Xmas Drop Slot Review

Xmas Drop Slot Overview

Xmas Drop from Hacksaw Gaming takes a tried-and-tested mechanic and wraps it in tinsel. The action plays out on a 5x5 grid with 19 fixed paylines, paying from left to right when three or more matching symbols land on adjacent reels. The default RTP sits at 96.22% with medium volatility, and the max win reaches a hefty 12,500x stake. Stakes start from 10p a spin and can climb right up to £100 on most setups.

Visually, Xmas Drop is pure Christmas comfort. Santa stands beside the reels in a snowy forest, gently wobbling along as the spins play out. The reels sit on a gold-framed, green panel loaded with presents, stockings and bells, while snow drifts across the screen. The soundtrack leans heavily on classic festive tunes, with jingle-style effects and the odd ‘ho-ho-ho’ from Santa to keep the atmosphere warm and light-hearted.

How To Play Xmas Drop Slot

Playing Xmas Drop is straightforward. You pick your stake with the familiar Hacksaw slider, anywhere from 10p upwards, then hit spin or set up autoplay. Wins land when three to five matching symbols fall along one of the 19 lines starting from reel one. Both Wild Santa and Wild Gift act as wilds for all regular symbols, while FS scatter symbols are the ones you want if you’re chasing those two free spins bonuses.

Xmas Drop Slot Paytable & Symbols

The paytable in Xmas Drop leans heavily on festive presents. At the top you have the bells, paying up to 20x for five of a kind, followed by the teddy bear and Christmas tree, each capable of up to 17.5x. Next come the candy cane and stocking, worth up to 15x for a full line. Low pays are the standard 10, J, Q, K and A, topping out between 5x and 10x for five across.

Wild Santa and Wild Gift symbols both pay 25x stake for a five-line on their own, and they substitute for every regular symbol. Wins only count from left to right on the fixed 19 paylines, so you’re always watching that first reel. In practice, the high pays do feel chunky enough in the free spins, but in the base game most of your hits will be on the card ranks unless the wilds decide to show up properly.

Symbols and Paytable

Symbol	Quantity	Payout
	5	x20
	4	x10
	3	x6
	5	x17.5
	4	x7.5
	3	x1.5
	5	x17.5
	4	x7.5
	3	x1.5
	5	x15
	4	x5
	3	x1
	5	x15
	4	x5
	3	x1
	5	x10
	4	x2
	3	x0.4
	5	x7.5
	4	x1.5
	3	x0.3
	5	x7.5
	4	x1.5
	3	x0.3
	5	x5
	4	x1
	3	x0.2
	5	x5
	4	x1
	3	x0.2
	Wild
	Wild
	Scatter

Xmas Drop Slot Features

The key feature in Xmas Drop is the Wild Santa symbol. When he lands, he checks whether expanding would create at least one winning line. If so, he drops down to the bottom of the reel, turning every position he covers into wild. If expanding would not help, he stays as a single 1x1 wild. Only one Wild Santa can appear on each reel at any time, which keeps the grid readable even when several reels go wild.

Wild Gift symbols come into play when a Wild Santa expands through them. When that happens, the Gift turns into a multiplier applied to the whole expanded Santa stack. Multipliers can be anything from 2x up to 200x. If more than one expanded Santa carries a multiplier in the same win, those values add together before being applied. That’s where you get the big screenshots, especially when two or three reels are fully wild with solid multipliers.

In the base game, a single expanding Santa without a multiplier often just gives a small top-up, but once he bites through a Gift the mood changes instantly. You start eyeing up those premium lines and hoping another Santa lands on a neighbouring reel. The feature fires fairly often for a medium slot, so spins rarely feel dead, but full-screen carnage still takes a fair bit of patience or a very kind free spins round.

Xmas Drop Slot Bonus Features

Xmas Drop has two main bonus rounds. Land three FS scatters in the base game to trigger Night Before Xmas, which starts with 10 free spins. In this mode, the game dials up the frequency of Wild Santa and Wild Gift symbols, so you see far more expanding stacks and multipliers than in the base game. Hitting three scatters during the round adds four extra spins, helping stretch those hot patches when the reels line up nicely.

Four scatters either in the base game or during Night Before Xmas trigger Santa Claus Is Coming To Town, also on 10 free spins. Here, whenever a Wild Santa lands, it can activate that reel. Once activated, the reel guarantees a Wild Santa on every remaining spin, so by the end you can have several reels locked with expanding Santas dropping each time. For non‑UK players there’s a Bonus Buy menu with Bonushunt FeatureSpins, Wild Santa FeatureSpins and direct buys into either free spins round, each with slightly tweaked RTP figures.

Bonus Buy Feature

BONUSHUNT FEATURESPINS Each spin is 5 times more likely to activate a bonus game.
Feature Cost:	x6 Bet
RTP:	96.44%
Volatility:	High
TWO WILD SANTAS FEATURESPINS Each spin guarantees that at least 2 Wild Santa symbols land.
Feature Cost:	x20 Bet
RTP:	96.34%
Volatility:	Extra
THREE WILD SANTAS FEATURESPINS. Each spin guarantees that at least 3 Wild Santa symbols land.
Feature Cost:	x50 Bet
RTP:	96.31%
Volatility:	High
NIGHT BEFORE XMAS Extra chance of landing Wild Santa and Wild Gift symbols.
Feature Cost:	x110 Bet
RTP:	96.2%
Volatility:	High
SANTA CLAUS IS COMING TO TOWN Activate reels to guarantee a Wild Santa symbol on activated reels every spin.
Feature Cost:	x200 Bet
RTP:	96.41%
Volatility:	High

Xmas Drop Slot RTP & Volatility

On paper, Xmas Drop sits at a 96.22% RTP with medium volatility and a 12,500x max win. The hit rate feels decent; you see regular small wins and the odd 15x–20x pop in the base when a Santa behaves. As usual with Hacksaw, there are variable RTP settings, and the numbers shift slightly when features are bought, ranging from around 96.2% to 96.44%, so I always check the game info page at any site before I settle in.

Xmas Drop: Our Verdict

After a few longer sessions on Xmas Drop, it came across very much as a Christmas reskin of a familiar Hacksaw formula, but that’s not a bad thing if you like their style. The expanding Santas with potential 200x multipliers do plenty of heavy lifting, and when two or three of them land together the slot feels properly explosive. Between that and the 12,500x cap, the maths profile hits a sweet spot for a seasonal release.

The theme is cheery rather than spectacular, but the animations, jaw‑dropping Santas and Jingle Bells riff in the bonus keep it entertaining. Medium volatility means you can grind the base game without being rinsed instantly, yet the free spins can still go off when the reels activate in Santa Claus Is Coming To Town. For me, Xmas Drop is a very playable Christmas slot I’m happy to spin outside December whenever I fancy some festive chaos.

Screenshots