When to send save the dates and wedding invitations: things to consider

Maybe you’ve just gotten engaged (congratulations!) or maybe you’re expecting a proposal sometime soon and you’re a planner (like me) and just curious. Either way, if you’re wondering when you should send out your wedding invitations, you’ve come to the right place.

This is a question we get asked pretty often and the reason for that is there’s really no straight forward answer. You’ll find so many different timing suggestions if you Google it, and I can guarantee every friend you talk to will recommend something different.

The best way to start working out these timelines is to ask yourself a few key questions. First of all, is your wedding going to be local, or will most of your guests need to travel to get there? If they do need to travel, you’ll need to add a few months to your timeline. Second, are you planning on sending Save the Date cards? If you are, you can send out your actual wedding invitations a bit closer to the wedding since guests already have the date and location locked in. And finally, if your wedding date is around the same time as public holidays, you may want to give guests a bit more notice so they don’t make other plans around the same time!

SAVE THE DATE TIMELINES

Save the Date cards are used to let your guests know they’re invited to your wedding, along with the date and general location so that they can block off that date in their calendars and can start making arrangements to attend, if necessary. They’re typically sent out about 6 to 8 months before the wedding, or 8 to 12 months before if it’s a destination wedding!

WEDDING INVITATION TIMELINES

Your formal wedding invitation should be sent to guests 3 to 4 months ahead of your wedding, and if you’re expecting most of your guests to travel from out of town to attend, then you’ll want to add a few more months to that timeline. Guests attending an out-of-town wedding may need to take time off work, find childcare, book flights and/or accommodation, apply for visas, and so on – so you want to make sure you’re giving them as much notice as possible, especially if you haven’t sent Save the Date cards.

WHEN SHOULD I PLACE MY ORDER?

If you’re ordering with us here at Embellished, we recommend ordering your Save the Dates or Wedding Invitations about 3 months before you want to mail them out. This is because from the time you approve your final design, it can take 3 to 5 weeks for us to get them printed depending on the type of print method you’ve chosen, plus another week to ship.

For more information on Our Process and timeframes, check out our page here.

ORDERING WITH EMBELLISHED

Have a browse through our collections and please drop us a line here if you have any questions – we would love to help!