13 best gifts for 8-year-olds: Toys, books and accessories kids will genuinely love

This interactive audio player puts kids in control, with a choice of hundreds of stories, songs and more available on Yoto Cards that you simply slot into the top of the box. The Yoto mini is a compact (and more affordable) version of the popular Yoto player, cramming a whole load of features into its diminutive 7cm x 7cm x 4cm size. 

It’s incredibly easy to navigate, with our eight-year-old testers getting to grips with the simple buttons and features almost instantly. You’ll need to download the app for the initial setup, but it’s very straightforward. Once that’s done, you can leave your eight-year-old to explore the free app and Yoto radio station, as well as whatever Yoto cards they own.

The choice of cards is epic, covering everything from Tom Fletcher stories to the BBC’s Frozen Planet and music by Queen. It’s certainly an eclectic mix, however, you may want to factor in the cost of the cards (typically around £9.99 each) when buying the player.

A full charge via USB-C leaves you with around 14 hours of battery life, making it an excellent choice for long car journeys. Our eight-year-old tester requested this rather than their tablet during a mammoth drive – absolutely unheard of.

It’s rare to find a gift that parents will love as much as their eight-year-old but the Yoto mini nails it. Screen-free fun that children can take ownership of, with enough appeal and features to last well into the secondary school years – what’s not to love?

Based on his hugely popular #DrawWithRob online series, children’s book author and illustrator Rob Biddulph brings his unique step-by-step style to this addictive art book. Our testers were hooked from the start, making their way through the colourful pages to create their own illustrated story.

The pages feature a mix of step-by-step instructions on how to draw everything from a robot to a pirate walrus, turning the most complex of illustrations into achievable end results through cleverly broken-down steps. The book also features some games as well as a guide to writing your own story. It’s perfect for dipping into, and we found our testers flicking through the projects and testing out their artistic skills before getting stuck into the story creation. There’s plenty to keep kids busy for a long time, and our testers were so chuffed with their illustrations. It’s a book our testers return to again and again.

We’ve been reliably informed by our eight-year-old testers that two-wheel scooters are immeasurably cooler than three-wheelers, and this chunky Micro cruiser is the coolest of the lot.

With a gleaming rainbow neochrome finish, light-up LED wheels and chopper-esque handlebar, it’s a thing of beauty. Our testers were desperate to show it off to their friends, which is always a good sign.

Our testers found it easy to get to grips with the scooter, which steers like a bike rather than the lean-to-steer feature of some other scooters aimed at younger users. The brake is operated by pushing the back of your foot down on the back wheel brake – very simple and effective, which is a good job, as our testers built up some impressive speed.

We love that the scooter comes with a built-in kickstand, which helps protect that shiny paintwork, and that it is foldable, making it easy to transport in the car or carry. Best of all, the handlebar is adjustable up to 89cm, which, paired with the wide footplate, makes the scooter suitable for riders up to around 12 years old. It’s the perfect scooter to grow with your child, and we think it’s worth every penny.

Nostalgia alert: if you had a Tamagotchi back in the 1990s, you’ll understand the appeal of this cute interactive pet. The idea hasn’t changed much – you start your Tamagotchi and wait for your pet to hatch from its egg. Once it’s hatched, it’s up to you to keep it alive. This involved our testers pressing various buttons to feed their Tamagotchi, give it a health check, clean up its poo (hilarious to eight-year-olds), and play with it through a series of simple computer games displayed on the tiny screen.

We cannot overstate how invested our testers were in the wellbeing of their Tamagotchis, rushing to check on them as soon as they beeped. This was such a popular toy, and one that shows no sign of losing its appeal after a month of use.

While you can set your Tamagotchi to sleep when you do – you ‘turn off its light’ and it will go into a snooze mode until the morning, when it will start beeping at you again – there is no off switch. This became a bit of an issue when our testers were are school and we were juggling work with regular interruptions from the Tamagotchi. Even worse, our neglect led to one mini tester’s Tamagotchi dying on our watch. Of course, this isn’t the end of the world, as you can simply re-start your Tamagotchi and go through the whole process again, however, we’d recommend waiting until the start of the school holidays if your eight-year-old wants to get the most out of their virtual pet.

How cute is this? It was love at first sight for our testers when they unwrapped this charm bracelet set from Stych. Everything from the cute heart locket (which opens and closes easily with a magnetic clasp) to the rainbow beads made this look and feel extra special. The two-piece set includes a gold-tone link chain to wear with the beaded bracelet, and there’s a fantastic choice of charms available on the Stych website (a reasonable £8 for two) to personalise your bracelet. These were easy enough for our testers to clip on and take off themselves.

We really like the price point of this bracelet, which offers a more grown-up and ‘special’ take on cheap children’s bracelets and a more affordable and age-appropriate alternative to pricier brands. The bracelet feels excellent quality, without being weighty, and our testers have barely taken it off since it arrived. It really is gorgeous.

We have Minecraft to thank for the off-the-scale popularity of the axolotl. Now, you can celebrate this cute amphibian in glowing form, with this cool light – a must for any eight-year-old’s bedroom.

For something so simple, it was an instant hit with our testers. Measuring 21.5cm in length, the white plastic light features the distinctive pixel details Minecraft is famous for, and is instantly recognisable as the world’s number-one salamander.

You can switch between colour-changing mode (the light rotates between glowing pink, orange, yellow, white and blue) or a static colour, by pressing the on/off switch at the back of the light. Our only gripe would be it’s solely battery operated, requiring three AA batteries, rather than rechargeable via USB. However, for £15, it’s a fun light that will add a gentle glow and some axolotl charm to any child’s bedroom.

When it comes to cuddly toys, you cannot beat Squishmallows. Super-soft, perfectly squishy and available in a range of sizes and characters, it’s no surprise they’ve achieved coveted status with children of all ages.

What we love the most about Squishmallows is the weird and wonderful designs, and the collectability, which moves these away from ‘baby’ territory into something a lot more enticing. Our testers adored this quirky frilled lizard, which came with his own back story on the tag (poor guy just wants to get back to his desert homeland). The generous 12in size is just right for cuddles in bed or on the sofa during family movie night.

No round-up of the best gifts for eight-years-olds would be complete without a Lego set, and our testers were big fans of this new offering. Based on a London sightseeing bus, the bright red double-decker is made up of 388 pieces, and our eight-year-old testers had no problem following the instructions to put the build together. There were a couple of tricky sticker placements, which tested their fine motor skills to the max, but the finished result was really impressive.

Our testers particularly loved the interactive features, including the opening doors and spinning destination panel at the front of the bus. We also liked how you can remove the top deck of the bus to fit your minifigures inside.

The set comes with five minifigures, including the driver (complete with microphone) and – our testers’ absolute favourite – a baby in a mini stroller. We felt this set offered great value for money at £25, providing plenty of fun during the actual build and bags of play potential afterwards.

While (hopefully) the pull of big labels is still a way away, eight-year-olds are starting to have an opinion on what kind of style they like. When it comes to crowd-pleasing, always on-trend and great quality trainers, you can’t beat a pair of classic Vans.

The cool monochrome, checkerboard design is an excellent gender-neutral choice and will look just as good paired with joggers and a T-shirt as they would with a summer dress. Our boy and girl testers all gave these stylish shoes the thumbs up for looks and comfort – an important consideration when they’ll most likely be running around in them a lot. We also like the fact the trainers are slip-ons, as, at this age, it can still be a little hit or miss when it comes to mastering the art of tying shoelaces. The only issue we have is whether our eight-year-olds would still be up for twinning with us, as we love these trainers just as much as they do.

There’s something quite addictive about this charm-making kit, which introduces children to the principles of coding, including binary and sequencing. Through easy-to-follow charts and patterns, children are able to create their own charms and keyrings, using the beads provided. It’s a perfect example of how STEM toys can make complex concepts accessible and a lot of fun.

The whole process is very easy – you just have to follow the charts in the booklet to add different coloured beads to a clear peg board, using the pair of plastic tweezers included. Once everything is in place, an adult can iron over the design using the reusable iron sheet, to fuse the beads together.

Since we first opened the kit, our testers have been creating a steady stream of colourful keyrings, including a smiley cactus and a pineapple wearing sunglasses – our iron hasn’t worked so hard in years. Thankfully, the beads used are fuse beads, which can be bought separately once your eight-year-old has worked their way through the 2,000 beads included in the kit (trust us, they definitely will). Prepare to have a house full of keyrings.

While eight-year-olds haven’t quite tipped into the ‘Sephora kids’ trend just yet, there’s no denying that many love the chance to play around with make-up – our testers certainly do. Miss Nella is a range of make-up and beauty products designed with children in mind. As a result, all products are hypoallergenic, alcohol-fee, perfume-free, chemical-free and non-toxic.

Our testers loved exploring all the goodies packed into this mini zip-up make-up bag, including cute eye shadows, lip gloss and brushes. The packaging isn’t too ‘babyish’ and the products impressed us – in particular, the colour pay off of the eyeshadow and the peel-off nail polishes. There’s a bit of everything in this set, which gave our testers the opportunity to experiment and do their own make-up, which made them feel incredibly grown-up. We think it’s a great gift for any little make-up fan.

Eight-year-olds love a fact, and this beautifully illustrated non-fiction book is packed with some excellent ones. Digging deep into the natural world, the book reveals the secrets of nature, covering everything from sea creatures to jungle animals – many of which we’d never heard of before. Pumpkin frog, anyone? It’s a fascinating mix of topics, which are brought to life with stunning, painterly illustrations that absolutely captured our testers’ imaginations.

This book became an instant favourite with our eight-year-olds, who were able to read it independently (with a little help on some of the trickier words) before imparting their new-found knowledge to anyone who would listen. The writing style is engaging, and we can see why our testers are so hooked. We think this is the perfect gift for any curious child, and excellent value, too.

This fun family game has quietly been building up a cult following of fans, thanks to its bonkers premise and ridiculously cute squishy burritos. Here, dodgeball meets traditional card game, with very funny results.

Designed for two to six players, you work through the game trying to collect as many ‘three of a kind’ card sets as you can, including odd characters such as Barky Sharky (a dog/shark hybrid character) and Meow Cow (well, you can imagine). Thrown into the mix are various burrito duel, burrito war and burrito brawl cards, with the aim being to spot these cards before your opponent, grab the squishy foam burrito and throw it at the other person to boost your score.

Our testers ended up in hysterics every time we played this game, and it really is a brilliant one to get the whole family involved.