Virtual Wedding Platforms?

We’re looking into an app called Lovecast, which has a completely free option. It’s just a one-way video on one screen, but it’s in a website link so none of the guests have to download or sign up for anything (which was important for our less tech-savvy guests!). They have a paid version that offers longer stream time and such but it’s not worth it to us as we’re mainly doing it for a couple of older guests that we know won’t be able to travel. If you’re doing a stream as your main event and having little to no one physically there, I would think a paid version might be worth looking into for the extra support.

Many of my friends used zoom for their virtual weddings.

This past year we attended a virtual wedding using Lovecast. Super simple to use. The couple had the option where you pay so we were able to sign a guest book. Their invitations called it an "intimate ceremony" and then they had an insert card that provided all of the information for the live feed. Hope this helps!

Are you having a hybrid wedding (guests in person and guests via livestream)? I did, and I used a Save the Date template as invitations for our virtual guests and directed them to our wedding website for information on the virtual portion. For our live guests, I sent them traditional invitations with physical address information. It seemed to work out well. Also, many videographers are adding livestream options to their videography packages (sometimes as a free add-on). It may be worth asking your videographer for options. We wanted the ability to interact with our guests immediately after the ceremony through a virtual toast (where we could see and hear the guests too) so we had our videographer handle everything regarding the livestream.

I've never heard of LoveCast before but I'm definitely going to look into it! I've seen a lot of recommendations for a Facebook Live but I know not everyone not coming to the wedding has a Facebook. My FH and I were thinking of using Zoom so it's good we have an alternative now.

I highly recommend Lovecast, we used it for our wedding. We had 17 guests in person and 100+ joined using Lovecast! It’s a free app, all we did is download it on a phone, put the phone on a tripod and press play before the ceremony. The nice thing thing with Lovecast is that you can also do trial runs before the event, I had played around with different microphones and angles, and during our ceremony rehearsal we did some trials too. You will need to make sure that your ceremony location either has good wifi or you have good service. My absolute favorite part about Lovecast is that, unlike Zoom, people can’t talk so no need to worry about having someone forgetting to unmute themselves, but they can leave messages in the chat. Once our wedding was over we sat down and went over all the notes people wrote us during the live streaming and it was awesome!


They also save the video on the phone and on the website so you’ll get to keep that too for your memories!
In regards to invitations, you should just make it clear that it’s a streaming option. “We cordially invite you to join us for our virtual ceremony at the link below on this day at this time” and then include the link.

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That's awesome! I was thinking of just doing FB Live, but this sounds like a much better option. Do you know if there's a way to put a link to the stream on your wedding website? I just took a look and it didn't look like you could, but figured I'd ask someone with direct experience.

View Quoted Comment Shouldn’t be a problem! You’re able to copy and paste the link to your event, so you should be able to paste it to your wedding website!
I emailed everyone the link about a week before the wedding.

Has anyone heard of Eventlive.pro ??? it looks rather simple but cost $50

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Did you use the free version or did you pay for the upgraded version? I really like the idea of having the recording saved and people having the option to leave messages in a chat but I'd rather not pay for the upgraded version just for those features (that money can be used elsewhere!).

View Quoted Comment So I actually was lucky, they started their paid program maybe a week before my wedding and after I had signed up so they kinda grandfathered me in so I didn’t pay anything.
From their website now, it looks like the guest chat and the automatic video saving is part of the free version!
https://www.lovecastapp.com/pricing

View Quoted Comment I’ve heard about it and have read nothing but great reviews. I like that you can live stream on and off again. And your guests will be alerted that you went back live. It also records the whole livestream and has great camera quality. Fh and I will be using this for the reception. We’ve played around with the free option. We have live streaming of the ceremony with our photographer but we’d also like different events like special dances and cake cutting to be streamed rather than the whole reception because of the cost. So we’ll go live with eventlive. It also lets you link things like your website or registry. It seems worth the one time payment.

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Awesome, thanks for your insight! I'll bring that up with FH and see what he thinks about it, but I definitely like the idea!

I used Zoom for my wedding because I wanted to make it interactive for the online guests rather than just a live stream, and we had virtual elements in both the ceremony and the reception (i.e. my dad did his speech online since he couldn't travel to the wedding).

It worked out well because I had a friend who was attending virtually be my "Zoom technician" and she was able to run a slideshow before the ceremony started, spotlight us and switch between two camera angles, control the recording of the Zoom, mute everyone when needed!, play our "ceremony reading" video for the virtual guests while in-person guests were heading out of the ceremony area to prepare for the confetti toss, take screenshots during the event... it allowed us to really make the most of the virtual element. Afterwards we were able to download the full video, audio-only file and the chat transcript. This all cost me just $29.98 for a two months' subscription to Zoom Pro! We also did my bachelorette party via Zoom using the same subscription, hence 2 months and not 1 ;-)

I was lucky though to be quite tech-savvy myself, have a techy friend to do the wedding day, (and I trained my chief bridesmaid to run the bachelorette).

I think if someone isn't familiar with advanced features of Zoom then it could be worth paying for help. There are services like Wedfuly that offer it as part of full wedding planning service and I considered that but it cost $500 at the time (now $1200!!) and that was too much for me last year. But now that Virtual Weddings are more popular, you could probably find a freelancer/virtual assistant who could run a Zoom it for you and it could possibly cost the same or similar as services like LoveCast Pro but, in my opinion, you'd get more for your money if you want 2-way interaction as part of your day.