Seating Charts

That sign is for the ceremony, as back in the day the bride's guests would sit on one side and the groom's on the other. For the reception, it is recommended you do assigned tables at least, unless you have like 10 people at a micro wedding. Otherwise, you run the risk of families being separated, grandma stuck in the back, etc. It's much easier for guests to pick a seat at a table they are assigned to rather than having people re-experience a high school cafeteria scenario. People typically do a seating chart or escort cards. It took us about an hour or so to arrange 110 guests at tables.

View Quoted Comment That makes sense, thank you!! My ceremony and reception will both take place in the same location. I don’t know if that makes a difference or not. They will have the chairs in ceremony style and then moved to the tables for the reception. I originally wanted to do a frame from amazon with all the guests names per table (80 guests- 8 tables) but the price is a little high so I’m trying to figure out what will save us more money some we’re also in the process of buying a home. Any recommendations? Thanks once again!

View Quoted Comment I bought a pack of small Avery tent cards on Amazon and printed them at home. The cards cost me about $12 and then Avery has free online templates. I didn't do anything fancy. Just a nice font for the name and table number. Then they were placed in alphabetical order on a table.


Are people going to go elsewhere during cocktail hour while the room is flipped from ceremony to reception? You can just have a small table somewhere outside the reception room or in the cocktail hour area for people to grab their cards during that time period.

Seating charts are not necessary. However, we are having one because 90 of our guests is my family, 50 of them are friends, and 10 are his family. Seating is sparse so I want to make sure everyone gets a seat and isn’t standing and there is no seat issues, lol

This is what I'm planning on doing. I already have a mirror this big and I'm having some vinyl letters being made that will say "please find your seat" we already have the sealing stamp for the invitations and I decided to use it for the seating chart as well. I'm still not sure if I want to print out the cards myself of have them made on etsy.

Etsy has editable seating charts you can download and then get printed yourself l! That’s what I’m planning on doing! They are pretty reasonably priced!

Seating charts are always recommended. If you choose not to have one, you’ll need to provide about 20% more tables, chairs, place segments, etc. since guests don’t seat themselves efficiently. I don’t have a photo of our seating chart yet, but we pretty much did exactly this and set it right in front of the door. We used an Etsy template and a frame that we bought for $5. The whole thing cost less than $15.

We did escort cards. Super easy and inexpensive!

Seating charts keep your reception running smoothly. Unfortunately, without one, you might have guests leaving one empty chair at tables which will prevent couples from being able to sit together. I’d highly recommend doing one. They don’t take long and are not expensive. We spent about $30 on ours and it looked similar to this.

We are not doing a seating chart. The vast majority of our 150ish guests are couples. The larger family groups are my immediate family who will be at the reserved family table. It's pretty common in our area and among our circle of people to not have assigned seats. And besides...my guests won't be sitting much. Too much mingling and dancing and other entertainment options for people to spend all night in their seats.

We're doing a seating chart so spouses of our wedding party will be seated with people that they know since we will not be doing a sweatheart table. Also, because there are family members that get along better with some people than others. That way no one is excluded.

I am doing a seating chart. I think it just makes things easier, especially if you’re having a larger wedding. My FMIL has a Cricut so we’ll be making something cute, I just don’t know what yet.

I am still deciding whether to do the seating charts Krista posted (order from Etsy) or just do what Fiance says, text everyone their table number lol.

I think I'll go with the former!