Santa has officially taken off and you can track where he is in the sky right now

Santa has officially clocked on for his annual shift to provide kids around the world with presents.

Any children who find themselves on the Nice List will be waking up tomorrow morning to gifts under the tree and in their stockings.

And those anxious for Mr Claus’ arrival no longer need to pray that he will make it in time as we can track exactly where he is.

Santa Claus flies so fast it's hard to spot him in the skies, but he's tracked by satellite (Getty Stock Photo)

This is due to NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, who track Santa’s sleigh on its journey around the world.

NORAD first began tracking Santa back in 1955, with 2024 marking the 69th time they've followed his progress through the skies.

The group started when a child accidentally called NORAD (then called CONAD) after seeing a newspaper advert for kids to call Santa Claus.

Santa departed on his journey at 9am GMT, which makes 11pm for the furthest time-zone along.

The first to experience Christmas in the world will be the children of the nation of Kiribati.

This is the nation that has the time zone furthest ahead of the world, UTC +14.

Fortunately in all those years of tracking him, Santa doesn't appear to have crashed once and he's been doing this job for centuries so he isn't likely to meet with disaster now.

For the tech aficionados among you they've also got the specifications of Santa's sleigh, with it being 75 candy canes long, 40 wide and 55 high.

It weighs 75,000 gumdrops at the start of the delivery run, but has packed on an extra 5,000 by the end of it after picking up some ice and snow from being out all night during the height of winter.

NORAD)

As for the gifts, they weigh approximately 60,000 tons, while the big man himself has an official weight of 260lbs.

However, by the time he's home and has tried all the food that's left out for him his weight has increased by 1,000lbs.

Since the sleigh can travel 'faster than starlight' it's pretty much the speediest vehicle in the world, which explains how Santa is able to deliver all of those presents in just one night.

NORAD intelligence has Santa as a man of about 5'7, and that he seems to experience time differently to the rest of us.

In addition, they say that since he knows when you're awake, if you're still up while he's in your area he'll go to another house and wait until you're asleep before delivering presents.

Judging by his progress throughout the world, it seems as though Santa prefers to do his deliveries between 9.00pm and midnight in the time zones he visits.

You can follow Santa's progress on this map.