People are only just discovering what the purpose of the red Christmas tree light is

Now that it's December you can safely start putting up the Christmas decorations without anybody judging you for kicking off the festive season too early.

With that in mind plenty of people will be digging through the Christmas decorations, discovering some of your favourite baubles are now broken and unspooling what feels like miles of lights to wrap around the tree.

And if you were wondering what the sole red spare fairy light is for, one TikToker has kindly explained:

One of the big early tests of decorating for Christmas is checking to see if the lights are still working after spending 11 months tucked away in a shed, cupboard or attic.

There's usually a bulb or two which stubbornly refuses to get into the holiday spirit, but luckily many sets of Christmas lights come with what looks like a spare bulb, even if the red light it gives off doesn't match up with the rest of them.

While the distinctive red bulb stood out among the trail of white lights, putting in the extra bulb that came with the lights also produced a flickering effect, where some of the lights blinked on and off again.

Loads of people were absolutely amazed at this discovery, scarcely able to believe their eyes as they'd always '1000% thought they were spares'.

Someone else said they'd 'wasted so many years not knowing about this' and wondered why the boxes the lights came in never mentioned that the extra red bulb had a special purpose.

While a few people seemed surprised that others were only just discovering this tidbit of information now, one person defended those new to the knowledge, writing 'as if it makes an oz of sense that putting a diff bulb in makes s**t blink'.

People like things that make them happy, and research found that putting up the decorations in early November can 'extend the excitement' and give people more time living in a pleasantly festive environment.

Even some of the supermarkets would think that was a bit too soon.