Wedding seating chart: from the guest list to the place cards
Nobody starts a seating plan with a plan. It starts with a guest list that is still changing, with an aunt who cannot be sat opposite her brother, and with a caterer asking how many vegetarian plates go to which table. The seating editor lives in the same place as your guest list, so you seat people as the replies land — and anything that has to be printed comes out as a PDF.
You lay out the room, not a spreadsheet
A venue is rarely one room, so the editor works on two levels: areas — the main room, the terrace, the marquee — and, inside each of them, the tables you put there.
Areas
Create the hall, the terrace, the garden. Each area carries its own tables, which is what stops table 14 quietly ending up outside on a single flat plan where nobody notices.
Tables
Add a table, give it its number of seats, rename it. A top table of twelve and six rounds of eight live together without you having to pick a template first.
Seating guests
Assign a guest to a table straight from your list. Everyone still unseated stays in the sidebar — three weeks out, that is the only question that matters.
Seats per party
An invitation covers a whole party, and how many seats it takes comes from the reply: two for a couple, five for a family. Until that reply arrives the party counts as one, so you set the number yourself — the free seats on the table follow at once, and so does the caterer's count.
Three PDFs and a spreadsheet
A seating plan does no work while it is still on a screen. The sheet you pin up at the entrance, the cards you cut out and the numbers your caterer needs are three different documents, so they come out as three separate exports.
The hall plan
The overview: your areas, your tables, who sits where. This is the sheet you display at the entrance and hand to the venue coordinator on the day.
The place cards
One name per card with its table, ready to cut. They follow the plan exactly, so a change on the morning does not leave a stale card sitting on the table.
The caterer's summary
What the caterer actually asks for: covers per table, and the total for each area. This is the document that saves the round of emails in the final week.
The spreadsheet
The whole seating in CSV, for anyone who wants to rework it elsewhere or keep it for the record.
Top table or sweetheart table
Two arrangements sit side by side in the English-speaking world. The top table is the older one — a long table facing the room, which in Britain and Ireland traditionally seats the couple with both sets of parents, the best man and the chief bridesmaid in a settled order. American weddings more often call it a head table and fill it with the wedding party, the maid of honor and the groomsmen included, while the parents host tables of their own. The sweetheart table is the newer habit: a table for two that came out of the United States and travelled well, because it frees everybody else to sit with their own partner. None of this is a rule, and plenty of couples now take two seats at an ordinary round table instead. The editor is content with all three — a table of twelve or a table of two, and a marker for whichever one is the head table.
Do I have to type the guest list in again?
No. The editor works on the guest list already in your account, replies and all — a yes that arrives late turns up in the unseated list, not in a second spreadsheet.
What happens when somebody drops out?
You take the guest off their table and the seat is free again. All three PDFs are generated at the moment you ask for them, so they show today's plan rather than the one you printed last week.
Can I print before everyone is seated?
Yes. The exports work on a partial plan — which is the normal case, because a seating chart is rarely finished before the last week.
How to divide the guests up
This page describes the tool. The question of WHO to sit next to whom — the step-families, the colleagues, the children's table — is the subject of the guide: Strategy at the table: how to plan the perfect seating chart
The seating chart comes with the website
The editor sits in your wedding account, next to the guest list and the replies arriving online. Create your site, invite your people, and seat them as the answers come in.
Create a wedding website for freeCreating and designing costs nothing. Sending invitations and collecting replies is part of a package.