The Best Gifts for Tween Girls, According to Tween Girls

Nine-year-old Talula, in San Francisco, recommended this colorful kit that comes with a wide assortment of stylish beads, including letters, hearts, stars, gold balls, and clay beads. “It’s fun to make cards to send to an old friend and it’s also really fun to make a simple bracelet,” she said. “Plus, it’s always great to have jewelry, right?”

Louise, an 11-year-old in Brooklyn, recommended this kit from The Woobles, a company that makes kits to create cute crochet animals, while teaching techniques with beginner-friendly yarn. “There are step-by-step video instructions, and it comes with all the materials in the kit. I love this bunny! Look how cute!”

“Wax is a really nice material to work with, and you can make many different shapes with it. Candles are also a great gift on their own,” Ruth and Daphne said. This candle-making kit offers a dozen 8-inch-by-8-inch sheets of beeswax in different colors, along with almost 14 feet of cotton wick. Colors can be rolled, layered, and cut into shapes to create unique candles.

This Texas-based slime company has won over the tween set as the crème de la crème of slimes, making limited-batch offerings with themes based on boba, cute animals, and holidays. They come in a range of textures, so if you’re more of a snow-fizz kid or a cloud slime kid, there are drops for every preference. “The one I really want right now is the Baby Axolotl Slime. It comes with this tiny mini figure, and you can see how it has a different texture to some of the others,” Nell said. “Also, it’s scented! Slime is really fun. You squish it. You collect it. It’s great.”

Another game both Nell and Ada recommended is Blokus, a strategy game for up to four players, where each player starts with 21 uniquely shaped pieces of a single color. “You have to fit as many of your pieces on the board as possible,” Nell said. “It gets really competitive at the end which is so good.”

Another highly portable card game that makes for a great gift is Sleeping Queens. “It has fun strategy where you’re trying to get as many queens as possible,” Ada said. “You can play with all different numbers of people and challenge your friends.”

For those learning to roller skate, or looking to level-up from adjustable skates, Story’s Quad Roller Skates, made of a soft shell boot and an aluminum blade, are a quality pick. “You can have a fun time going around your neighborhood or a rink, and these ones are really fast and smooth,” said Ada, an avid skater. “The colors are pretty and the style is a lot more comfortable than the ones you can rent at the skating rink.”

There’s a good chance the tween in your life already has a pair of Crocs, making Jibbitz, the tiny charms you push through the holes in the shoes, a likely hit. “I have Olivia Rodrigo ones. But you can get all sorts of different ones depending on what you or your friend is into,” Elodie said. Crocs doesn’t make official Olivia Rodrigo-themed Jibbitz, but there are plenty of inspired options online.

If your kid has their ears pierced, Ada shouted out Oh Clementine as a good place to find “really cute studs, like tulips or cherries or holiday stuff.” It’s one of a handful of companies offering cute earrings made of high quality metals, intentionally designed for sensitive, younger ears.

“I also love the mismatched earrings from Yellow Owl that have fun themes,” Ada said. “I have a pair where one is scissors, and one is a bottle of glue.” Other combinations include taco and hot sauce, a burger and fries, and musical notes.

“I’m obsessed with these sunglasses,” said Kyle, 11, who lives in NYC. “They are so cute and inexpensive so if I lose them I won’t feel bad.” The glasses come in several shades and are available at the online boutique Cider.

“These hearts and the red color of these clogs are super cute and would look good with a lot of my outfits,” Nell said. “It is so fun to wear heels with my jeans or my green knit skirt.” Nell’s mom is also a fan: “These shoes are officially the perfect middle ground. They’ve got just enough heel to make Nell feel grown-up, but still pass the ‘practical shoe’ test for me. And I have to agree with her — they’re very cute.”

The other shoes much-requested and coveted by tweens are these versatile high tops, which come in an array of colors and sole heights. “They make you a bit taller, they’re fun, and you can get them in a bunch of colors,” Ada said. “I have these white ones with a chunky heel and a zipper on the side.” Claire and Amy also recommended the Converse Lift Platform Weatherized Leather High Top “because you can wear them with anything, and the leather keeps your foot warm, so they’re good for winter.”

Sambas, which have made an all-ages revival and now come in a seemingly endless array of colors, are also a hit with the tweens, including Louise: “I like these white ones with the green stripes. They’re very stylish and would go well with the Nike socks,” she said.

Hokas are a popular athletic shoe choice, ideal for gym days at school, or for after school and weekend sports. Like their adult counterparts, Hokas for kids have a chunky foam padded sole, making them cushy to wear all day long. “I want pink or blue Hokas,” Stella said. “I just did a 5K run yesterday, and these are really great if you need shoes to run in.”

Finnish brand Reima makes these waterproof cold-weather boots with a cozy fleece lining. “These boots are really warm, but easy to run around in and get on and off,” Ada said. “I wear them over leggings, and mine are the dark purple color.”

Somewhere between an activity book, journal, and diary, this book encourages kids to literally destroy it in the process of creating it. “It’s fun because you can mess it up, and the prompts are really fun,” said Ada, who received it for a recent birthday. “You can do stuff like draw with coffee or frosting, and poke holes in the pages.” There’s a color edition as well as this black and white one.

“These graphic novels make you want to keep reading them,” Elodie told me. The five-part series by Alice Oseman follows Charlie, an anxious, openly gay teen, and Nick, an upbeat rugby player. They become friends, and romance buds, but not without other ups and downs in their own lives and in their relationship. “The Netflix show” — now in its fourth season — “is a good adaptation of the book that seems very true to the characters,” Elodie adds.

“This is a really fun graphic novel about this girl named Vera, who figures out how to have a good time going to a place she really hates,” Ada said. The place is a Russian summer camp, where she has to navigate girl drama, Russian classes, and gross bathrooms, among many other misadventures. “It’s really well-written. I’ve read it so many times,” Ada said — the ultimate praise for a kids’ book.

This series starts with The 13-Storey Treehouse, then expands with each edition by a multiple of 13. There are now 13 books, the latest being The 169-storey Treehouse, and numerous spinoff joke and activity books. “There are mainly three characters, Andy, Terry, and Jill, who have tons of adventures and are always struggling to get a book written on time. It’s very humorous,” Ada said.

A lot of the tweens I talked to were excited to transform their rooms to represent new interests, and put up photos of their friends. Elodie recommended these string lights, which come with clips to hang photos or other mementos. “They make my room seem more fun and cozy. I turn them on when I’m reading before bed.”

“Who doesn’t want to see their name in lights?” asked sisters Claire and Amy. Your recipient can get a favorite expression, band name, or their name written out in the neon color of their choice. They can also choose the font style, and add special characters for flair.

An easy way to jazz up a bedroom is with a mini disco ball, which they can hang from a hook on the ceiling. “It’s fun and decorative and sparkly and you can get them in some fun colors,” Ada said. “I have a pink one and shine my reading light against it at night.”

“These window stickers cast rainbows all over the floors/walls,” Tessa said. They’re an easy and reusable way to brighten up a room, and make for a great gift or stocking stuffer.

“Instant and disposable cameras are also at the top of my list,” Rosa said. “These are fun to play with at parties or when friends are over.” Olympia, who has a smart watch, but no phone yet, said, “I’d like to take more photos, so this kind of camera would help me take photos with my friends.”

For tweens who have access to a smartphone or another digital camera, sisters Claire and Amy recommended this portable photo printer, which is also Bluetooth compatible: “It’s so fun to be able to print photos for your room!” The photos are peel and stick, and can be adhered to notebooks, cards, or a locker. They can also be hung up on fairy lights with clips, or on a bulletin board with the backs left on.

“I really want a Bluetooth speaker that connects to my bike so I can listen to tunes while we ride on trails,” said Stella.

For kids who revel in getting their stuff in order, Stella, 9, in Atlanta, recommended this label maker and printer. “I am a very, very organized person and love label makers because I can put my name on all of my notebooks and label my school journals with stuff like ‘Writing 2024.’”

For avid audiobook listeners, or for a non-phone- or tablet-based way to listen to music, the Yoto Mini “is great for car rides or plane trips,” Ada said. “They have Harry Potter cards now, the Roald Dahl books, or you can get your parents to download other books and put them on the make-your-own cards.” The Yoto doubles as a bluetooth speaker, and has a headphone jack compatible with standard headphones or earbuds.