Q: How far in advance should I mail save the dates?

A: You can send save the date cards anywhere between 6-12 months before the wedding. You don’t want to send them too early or people will forget, but too close to the wedding and you might as well forget it entirely and just send them an invitation. Here’s why…

The purpose of the save the date is to give people enough advance notice to plan ahead, make travel arrangements if necessary, and decide to come to your wedding instead of someone else’s super awesome event that may end up being the same day. It’s also a nice way to show off your beautiful engagement photos and get people excited about your upcoming wedding.

There are generally a few good reasons to send a save the date:

1) your wedding falls during May-October

2) is on a holiday weekend or an unusual day of the week or

3) is a destination wedding.

These are all circumstances that people like to plan way in advance for, or they are likely to have other plans altogether. And you don’t want your closest friends and family to not make it to your wedding simply due to a lack of prior notice, do you? Of course not.

Some couples like to send a save the date as their holiday card since the timing is perfect if you’re getting married during “Wedding Season”, plus you can use one of those amazing engagement photos we were talking about, and it kills two birds with one stone (Christmas card + save the date = only one holiday mailing).