Inviting guests to ceremony but not reception

Personally I don’t think it’s a good idea, especially since you can’t guarantee everyone will be understanding. I know we were invited to an afterwards at the bar but not the reception and it hurt our feelings because the bride and groom knew we would have to take time off work, travel, spend the night, and bring a gift. It made us feel kind of like an afterthought (this was pre-covid and other stuff was going on too, so maybe things would have been different, but it wasn’t a nice feeling).

Indian weddings do this way since we have 1 pre celebration prior to the wedding. Guests do come to the celebrations they can attend and you can do the same to have your guests not feeling bad if the times don't get better. Guests plus vendors all have to be part of the count.

I personally wouldn’t do it. If I was invited to a ceremony, but not the reception (covid or not) i would think it’s rude. I think people will feel obligated to bring a gift to the ceremony, and it’s just poor taste.

View quoted message That's a great idea. And honestly I think given the circumstances right now family and friends are being understanding regarding these situations. We are limited and doing the best we can given restrictions. We are likely doing the streaming thing for those who we can't have there.

I personally wouldn't especially if it is ceremony then those people go home. If you wanted to invite more people I think most people would be happy enough with a live stream.

Personally, I think it's a bad idea. From all the weddings I've attended pre-pandemic, there is always more people at the reception than the ceremony but that's because they're invited to both but have to decline attending the ceremony. Though circumstances are obviously different, I think etiquette should be if you want them at the ceremony, you should be able to accommodate them at the reception as well.

We went to a wedding in October that dealt with this situation. They had online invitations and sent out a certain invitation to group A and a certain invitation to group B. Everyone was invited to the ceremony, but after the ceremony, group A stayed at the venue and had drinks while group B went to a nearby restaurant and had drinks with the Bride and Groom for about 60-90 minutes. Afterwards, Bride and Groom came back to the venue and we went right in to dinner/speeches/etc. Originally we were part of group B and felt absolutely no awkwardness or hard feelings about not being invited to the formal dinner since we knew they had a max limit of 50 and would be inviting mostly family. We only got bumped to group A after a few family members couldn't make it due to travel.