup in #60475 LEGO City Advent Calendar are excellent and you will be hard pressed to find fans disappointed by the Minifigure lineup. Despite many great options, I do not want to spoil the festive magic and will reference just 2 of the 7 excellent mini figures included.

Polar Bear Costume (left) and Christmas Tree Costume (right).

• Polar Bear Costume – The Advent Calendar starts with a great choice in the Polar Bear Costumed child. With a unique printed torso and a head piece that only comes in 4 sets total to date, this is a wonderful minifigure. It captures the Holiday cold perfectly and is a great piece to add to the Costumed minifigure lineup that many likely collect.
• Christmas Tree Costume – This is the best minifigure of the set and all I can say is WOW. Using a brand new headpiece, the Christmas Tree is printed amazingly, packed with baubles and tinsel. I am surprised LEGO has not introduced this minifigure earlier as it is a great differentiator when compared to the brick built Christmas Trees we often get. Both serve its purpose but I love this change with the minifigure approach for the tree.

Conclusion

Not amazing and not bad, that is how I would describe #60475 LEGO City Advent Calendar. This set does its job and does not let down. The unique minifigures in this set do a lot of the heavy lifting to elevate this however, with me potentially having knocked this down a rating were it not for the amazing collection of costumed children.

Seeing the common trend of price increase and piece count dropping worries me, but I already see this set on sale for upwards of 30% at many retailers so you can pick this up for a much better price easily. Despite price being a point to call out, the excellent building techniques demonstrate that piece count isn’t the be-all and end-all and still makes this a great set. With all of this in mind I give #60475 LEGO City Advent Calendar a respectable Good (3/5 Stars) rating.

#75418 LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar

Review by Amy Alphin

#75418 LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar is $44.99 (34.99€ / £29.99 / 59.99 CAD / 59.99 AUD) and contains 263 pieces.

#75418 LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar

Initial Impressions

This Advent Calendar looks so fun! I love the droid-shop atmosphere decked out in festive trimmings. The play space is inviting without having the board game element, which often feels forced to me. Both sides of the box hint that this will be a droid heavy Advent Calendar this year, and it will be interesting to see the balance between minifig and brick built elements.

Top 4 Mini Builds

This set is packed with mini builds, since most of the droids are brick-built, and all but two of the other mini-models use a fair number of parts to complete. (There are two very small single piece droids in this set, and they come without accessories on the two days which they are found in.)

So many great brick-built droids this year!

• Peppermint Mouse Droid – Adding a pair of clips on top adds a ton of play value, since many other bags in this calendar contain tools or droid parts it can carry.
• Buzz Droid – This is immediately recognizable version of the droid despite the rather modest part count. It looks menacing and I wouldn’t want one trying to puncture my ship’s hull.
• B2EMO – This droid is both cute and contributes meaningfully to the Andor storyline, and I’m glad to see it here.
• BB8 Snowman and Christmas Tree – Recreating the droids round form as a snowman is an obvious choice, but it is cute and complemented by a tiny Christmas Tree. The tree isn’t great, but we got two builds in one bag.

Minifigures

It is difficult to draw a clear distinction between mini-builds and minifigures in a droid-centric set, so we picked two of the more minifigure-like options to highlight here.

Jawa in Christmas sweater (left) and a dark red R-unit.

• Jawa with a Christmas sweater – The green sweater is a treat, featuring a Gonk droid on the front, and both R2-D2 and BB-8 on the back.
• Dark Red R unit –

Conclusion

Two of the bags contain tiny single-piece droids, and I wish that they came with a few more pieces to build something small to complement them. Similarly, the Peppermint Mouse Droid is ADORABLE, but I would have loved to have something to clip onto the clip pieces included in that build (although there are plenty of accessories in other bags). The new candy cane piece would have been ideal.

Those minor issues aside, these ARE the droids you’re looking for — and then some! This set is incredibly thematically strong, with all minifigures and minibuilds being creatures or features you’d find in a droid machine and repair shop. With easily recognizable fan favorites such as BB-8 dressed up as a snowman, to deeper-cuts such as the Treadwell Droid, this Advent Calendar has a little something for every fan. There are two non-building bags, but otherwise they are all built, and four of the mini-builds can attach and create a small scene within the shop. This Advent Calendar is full of holiday whimsy, and is a lot of fun to build!

Closing Thoughts

With some great new options and the calendars retiring at the end of the year, it is worth picking up a copy you would like to build it. As with previous years, as we approach the holidays we will see prices drop before the supply drops entirely so pick it up soon or risk missing out.