The Top 5 Toys of Christmas 2012
A Furby with new eyes, a Lego line for a new audience, a tablet with its own award, the Turtles back on screen and a game with a portal: five toys of 2012.
November 3, 2026 · ZABI LLC
Christmas 2012 had a little of everything: an old pet reborn, a very old brick company reaching for a new audience, a handheld learning tablet, a cartoon revived for a new generation and a game that you played by putting figures on a plastic pad. Business Insider, looking back, chose Nintendo's Wii U as the season's hardest-to-find item, but the toy lists are where the variety showed.
If you were a parent then, you may notice how much of it sounds familiar: the Toys R Us Canada list that year included a Furby and Ninja Turtles figures alongside the tablets and consoles. Here are five toys from 2012 that the lists and awards back up.
The five
Documented on: 2013 Toy of the Year awards (Toy of the Year); Toys R Us 2012 hot toy list
LEGO Friends
Lego Friends launched in North America in January 2012. According to Wikipedia, the company's research had found that around nine in ten of its sets were aimed at boys, and so it designed a line for girls: slightly larger, more detailed mini-doll figures instead of the classic minifigures, set in a fictional town called Heartlake City, with five main characters and new colours such as lavender and turquoise.
The Toy Industry Association named it overall Toy of the Year in February 2013, and it also won Activity Toy and Girl Toy of the Year. A Friends stable set was on the Toys R Us Canada hot toy list, and Wikipedia adds that its Olivia's House set won a DreamToys award in the construction category. If you are choosing a set today, read the piece count and the age on the box, since sets in the range vary.
Documented on: Toys R Us 2012 hot toy list
Furby (the 2012 version)
Hasbro announced a new line of Furbies in April 2012 and released it in September. According to Wikipedia, the new Furby had LCD eyes, a wider range of movement and a personality that changed with how the owner treated it, and an app for phones and tablets that talked to the toy using sound. Furby was on the Toys R Us Canada hot toy list that holiday, and it is the toy that would return the next year as Furby Boom, in our 2013 piece.
For parents who remember the original, the story of the 1998 Furby is its own chapter. The point to check on any second-hand Furby is the app: Wikipedia notes the 2012 Furby app was later removed from the app stores, so the toy may work but the app features will not.
Documented on: 2013 Toy of the Year awards (e-Connected Toy); Toys R Us 2012 hot toy list
Skylanders Giants
Skylanders is a game series from Activision in which you stand a real figurine on a reader, the Portal of Power, and the character appears in the game with its progress saved in the figure. Skylanders Giants, the second main game, added larger figures, called Giants, who could lift and break things in the game.
It was on the Toys R Us Canada hot toy list for 2012 and won e-Connected Toy of the Year at the February 2013 awards. The thing to check with a toy like this is the console: the figures only work with the game on a compatible system, so confirm the platform before you buy the starter set.
Documented on: 2013 Toy of the Year awards (People's Choice; Educational Toy); Toys R Us 2012 hot toy list
LeapPad2
The LeapPad2 is a children's learning tablet from LeapFrog. It took Educational Toy of the Year at the February 2013 awards and was named People's Choice, the award chosen by consumers. The Toys R Us Canada hot toy list that autumn named a LeapPad2 bundle with Crayola creativity extras.
Business Insider named LeapFrog's LeapPad Explorer as its hard-to-find pick for 2011, and the LeapPad Ultra turns up in our look at 2013. As with any older tablet, the thing to check is whether the software you want still loads. We could not confirm which downloads are still supported for this model, so treat second-hand units with caution.
Documented on: 2013 Toy of the Year awards (Property of the Year; Boy Toy for the Shellraiser)
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
The Turtles are old enough to be a parent's own memory. They were created by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, and in September 2012 a new Nickelodeon series premiered, with Playmates Toys making the new figures, which, according to Wikipedia, started with the four Turtles, Splinter, April O'Neil, Shredder and others.
At the Toy Industry Association awards in February 2013 the Turtles won Property of the Year, and the Playmates Shellraiser vehicle was Boy Toy of the Year. The Toys R Us Canada hot toy list had Turtles battle figures too. For a gift, the useful check is which series of the toys you are looking at, since there have been many over the decades and the older ones can be collectors' pieces.
What the year tells us
Notice how many of these were bridges between generations: a Furby for the parent who remembers 1998, the Turtles for the parent who remembers the 1980s, and bricks as ever. For the year after, see the top toys of 2013; for the year before, 2011.
Sources
Where the facts in this post come from. Rankings and lists belong to the people who published them; the selection and the stories are ours.
- Toys R Us Announces 2012 Holiday Hot Toy List, Toys R Us Canada release via Newswire, 1 November 2012 — The 15-item hot toy list: Furby, Skylanders Giants, LeapPad2 bundle, Lego Friends stable, Turtles figures, Wii U
- Toy of the Year awards winners, Gifts & Decorative Accessories, 12 February 2013 — Friends Toy of the Year, Skylanders Giants e-Connected, LeapPad2 People's Choice, Shellraiser
- Nickelodeon's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles win Property of the Year, NickALive, 12 February 2013 — Full list of February 2013 winners including Property of the Year and Educational Toy
- The hardest-to-find toys each holiday season since 1983, Business Insider (via Yahoo Finance) — Wii U as 2012 pick; LeapPad Explorer as 2011 pick
- Lego Friends, Wikipedia — January 2012 launch, concept, research behind the line
- Furby, Wikipedia — 2012 relaunch details and app
- Skylanders, Wikipedia — How the toys-to-life game works; Giants
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2012 TV series), Wikipedia — September 2012 premiere, creators, Playmates toy line