How many bridesmaids is too little?

Currently me

You can have as many as you want. Plenty of people have between 0-2 bridesmaids.

Bridesmaids are optional. You don't need to have anyone if you don't want to. Two is fine, and the numbers don't have to match with your partners.

What do you mean by "bridesmaid material"? What are your expectations?

Two is totally fine! There isn't anything wrong with a small bridal party. I'm planning on having 3. It's all about who you want to be with you at your wedding. Also, small parties make it less dramatic, easier to find dresses (so many less opinions), and honestly easier to do fun things for a bachelorette or whatever. If you're worried about not having an entire entourage, if you want to include siblings, cousins, aunts, or moms into some of the fun activities, that could be fun too. But honestly, if you only have two people, that's also perfect.

View Quoted Comment Thankyou for replying!! And I guess I say bridesmaid material meaning she’s not very girly or into the whole wedding scene if that makes sense. I may have worded my question wrong lol but I have a friend who I would love to be my bridesmaid but she is more of a tomboy so she’s not into wearing dresses, she has different beliefs than I do as far as weddings and religion so I feel that she might not want to be my bridesmaid but we have been friends since middle school and I love her so I would like for her to be apart of my wedding you know?

View Quoted Comment Okay Thankyou! I felt like I might have been weird for only having 2

View Quoted Comment Thankyou so much! I’ve never been to a wedding so planning all of this has been a little stressful. I was actually thinking of having my niece as my 2nd bridesmaid and my bestfriend as my first. My sister would be my maid of honor 😊

View Quoted Comment So I guess my expectation would be for my bridesmaids to actually want to be apart of this , being excited about going dress shopping, etc

Two is fine! I was in a wedding where we were just 2 bridesmaids. It was great because we got a lot of quality time with the bride, and she didn't have to spend a lot of $$$ on our hair and makeup. I hear photographers say that a smaller wedding party also makes for better photos because they don't have to zoom out to fit everyone in.

I'm only going to have 3. It was either that or a dozen, so I stuck to family only 😆

View Quoted Comment Awesome!! Thankyou for sharing! I think that’s what I’ll be doing too😍

Hi Victoria, congratulations! I agree that two bridesmaids is fine. I have a small bridal party as well (1 Matron, 1 Bridesmaid) and I find that much easier to manage. Happy planning!

Bridesmaids are optional. The only requirement is having 1-2 legal witnesses to sign the marriage certificate according to your state laws. The average we have seen is 2.


Some brides pick anyone and everyone regardless if they have a relationship because they are more concerned with aesthetics and people pleasing. The role should only be reserved for the closest ride or die friends you have who are the first ones you call/email to celebrate or vent your relationship with fiancé. Don’t ask a sibling or in law unless you are extremely close to them and they are your rock. Also if fiancé has a sibling or friend to include as an attendant, they go on fiancé’s side, not yours. If you search the forum, there are many posts of people asking the wrong people and they aren’t able to keep the friendship afterwards.

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Hey Victoria! Having just 2 people would be totally fine! If you don't think your other friend would be into the whole "bridesmaid" thing, you could always ask her to do a reading as a way to include her.

That being said, it looks like your wedding isn't for another 2 and a half years, so I'd advise against asking anyone just yet. There's a ton of posts on this forum about people who ask super far in advance and end up running into issues as the date gets closer.

View Quoted Comment I didn't check OP's wedding date but this is right.


Victoria, wait until spring 2024 to pick your bridesmaids. If you ask now, you may not still be close to them by the wedding and then you'll be left awkwardly wondering how to "fire" them. There is nothing they need to do before the 6-month mark so there's no reason to ask now. My friend in that photo originally asked 7 bridesmaids, but when it came time to RSVP, almost all of them backed out except me. So wait and see who you want when the wedding is closer!

View Quoted Comment Awh congratulations to you as well I’m so happy I’m not the only person deciding on a smaller bridal party! Happy planning to you as well

View Quoted Comment Yea that’s been my struggle! I don’t talk to a lot of people and I really only have my sister and my bestfriend that I go to about everything. They’re my ride or dies all the way. So finding one more person to be the second bridesmaid has been a little hard. My sister is my maid of honor so my bestfriend is the 1st bridesmaid. I figured maybe asking my niece to be the 2nd bridesmaid would be good because she’ll always be my niece you know? Thankyou for your response it’s helped a lot! I also wasn’t going to ask just yet because I’ve been so uncertain this whole time haha

View Quoted Comment That’s a great idea! Thankyou so much I think that would be a good thing to do to still have her included!! & yea I’ve been so uncertain this whole time so I figured I’d hold off on asking since my wedding is still fairly far out lol

View Quoted Comment Thank you and yes planning is going great! No, you're not alone. You'd be surprised by the amount of couples going this route or having no bridal party at all.

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You're so welcome! And no worries, we all started out not knowing things lol

Two is a perfectly good amount of bridesmaids! Honestly it makes it easier to plan things, lowers the cost, and likely means less drama. I saw your comment about having a tomboy friend as well. If you wanted to include her, you could see if you could find a matching jumper or pantsuit to go with the other bridesmaid dresses. Or ask and see if she will wear a dress. Who knows, maybe she will. Either way, 2-3 is a great amount and I wouldn’t add more people just to add them. 😊