Is Most Gift Wrapping Recyclable? How To Tell In Less Than A Minute

When I was growing up, my Christmas mornings were pretty typical: A Christmas Story marathon played in the background as my family carried through the ritual of opening presents, collecting wrapping paper on the floor as we went. By 10 a.m., when the paper pile was almost as tall as I was, my mom would toss it all in a black trash bag and—I think?—recycle it.

Back then, there was a more laissez-faire attitude about recycling. If you weren't sure how to get rid of something, throwing it in the blue bin and crossing your fingers seemed to be the logical and responsible thing to do.

But looking back now, with a better understanding of what happens when you recycle wrong, I really hope we just trashed that stuff. China's decision to stop accepting U.S. recyclables because they were improperly cleaned and sorted has me wondering what kind of paper, if any, we can safely toss in the blue bin.

I posed the question to Beth Porter, a waste expert and author of Reduce, Reuse, Reimagine: Sorting Out the Recycling System. She got back to me with a smart trick for figuring out if a wrapping paper is recyclable in 20 seconds or less. It's called the scrunch test: "If you scrunch up the paper into a ball and it stays in a ball, then it can most likely be recycled. If you scrunch it and it starts to unfurl right away, then it's made with foil or plastic and shouldn't be recycled," she explained.

If it doesn't pass the scrunch test, do NOT recycle it. Instead, try to reuse it for future gifting. And if your paper is metallic or glittery, don't bother doing this: It's definitely not recyclable. Tissue paper can't go in recycling either since its fibers are too short.

If your paper passes the scrunch test, you can go ahead and recycle it. That is, after you remove all of its bows, ribbons, and other decorations: "Those items can't be recycled, and even ribbons that aren't shiny and coated in plastic shouldn't be recycled because they're tanglers in the machines," explains Porter. "Tanglers," anything that could potentially get tangled in machinery, are one of the three most problematic waste categories for recyclers. The other two are "tech" (e-waste) and "tiny items" (anything smaller than 2 inches that can slip through a machine's cracks).