Invitations

Between Save The Dates and invitations, the Save The Dates are the optional one. If you don't want to do both, I would skip the Save The Dates (or send them through email) and just do invitations. People are not typically expected to RSVP when receiving a Save The Date.

If you want to skip one, skip Save the Dates and send invitations only. You can just email/text or do electronic save the dates if you want to get it on everyone's radar. Unfortunately if you ask for an RSVP six months in advance, people are going to just forget, or not know their schedule that far in advance, and you'll have to track people down months later.

Why not just skip the save the dates and just send invitations...

I agree with PP. Just send invites a little earlier than normal, like 8-10 weeks, and don’t do save the dates.

Agree with the other posters. Most people won't be able to give a firm RSVP 6 months in advance, they just won't know their plans yet. Tell people the date via email or phone call, then spend your money on the invitations when the date is closer.

6 months is too far in advance and many people won't be able to give you an answer yet or know their plans then. If budget is the issue, then you can send electronic save the dates. Or skip save the dates altogether and send invitations a tad early

Because save the dates are sent at the 6-12 month period, that is way too early for rsvps. No one can commit before 4 weeks and employers don’t give final schedules before then. Plus they will completely forget and lose the information. Contrary to popular belief, a save the date does not have to cost you a penny. For decades, they were sent over the phone with zero issues, nothing through the mail to get lost. If you only mail one item, make it the invitation that is sent no earlier or later than 6-8 weeks. Have them rsvp at that time.


Some people won’t take the invitation seriously unless it’s something they can see and hold. We’ve been to a couple weddings where the couples sent digital invites at the standard time frame and hardly anyone showed up because they were waiting for actual paper invites.

If you ask for RSVP six months in advance, it won't give you the result you want. You'll get a lot of "maybe"'s. In addition it'll look like you're trying to "B-list" your guests, replacing ones that reply no with others on the list. This is considered really rude.

You're confusing STD's with invitations. You don't need to send a STD at all. Send invitation 6-8 weeks ahead of the wedding and just let your VIP's know early by text or phone call.

Truthfully, if I received a save the date without an invitation, I would likely set it aside (too early to commit) and completely forget about it. I don’t think people will take the event seriously without an actual invitation.

Yeah I agree with other comments and just skip the save the dates. I don't think save the dates are required at all and I didn't do them.

In addition to everything everyone else said, I would be a little confused about receiving a save the date and not receiving an invitation later on. Even if the save the date requested an RSVP, unless it was extremely clear that an invitation will *not* follow, I would think I was uninvited.

Yes if you need to skip one don't bother with the save the dates. Just go straight to the invitation.