How to Make Paper Snowflakes

Try one of our printable templates, then invent your own. With a little practice, you'll craft a whole flurry.

Key Points

Making paper snowflakes is a simple, low-cost holiday craft that adds a festive and personal touch to your home décor.
Lightweight paper cuts easily but is fragile, while heavier paper takes more effort to cut yet lasts longer for display.
Experiment with colors and shapes—no two snowflakes will ever look alike, making each one a fun, creative masterpiece.

On the first truly chilly morning of the year, when frost feathers across the windowpanes, there’s nothing quite as comforting as creating your own indoor blizzard. Paper snowflakes bring that crisp winter magic inside—each one a tiny surprise when it unfolds.

One of the easiest and most affordable ways to decorate your home for the holidays is with paper snowflakes. All it takes is a few quick snips with the tips of your scissors to make a whole flurry that you can use to decorate your tree, gifts, windows, walls, and beyond.

You can use our printable template to make a beautiful snowflake or cut out your own patterns for a one-of-a-kind flurry. If you use our template, scale it to your paper size, print it, and cut it out. Staple the template to folded paper in areas to be cut out and use craft scissors to cut the uncovered portions and along all solid lines.

When choosing paper, remember that lightweight paper (wrapping paper, tissue paper, or crepe paper) is easy to cut but more fragile for decorating. Medium to heavy-weight paper (butcher paper, cardstock, or text-weight poster paper) is harder to cut but is more sturdy for decorating. We recommend choosing heavy-weight paper if you plan to display the snowflakes around your home. For a more eco-conscious craft, reuse old shopping bags and discarded scraps of wrapping paper.

While white paper is a classic choice for paper snowflakes, give your flurry more personality by choosing paper in various colors. Green and red is a traditional holiday color combination, but we think you can make this DIY even more fun with bright shades, like pink and yellow.

With supervision, kids can happily occupy themselves by cutting out snowflakes by the dozens. Then, adults can step in to help decorate the home. Together, you can watch your family's own blizzard materialize.

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What You'll Need

Materials

12" by 12" paper
Craft scissors
Snowflake templates (optional)

Instructions

Gather your paper:

Start with a square piece of paper.

To cut a perfect square from a standard 8-by-11-inch sheet of paper, fold paper into a right-angled triangle; trim off excess.
Fold paper in half:

Fold paper in half diagonally to make a triangle.
Fold paper in half again:

Fold paper triangle in half so that the pointed corners meet.
Fold paper into thirds:

Fold paper triangle in thirds, overlapping the lefthand pointed corner over the triangle.
Overlap pointed corner over triangle:

Overlap the righthand pointed corner over the triangle.

You may need to adjust these folds a little to get the sides to match up, so don't crease the paper until the folds are just right.
Trim pointed ends:

Trim the pointed ends so the paper triangle looks as shown.
Cut out snowflake:

Cut your folded paper with variations of cutouts.

The snowflakes with straight lines are easier to make than the ones with curvy lines.
Unfold snowflake:

Unfold the snowflake gently. Don't worry if your snowflake isn't exact—no two snowflakes are ever alike. To smooth out any creases from folding, lightly iron one paper snowflake at a time on a low setting. You can also spritz a little spray starch to stiffen and flatten out the snowflakes.

For a refined finish, brush a light coat of craft glue over your unfolded snowflake and dust it with fine iridescent glitter. The delicate shimmer will catch the light beautifully—especially when your snowflakes are displayed in a window or near a holiday tree.