Afternoon cocktail wedding reception hors d'oeuvres

It depends on what you order, when your reception is and how long it lasts. A 2-hour reception will require a lot less than a 4+ hour reception. You probably won't need as much if you have heftier things like mini fries supreme, samosas, or sliders since they're filling. But if the hors d'oeuvre selection are smaller bites, like those spoons of cocktail sauce topped with a single tiny shrimp, a button mushroom cap, or one of the tiny polenta things that are the size of a quarter, you'll need more pieces to pass around.

If you start your ceremony later, people would've had lunch and won't need to fill up as much. But if you start your ceremony before 1pm, people likely would not have eaten (or only ate something really light) and will be hungry and wanting more.

As per other comments I'd say 5 or 7-10 pieces

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10 pieces per person will do. You need to be able to feed your guests something and not have them starving

I would do the 7-10/pp since you are ending at dinner time. All your guests will either have to stop for dinner after reception or have to wait for dinner to be made once they get home.

View quoted message Even though our reception would finish at 5pm, before dinner time? Our idea in having an afternoon reception is so that it doesn’t go over dinner time.

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I would do a bigger portion since you're not serving dinner

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Then yes I would order on the higher end per person.

View quoted message We are not planning to serve a dinner later as this is an afternoon reception, not over any dinner time.

Your planning on only having hors d’oeuvres? No meal to follow? I would probably plan for 7-10 pieces per guest then. If you are serving a dinner later, 3-5 pieces would be okay.