Postcrossing Blog

World Postcard Day is a little less than one month away, so it’s time for the traditional “let’s get ready!” post!

Every year, we get lots of questions about the day, the badge, the postcards, the limits, the events… So this year we tried to put all those questions (and answers) together in one place, so that everyone can be prepared. Please have a look, and if you have other questions that have not been answered, leave them in the comments!

When is World Postcard Day?

World Postcard Day is celebrated every year on October 1st.

This is the anniversary of the first postcard ever sent, and we celebrate it in the best possible way: by sending postcards!

What should I do on that day?

Send postcards! 😍

You can send official Postcrossing postcards through the website, but you can (and should!) also send postcards to other people in your life that could use a smile in their mailbox.

World Postcard Day goes beyond Postcrossing: it’s a day for everyone who enjoys postcards, stamps, mailboxes and handwritten messages.

What happens on Postcrossing?

On October 1st, if you request and send at least one postcard through the Postcrossing website, you’ll receive the World Postcard Day badge on your profile once that postcard is registered.

If you already have the badge from previous years, the number on it will grow by one.

So, for example, if this is your third year participating, your badge will eventually show a 3.

Does the postcard need to be requested on October 1st, or just mailed that day?

For the Postcrossing badge, what matters is that the postcard is requested through Postcrossing on your October 1st.

You can mail that postcard in the next few days, or as soon as possible. The postmark does not need to say “October 1st” for it to count.

What about timezones?

The Postcrossing website shows dates in UTC, which can sometimes make things look a little confusing.

To make sure no one misses out because of timezones, postcards requested on October 1st in your own timezone count. So even if the date shown on the website looks like September 30th or October 2nd because of UTC, don’t worry: if it was October 1st where you are when you requested the address, it counts.

How do I know if my postcard counts?

Eligible postcards will have a little World Postcard Day marker next to their Postcard ID on your Traveling Postcards page.

If it’s there, that postcard counts for the badge once it is registered.

How many postcards can I send through Postcrossing on World Postcard Day?

This year, each member can send up to 5 postcards on October 1st.

There is a limit because World Postcard Day is a very busy day for Postcrossing. Lots of people come to the website at the same time wanting addresses, and the pool of available recipients is not infinite. If too many postcards are requested at once, we risk running out of good matches and the matching system starts having a very stressful day. Paulo also starts having a very stressful day. Please think of Paulo. 😅

Do I get extra slots on October 1st?

No — World Postcard Day does not give anyone extra slots.

The limit is the maximum number of postcards you can send that day, if you have enough available slots.

For example:

• If you have 1 available slot, you can send 1 postcard.
• If you have 3 available slots, you can send 3 postcards.
• If you have 5 or more available slots, you can send up to 5 postcards.

So, if the badge is important to you, it’s a good idea to save at least one empty slot for October 1st, so that you can request a postcard on that day.

Do I need to send all 5 postcards?

No! You only need to send one official Postcrossing postcard on October 1st to receive the badge once it is registered.

Sending more is fun, but not required.

How can I celebrate if I don’t have empty slots to send postcards through Postcrossing?

You can celebrate by sending postcards to friends, family, neighbours, teachers, librarians, local firefighters, nursing homes, schools, someone who helped you recently, or anyone else who deserves one! You can also organize events and bring people together!

What postcard should I use?

Any postcard you like!

We provide an official World Postcard Day design every year, so you can download this year’s postcard and then print it locally or through an online printing service.

But you don’t have to use the official design! Handmade cards, other World Postcard Day designs, postcards from your stash, tourist cards, art cards, funny cards… they all count. Any postcard is a World Postcard Day postcard if you send it on October 1st.

Can I make my own World Postcard Day postcard?

Yes! Many postcrossers make their own World Postcard Day postcards, and we love seeing them.

You don’t need approval from Postcrossing to create your own card, as long as it is clearly your own design and doesn’t pretend to be the official postcard.

Please don’t edit, recolour, remix or distribute altered versions of the official artwork. The official files are shared freely for everyone to use as provided.

If you’d like to use the World Postcard Day logo on your postcard, please respect its license.

Do I have to celebrate alone?

Not at all!

There are lots of meetups and events being organized around the world. You can find them on the World Postcard Day events page.

And if nothing is happening near you, you can organize something small yourself — even meeting one friend for coffee and writing cards together counts as a celebration!

We’ll also have the online Postcard Lounge open again, so you can join other postcrossers around the world while writing your cards from home.

How does the Postcard Lounge work?

The Postcard Lounge is an online space where the community can quietly write postcards together. Everyone joins on a video call but stays muted, providing a shared little window into desks, postcards, pens, stamps, and people writing mail in different corners of the planet.

On October 1st, the lounge will be open again, so you can join others there for some shared postcard writing.

Can World Postcard Day events happen on another date?

October 1st is the official day, and that’s the date that counts for the Postcrossing badge.

But events can happen around that date too, especially if a library, museum, school, postal operator or group that is meeting needs to choose a nearby weekend or another practical day. The goal is to celebrate postcards and help more people discover them.

Are there special postmarks?

Yes! Some postal operators and postcrossers organize special postmarks for World Postcard Day. These vary from country to country, and they get listed on the events page, when we know about them.

If you know of a special postmark, postal event or postcard activity that isn’t listed there yet, please let us know!

Should I write something special on the card?

Anything you want to write is perfect! If you want to, you can use the opportunity to mention that you’re writing the postcard on World Postcard Day, to spread the word about this celebration! 😉

Can I share photos?

Yes, please! We love seeing your postcards, writing tables, meetups, stacks of stamps, library displays, colouring activities and happy mailboxes.

You can share photos on the forum, on social media, or wherever you usually post things. Use the hashtag #WorldPostcardDay so others can find them too.

What should I eat?

The official World Postcard Day menu is “things that look like postage stamps”!

For the main course, we recommend ravioli. For dessert, stamp-shaped cookies. 😋

So… everyone ready for the big day?

Make sure you have postcards, stamps, pens and at least one available slot if you want the badge. Then, on October 1st, request an address, write some postcards, and send a paper bridge into the world.

We can’t wait to celebrate the postcardiest day of the year with you! 😍

Good news, everyone! Just like in the last couple of years, Geocaching is joining the World Postcard Day celebrations with a special souvenir!

In 2025, 20,791 geocachers logged attendance at a World Postcard Day-themed event, and many postcards also made their way to Geocaching HQ in Seattle, where they were proudly displayed around the office. Look how cool their walls look!!

So we’re happy to share that Geocaching is continuing this collaboration in 2026! 🎉

Here’s what you need to know: from September 27 to October 4, 2026, geocachers will be able to earn the World Postcard Day souvenir by attending or hosting a Geocaching Event, as well as finding and logging one Letterbox Hybrid geocache. The dates line up neatly around World Postcard Day, which is on October 1.

By now, I think everyone knows what Geocaching is all about… but for those who might not be familiar with it, it’s a global treasure-hunting game played outdoors with the help of a GPS or smartphone. Players search for hidden containers (called “caches”) all around the world, sign their logbooks, and then share their adventures online. It’s all about getting out there in nature, looking out for treasures with friends!

This year’s extra challenge is kind of cool too: Letterbox Hybrid caches are inspired by letterboxing, a hobby that combines navigation, puzzle-solving and rubber stamp artistry. Many Letterbox Hybrid caches include a stamp for visitors to use in their own logbook… but which could also be used on a postcard, to make it extra fancy! 😍

If you’re organizing or attending a Geocaching event during that week, why not bring a few postcards along? You could write postcards together, exchange them, send one to Geocaching HQ, or even invite other curious geocachers to discover Postcrossing and the World Postcard Day.

And if there isn’t an event near you yet, you can always organize one yourself on the Geocaching website, making sure to follow their event guidelines. If you need ideas, you can check out Geocaching’s wrap-up post from last year, with photos and stories from the 2025 celebrations.

So let your postcards tag along on a little Geocaching adventure! Pack a pen, bring a few postcards, keep an eye out for Letterbox Hybrids, and see where the adventure takes you!

Now that our birthday shenanigans are over and we’ve recovered from the excitement of seeing so many of you join the Postcard Lounge and write postcards with us, we can finally jump to the next very important item on the agenda… World Postcard Day!

It’s time to reveal this year’s theme and design! So, without further ado, here’s 2026's World Postcard Day postcard, created by postcrosser Oce (aka ohhsayy):

This year’s theme is “Paper Bridges” — a way of thinking about postcards that feels almost obvious once you say it out loud, and yet is easy to forget in the everyday rush of writing and mailing. Every postcard begins as a small piece of paper… but once it is written, stamped, and sent, it becomes something much larger: a bridge between two people. “Paper Bridges” celebrates that little metamorphosis, the way a flat, ordinary object turns into a very special form of connection that spans the distance between sender and recipient.

Oce’s design plays with this idea beautifully, using folded-paper shapes, bold lettering, and bridge-like forms woven right into the typography. Arches and ribbons of paper curve across the card as if the letters themselves were built to connect one side to the other. The textured background will look particularly nice in textured paper, so if the service you use to print postcards offers that option, give it a try!

We first crossed paths with Oce at the Boston Stamp Show, where we got to see his work up close and were immediately drawn to it. He’s based in California, and if his name sounds familiar, it’s probably because he’s no stranger to the Postcrossing community: Oce has designed many postcards and special cancellation marks for meetups, and by now his playful, graphic style has become a familiar sight to quite a few of you already. We’re thrilled to have him bring that style to this year’s official postcard!

The design is, as usual, free to download, so you can have it printed locally or through any online service. Remember that every postcard posted on October 1st counts as a World Postcard Day card, so feel free to use this design or any other postcards you have on hand — they’re all good!

This year, we’re also trying something new: a black-and-white outline version of the postcard, designed for coloring in by hand. We first created a version like this a few years ago for a museum activity, and it was such a hit with young visitors that we thought it was time to share the idea with the wider community too — so that kids (and kids at heart!) everywhere can print it out (in uncoated paper), grab their favorite pencils or markers, and make the design their own on paper. You can find it alongside the regular design on the World Postcard Day website.

This will be the seventh World Postcard Day we celebrate together! For those of you who are new to it, October 1st is the anniversary of the first postcard ever sent, and has thus been chosen as the day to celebrate postcards. It’s a day that goes beyond Postcrossing — a day when everyone is invited to send a postcard to friends, family, children, people they admire, those that need a bit of support or cheering up… 😊

So… got any paper bridges to build this year? Whether it’s your first or seventh time celebrating, we hope you’re as excited as we are, and that this will be the best one yet!

PS: It’s completely fine if a design isn’t everyone’s personal style — artwork is subjective. And one of the nice things about World Postcard Day is that people can use any postcard to celebrate it: the official design, handmade postcards, other World Postcard Day themed designs or any postcard at all!

That said, please keep comments kind and constructive here. This year’s postcard was created by a member of our community and is being shared freely for anyone to use. It is a lot of work and it is offered in the spirit of a gift to the community.

Saying something isn’t your style is one thing… dismissive or hurtful comments about the artwork are another, and will be removed.

The balloons are slowly deflating now, and we’ve swept the confetti off the floor… but what a party World Postcard Day was! 🥰 Every year, we think things can’t possibly go any better, and every year the community proves us wrong. Now that the postcards sent on October 1st are starting to make their way around the globe, it’s time for a little recap of all the fun and magic.

The forum topic was buzzing with excitement from the very first time zone to the last. As midnight rolled across the world, celebrations began popping up like a beautiful stadium wave — from Asia to the Americas, one after another! Postcrossers shared photos, stories, and stacks of postcards ready to fly off to new destinations. The energy was infectious, and it even spilled over onto social media, where #WorldPostcardDay was full of smiling faces, mailboxes, and beautiful cards.

Over in the Postcard Lounge, things were just as lively: 410 of you joined us throughout the day to write postcards with some company! At one point, over 40 people were online simultaneously, quietly writing postcards together. We saw participants from Chile to New Zealand, and a few even recognized familiar names of people they’d once exchanged postcards with. It turned into a wonderfully long, cozy session of shared scribbling and postcard showing. A big thank you to everyone who volunteered to help host it — we’ll definitely have to do it again!

Meanwhile, 163 meetups took place all over the world, bringing postcard friends together in real life. Many meetups also happened via Geocaching, and a handful of libraries joined as well!

The official World Postcard Day design was everywhere, printed by postcrossers individually or in huge group orders. What a joy to see it travel! And we also saw many other postcards celebrating the day, including these beautiful handmade postcards that kara_ann's mom, Kris, sewed just for the occasion!

Also 2025 was the year in which we broke all records: over 117,000 postcards were sent on October 1st across all time zones! 😱 It’s a bit mind-boggling and, for us who have to manage the system — and a bit worrying too, as Postcrossing wasn’t built for such huge peaks of activity as there’s a limited amount of addresses that can be select at any given time. We’ll need to brainstorm some solutions for next year, which will (sadly) likely include lowering the limits on the day… but for now, we’re just amazed and grateful for everyone’s enthusiasm.

And speaking of gratitude, today is World Post Day — which marks the anniversary of the founding of the Universal Postal Union back in 1874. This year’s theme, “#PostForPeople: Local Service. Global Reach.”, celebrates postal services as a vital public service rooted in communities and driven by people. From rural villages to bustling cities, the postal infrastructure everywhere keeps us connected — often serving as a bridge to the wider world, and sometimes even to the digital one. We’re proud that postcards are a small but meaningful part of that mission, helping build connections that go beyond borders and bring a bit of happiness into the world. So here’s to postal workers everywhere (and to all of you!) for keeping this beautiful network alive, one postcard at a time!

It’s no secret that October 1st is our favorite date on the calendar: the day we come together to celebrate postcards, the little rectangles of paper that have been connecting people and carrying happiness across the globe for 156 years.

If you pause for a moment, you might imagine today’s postal network humming with extra excitement! Sorting machines whirring a little faster, postboxes filling up with colorful postcards, and mail carriers unknowingly carrying a bit of extra joy in their bags. Somewhere, someone is carefully choosing the best postcard, the nicest stamps, and the kindest words to brighten another person’s day. 🥰

So today, wherever you are, we invite you to take part in this big wave of connection. Write a postcard to a fellow postcrosser, but also think of your neighbors, friends, family (young and old), teachers, co-workers, or someone who could use a smile. Let’s make mailboxes everywhere burst with cheer!

If you need a little boost of energy for the task, we recommend the official fuel of World Postcard Day: ravioli (because they look like postage stamps) and stamp-shaped cookies for dessert. 😋

And of course, don’t forget to share your celebrations with us! You can join the Postcard Lounge at any time today to write postcards alongside others around the world or post your photos on the forum or on social media with the hashtag #WorldPostcardDay — we’ll be watching and sharing throughout the day.

Happy World Postcard Day, everyone! 🥳 May your pens flow smoothly, your mailboxes overflow, and your heart be a little happier knowing that you’re part of a global movement that spreads happiness, one postcard at a time.