TikTok is rekindling these New Year's rituals. Here's what they mean and where they're from

Everyone testament be ringing in 2026 in their possess path — whether it's watching the globe discharge in New York's Times Square, finding someone to kiss at midnight, taking in the Stranger Things series finale or working the graveyard shift.

TikTok is inundated with tips on New Year’s traditions that aim to help people have a prosperous 2026, whether in love, luck, life or all of the above.

Traditions like eating 12 grapes under a table at midnight or running down the block with an empty suitcase may have been given new life on social media, but here are their origins. 

Eating 12 green grapes under a table at midnight in hopes of having good fortune in the new year has been a hit on TikTok in recent years. Videos of people sitting under tables, frantically stuffing green grapes into their mouths before the clock strikes 12:01 a.m., go viral around this time of year like clockwork.

With origins in Spain, the tradition is practised in many Spanish-speaking countries around the world. People eat 12 green grapes with each chime of the clock while making one wish for every month of the year in hopes of bringing good fortune in the new year.

On social media, the specifics have been slightly tweaked to include the additional element of sitting under a table while eating the grapes, often with the hope of manifesting romance in the year to come. 

Another custom popularized by social media is tossing lentils over your head at midnight for abundance and wealth in the year ahead. On TikTok, you might see people doing it sitting under a table or standing outside, where the mess might be a bit easier to clean up.

Lentils have a pretty wide presence in New Year’s traditions around the world, including Italy and some Latin American countries. With their round shape, they often resemble coins, which makes them attractive for those hoping for good things in the new year. Lentils are eaten, carried around in little pouches and sometimes actually thrown at midnight, with the hope of bringing abundance and wealth in the year to come. 

“A Filipino NYE tradition is to wear polka dots, they symbolize wealth and prosperity,” reads a TikTok video by @bethanyyschmidt.  

This comes from a common New Year’s ritual in the Philippines, where wearing polka dot clothing is said to bring wealth and prosperity in the new year. Like the lentils, the round shape of polka dots, resembling coins, is likely behind this tradition.

“Make sure you guys are running down the street with y’all’s suitcases so you can travel all year long,” TikTok user @copyallycat says in a video from last year. 

This superstition has roots in some Latin American countries, where hopeful travellers take a stroll around the block with a suitcase at midnight in hopes of having more opportunities to jet off around the world in the new year. 

Some believe that the longer you walk with your suitcase, the more you will travel. 

“I don’t know about y’all, but every New Year’s, my Cuban mother was like ‘you need to wear red underwear so you can find yourself a man,’” TikTok user @sharoncancio says in a recent video. 

In some Latin American countries and Italy, wearing certain coloured underwear is believed to bring different things into your life: red for passion, yellow for wealth, pink for new love and blue for health. 

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