Nail Search Atlas 2026

Britain is the Christmas nails capital

For every 100,000 internet users, Britain searches “Christmas nails” 111 times a month. That is 1.6 times Czechia and Poland, 2.7 times the United States and more than 12 times France, which comes 17th of the 18 countries ranked.

Britons search most nail topics a little more than Americans per person: 1.4 times, the median across all 37 topics. Christmas is nearly double that usual gap, so it is a real preference and not a habit of searching more.

Figures are 12-month averages. Christmas searches peak in December, so December alone runs higher in every country.

Every country has its own nail holiday

Inside each country we split the four holiday searches: Halloween, Christmas, New Year’s and Valentine’s nails. The queries share one language, so this comparison does not depend on population.

Czechs give 91% of their holiday nail searches to Christmas, the most single-minded calendar in the study. Ukraine is the reverse: New Year’s manicure takes 93% and Christmas manicure 3%, a 35 to 1 split. Britain mirrors Ukraine, with Christmas ahead of New Year’s 39 to 1.

Americans spread their nails across the year. Valentine’s nails are searched exactly as often as Christmas nails, 135,000 times a month each, with Halloween close behind. Germans, Swedes and Hungarians keep a real slot for New Year’s Eve, 17 to 22% of their holiday searches.

Shown for countries where all four queries reach 100 searches a month, plus Ukraine, where Halloween falls below that (40 a month).

Britons and Americans want different nails

Per person, Britain searches most nail topics about 1.4 times as much as the United States. Against that baseline a few topics split sharply.

Burgundy nails and Japanese manicure run more than three times higher in Britain, and Christmas nails 2.7 times. America leads on New Year’s nails (3.6 times), rubber base (3.5 times) and Russian manicure (3.4 times), and searches Valentine’s nails 1.5 times as much.

Both countries search in English with the same queries, which makes this the cleanest comparison in the study.

Burgundy belongs to Poland, Italy, Britain and Hungary

The deep red of autumn is searched most in Poland (20 per 100,000 internet users a month), Italy (19), Britain (18) and Hungary (18). That is more than three times the United States and about twice France.

Germany is left out: “Burgunder Nägel” is not how Germans name the colour (they say bordeaux or weinrot), so the query undercounts.

Hungary searches nail colours by name more than anyone

Hungary ranks first per person for red, black, blue, green and grey nails, and for winter nails, and second for pink. Red nails alone: 49 searches per 100,000 internet users a month, 3.2 times the United States.

Averaged across eight everyday colours, Hungary is 1.4 times Poland, the next country, and almost six times Germany.

The chart is the geometric mean of the red, pink, black, blue, green, purple, orange and grey rankings, for the 13 countries ranked on all eight.

Poland searches the French manicure 3.5 times as much as France

Counting both the classic French manicure and French tips, Poland leads with 204 searches per 100,000 internet users a month, followed by Hungary (150), Spain (124) and Germany (101). France comes 8th of 16 with 59, level with the United States.

Portugal is left out because “francesinha” is mostly searched as the Porto sandwich; Ukraine because “френч” also names a jacket.

Named manicures are searched everywhere except at home

Japanese manicure is a Polish favourite: 69 searches per 100,000 internet users a month, more than 25 times the United States. In Japan the term gets no measurable searches at all.

Russian manicure is searched most per person in the United States (34) and France (30). In Ukraine the same e-file technique goes by another name, machine manicure (апаратний манікюр, аппаратный маникюр), at about 1,200 searches a month.

Russia is not part of this study.

Portugal is Europe’s gel nail capital

Portugal searches “unhas de gel” 33,100 times a month: 346 per 100,000 internet users, nine times Spain and almost 12 times France. Romania (191) and Czechia (104) follow.

English speakers often say builder gel, BIAB or gel manicure instead, and Poles say hybryda, so the US and UK bars are not like for like and Poland is left out.

The north takes cuticle care seriously

Finland leads cuticle oil searches per person with 25 per 100,000 internet users a month, ahead of Britain (22), Sweden (19) and the Netherlands (17). Southern Europe barely looks for it: Spain 1.9, France 3.9.