When to send everything: your wedding invitation timeline.
One date in, every deadline out: save the dates, invitations, the RSVP deadline, the reminders, final numbers for the venue and the seating chart. Add them all to your calendar in one tap. No sign-up.
Guests can drive there and home again, or stay one night.
Check your contract; two weeks is the most common, and the safest guess.
The dates follow the timings most planners and etiquette guides use. Your venue contract and your guests come first: if they need more notice, give it.
How the dates are worked out
Everything runs backwards from one fixed point: the day your venue or caterer needs final numbers. The RSVP deadline sits two weeks before it, so you have a full week to chase the guests who have not answered, and the invitations go out early enough to give guests four to six weeks to reply. Save the dates come months earlier, and only matter when the wedding is far away or guests need to travel.
The reasoning behind each step is in when to send wedding invitations, and the messages to send when replies are slow are in what to do when guests don't RSVP.
What changes when guests travel
Everything moves earlier. Flights, time off and hotel rooms need booking, so save the dates go out eight to twelve months ahead and invitations three to four months ahead. The RSVP deadline moves to six or eight weeks before the day, because hotel room blocks usually have to be released about a month out, and guests who have not booked by then pay more.
If you are already late
It happens, and it is fixable. Skip the save the date, send the invitations this week, and give guests at least two weeks to reply. A digital save the date or invitation goes out the evening you finish it, with no printing or postage, which is exactly the time a late start does not have.
Common questions
When should wedding invitations be sent?
Eight to ten weeks before the wedding when most guests are local, and three to four months before when many guests will fly or the wedding is a destination wedding. Save the dates go out six to eight months ahead, or eight to twelve months when guests travel.
When should the RSVP deadline be?
Two weeks before your venue or caterer needs final numbers, which for most weddings means three to four weeks before the day. That leaves a full week to remind the guests who have not replied. When guests fly in, set it six to eight weeks out so unused hotel rooms can be released.
When should you send RSVP reminders?
Send a light, individual reminder about four days before the RSVP deadline, a short direct message about three days after it to anyone still silent, and phone the last few a week after the deadline.
When do you give final numbers to the venue?
Whenever your contract says, usually one to two weeks before the wedding. Check the exact number of days, because every other deadline in the timeline is worked out backwards from it.
Can I add the timeline to my calendar?
Yes. The calculator makes a calendar file with every step as an all-day event, which opens in Google Calendar, Apple Calendar and Outlook. It is created on your own device and nothing is sent anywhere.