Real Candles vs Battery Operated Candles

I am using both - tea light submersible ones and floating candles. The floating ones will put off a bit more light, but if you get the flickering ones and put them in frosted votives they look so romantic!

Honestly, the battery tea lights are great, IF they are in containers where you do not see them, but only their glow. It you see the actual tea light with the flickering fake wick, not so great.

At home, I use only battery operated candles, but their "wicks" are hidden from view, so only ambient light shows.

I think LED candles are totally fine when they work and when they're covered well. However I purchased some LED tealights at Michael's, and half of them were duds. They wouldn't turn on at all, or they would only turn on when I pressed on the battery, which I obviously cannot do all night at my reception! And they were way more $$ than real filled votives, even with a coupon.

I would choose real filled votives any day. But is there a safety concern with having the real flame? Just wondering.

Than you guys. Kris - the only concern I have is my poor wedding planner trying to manually light up 52 tea lights and 20 lantern candles in 45 minutes. You see my ceremony and reception are in the same room, which gets transformed during cocktail hour. So basically is more me, trying to be considerate and create less work :-/

If it is a matter of getting candles lit, do not worry. The venue staff will make that happen in a snap.

Ack! Triple post!

I would play around and see which is going to be easier to use personally. Do it ahead of time. For me I don't have a choice. We are going with battery operated ones as we are outdoors and and it will be rather windy or can be so I'm taking no chances and going with all battery ones. Not to mention we are in a historical setting and I don't want to take any chances of something accidentally catching on fire somehow someway.

I agree with Kathy - I think it's just as easy to manually light real candles as it is to flip on the battery operated ones. Actually - I think it could be easier to light the real ones if you use a long lighter.

Some venues don't allow open flames regardless how they are used. Check with your venue before deciding.

Definitely test them out first just to see what it looks like. I originally wanted to use battery-operated tea lights in our lantern centerpieces but they looked too fake (the lanterns are scrollwork so you can see the tea lights inside). We aren't allowed to use real candles because of wildfire warnings/drought in the part of the country we're getting married in so what I'm doing is using battery-operated votives (pricier than tea lights but way more realistic) in the lanterns and then using the tea lights inside our luminarias/ paper bag lanterns on a low wall around the patio because they'll be covered and you can only see the flickering light, not the actual tea lights. For you I would look at using battery-operated votives in the lanterns and actual tea lights around them. These are the votives I'm using and I'm pretty impressed with how real they look and the glow is strong enough that I only need one per lantern: http://www.amazon.com/Inglow-CG10286CR6-Battery-Operated-Fl