9 Automotive Gifts We’re Putting on Our Holiday Wishlists

Let us stop you right there: Yes, it’s barely Halloween. Yes, most folks haven’t even scoped out the turkey that will adorn their dinner tables late next month. Yes, we’ve got a whopping 55 days to go until Christmas. No, we don’t think it’s too early to make wishlists. Sure, we’ll check them twice in a few weeks.

Look, if department stores can deck their halls with festive decor this early, what’s to say we can’t also settle into the mood a bit ahead of normal?

Our digital staff is already beginning to hunt for the things we’d love to unwrap this year. Gathered here is a collection of items from our team that might spark ideas for the car nut in your life—or give you ideas on what to ask for—as well as a few that are a bit out there, but noble and worth including nonetheless.

A Helping Hoist for the Holidays

I’m always trying to maximize the functionality and fun in my garage, so my wish list is pretty simple:

A QuickJack 7000TL would cover just about everything I do in my shop and save me a little time with each car or project I need to lift. Saving a few minutes each time can give me back enough time to maybe get around to a few of the projects that have been sitting for too long. My floor jack and stands have been fine for years, but a boy can dream that this big box will be under the tree this year. Since I am 100 percent sure there won’t be an extra few feet of ceiling height under the tree, this would be the next best thing. — Kyle Smith

Scaled-Down, Still Sweet

This is easy for me, after writing this article I re-cemented my desire to get a 1/8th-scale Ferrari Testarossa die-cast model car. They were only a dream to a kid visiting The Sharper Image catalog back in the early 1990s, but they can be a reality now.

Of course, nothing car-related is ever easy when you also write about cars for a living. Now the lone item on my Christmas wishlist also has to be restomodded using aftermarket interior/suspension/engine parts, painted Miami Vice white, and documented here on Hagerty Media to be the ultimate gift to me. This might just happen, so be ready for it! — Sajeev Mehta

Upgrading the Toolkit

The long-handle, flex-head set of 1/4-, 3/8-, and 1/2-inch Craftsman V-Series ratchets are looking pretty tempting and are on sale for the holidays. My recent go-to ratchets have been my standard-length 1970s-era round-head, fine-tooth ratchets. These would provide a lot of options to flex into position and tackle projects with extra torque. — Brandan Gillogly

The Will (and Time) to Part with My Volvo

When I bought my Fiesta ST a year and a half ago, my ’86 240 wagon got parked . . . and stayed parked. The little Ford was just too much fun—and it had air conditioning and CarPlay. The Volvo is my first hobby car, though I never had to get it running because it just always ran. Well, the few times I’ve tried to start in the past year and a half, it struggles to start. (Could be that I parked it with nearly zero gas. I pray it isn’t the squirrels on the property.)

All I need is an afternoon and the will to face my guilt, and I could probably get it running—but I’ve promised my significant other that I’ll sell it, to make space in the driveway, and something tells me I’m more sentimental than I realized. Letting go is hard! — Grace Houghton

Lift, Part Deux (and Much More)

To free up space and make wrenching easier in my cramped garage, I’d love a lift. Getting my Formula Vee project going and completed will be challenging enough, so while we’re fantasizing here, I’ll take an extra three or four free weekends on the 2025 calendar. And, once it’s done, I’ll need a truck and a trailer if I actually want to race the thing, so I’ll take those, too, please. — Andrew Newton

A Sleigh of His Own

Topping my automotive holiday wishlist is Toyota’s GR86 Hakone Edition (and it looks like I’ll need a little of Santa’s magic to get my hands on one). It’s my perfect combo of conservative and approachable in a sports car that wouldn’t scare me away from redlining the hell out of it often and in nearly any weather. Also, it would look really good next to the Tacoma in the garage. — Bryan Gerould

Short-Track Salvation

Really hoping to find a race track under my Christmas tree. Too many of America’s short-track ovals are being sold off for various reasons. Lack of community support, aging owners, or fat checks from land developers, to name a few. I’d love to save at least one. Even if I never opened the gates to the public, it would make the ultimate automotive playground for my friends and family. — Cameron Neveu

Space Like the Cool Kids

I’d love to open up a giant box with a garage in it. Just a humble little 1- or 1.5-car deal. Doesn’t even need to be a fancy one with custom cabinets or a swanky floor. I’ll take bare bulbs for lighting. In all my adult life I’ve never owned a house with a usable garage, and living in the rainy PNW means I have zero interest in doing anything to a car in my driveway from about October to June. A garage would solve a lot of my problems and maybe up my incentive to do more work on my vehicles. Or set up a massive Tyco track that incorporates the 15 sets I currently have in storage . . . — Stefan Lombard

Simple and Sweet

Ain’t it great that dreaming is free? Man, these answers sure do run the gamut of what’s possible. I love it. Earlier this summer while working on swapping the rear hub and bearing assembly on my wife’s Toyota Highlander, I realized that my socket drawer—perhaps the most-used tool and bit category for car nuts—was sorely lacking. So, I’ve made it a goal this year to fill my Christmas list with a few new ratchets and a whole mess of new sockets.

For the ratchet, I’m quite fond of this 3/8-inch-drive, eight-inch quick-release model from Tekton. It seems like the most foundational element in a well-stocked socket drawer, and something I can build on from there. I love the look of the chrome handle, practicality be damned, so I’d pick this version over the rubber-gripped one in part because it’s easier to clean, but also because it just looks timeless. I’m a huge fan of Tekton mainly because the company is headquartered in Grand Rapids, Michigan, close to where I grew up. Once that piece is in hand, I’ll start piling on the deep and shallow socket sets, the metric and the imperial, the Torx bits and the swivels . . . There’s truly no end to the bottom of this barrel. — Nathan Petroelje