When to send party invitations, by type of party

There is a window for each kind of party. It opens when guests can still see the date as free and closes when the invitation stops feeling like news. A casual Thursday drink and a 40th birthday sit at opposite ends of that range, and sending one on the other's schedule is how hosts end up with six replies out of thirty.

The numbers below are lead times from sending to the party itself, with a reply deadline attached to each. Bringalong does the sending-side work: you build the event in a minute, share one link, and your private manage link shows who has answered, so you know on any given day whether the count is real or whether you are still waiting on nine people.

Lead times for parties at home

Match the lead time to how much the guest has to arrange. Showing up for a drink after work needs no planning, so a long run-up adds nothing. A babysitter, a day off, a train or a gift all need notice, and each one pushes the window out.

Use the longer end of each range when the group is large or when guests are spread across cities. Use the shorter end for friends who already see each other every week.

• Casual drinks, after-work pints, a last-minute barbecue: 5 to 10 days. Replies by two days before.
• Weeknight dinner for 4 to 6: 10 to 14 days. Replies by the day before you shop.
• Weekend dinner party for 6 to 10: 2 to 3 weeks. Replies by 4 days before.
• House party or birthday drinks for 20 to 40: 3 to 4 weeks. Replies by 1 week before.
• Game night, watch party or anything tied to a broadcast: 10 days to 2 weeks. Replies by three days before.
• Housewarming or open house: 2 to 3 weeks. Replies by 4 days before, mainly so you know how much ice to buy.

Lead times when guests have to plan around you

Once there is a venue, a per-head cost, a gift or a flight involved, the window moves from days into weeks. The number you are protecting is not the turnout, it is the deposit: a caterer or a hall wants final figures a fortnight ahead, and you need a reply deadline that sits comfortably before theirs.

Kids' parties are their own category because the date competes with the class calendar. Check term dates, inset days and the two other birthdays in the same week before you fix anything.

• Kids' birthday party: 3 to 4 weeks, with the school calendar checked first. Replies by 10 days before so you can confirm a headcount with the venue.
• Milestone birthday at 30, 40 or 50 with catering or a hired room: 6 to 8 weeks. Replies by 2 to 3 weeks before.
• Baby shower or bridal shower: 5 to 6 weeks, since guests are shopping from a registry. Replies by 2 weeks before.
• Engagement party, rehearsal dinner or anything orbiting a wedding: 6 to 8 weeks, and after the wedding invitations have gone out, not before.
• Graduation party: 4 to 6 weeks, sent the moment the ceremony date is confirmed. Replies by 2 weeks before.
• Destination weekend or a party that needs flights and a hotel: 2 to 3 months, with a save-the-date earlier still.

When a save-the-date earns its keep

A save-the-date is worth sending in four situations: guests have to travel or book a room, the party falls on a long weekend or in December, your guest list is over fifty, or the party is more than ten weeks out and you do not have the venue nailed down yet. Outside those cases it is an extra message that uses up the attention you will want later for the real invitation.

Send it 3 to 6 months ahead. Keep it to four lines: what it is, the date, the city, and the words "invitation to follow". Leave out the start time, the address, the dress code and anything you might change, because a guest who has two versions of the details will arrive with the wrong one. Then send the full invitation on the normal schedule for that party type, as if the save-the-date never happened.

That second send is the part hosts skip, and skipping it is why three months of notice produces a worse turnout than three weeks. A guest reads an early message, means to reply, puts the phone down, and it sinks under four hundred others. Keep the real invitation close to the date and let the calendar carry the memory: when guests reply on Bringalong they can drop the event into Google Calendar, Outlook or an .ics file in one tap, so the nudge arrives from their own phone the day before.

• Send 3 to 6 months out, no earlier unless flights are involved.
• Include the date, the city and the type of event. Nothing else.
• Write "invitation to follow" so guests know not to look for details yet.
• Send it to the same list you will actually invite, not a wider one.
• Follow with the full invitation on the standard lead time, and ask for replies only then.

December, and the fight over the same four Saturdays

Most December parties in your city are competing for the first three Saturdays of the month. The second Saturday is the most contested night of the year in most workplaces, since that is when office parties land. If you want a Saturday in that stretch, your invitation has to be out by the first week of November, and a save-the-date in late October is reasonable.

There are cheaper dates available. A Thursday in the second week of December is wide open and people will come, because they have nothing else on and the office party is Saturday. A Sunday afternoon open house between 2 and 6 competes with nothing. And the first two weeks of January are empty: a brunch or a leftovers party on the 10th gets a yes rate that a December Saturday cannot match, and everyone is relieved to be asked to something with no obligations attached.

If you are sending a December invitation in the last week of November, expect a lower acceptance rate and plan the food for the number who reply rather than the number you invited. Four weeks is not enough notice for that month.

• Saturday the 6th to the 20th of December: send by the first week of November.
• Weeknights in December: 3 weeks is enough, and the competition is thin.
• Sunday afternoons in December: 3 to 4 weeks, almost no competition.
• The week between Christmas and New Year: 3 weeks, but expect half your list to be away.
• Early January: 2 to 3 weeks, and the yes rate is the best of the whole holiday season.

Where to put the reply deadline

Work backward from the moment the number stops being changeable. If a caterer or a venue needs final numbers, your deadline is two days before theirs. If you are cooking, it is the day before you shop. If it is drinks and crisps, the deadline barely matters and you should set it two days out so you are not thinking about it.

Give the deadline a reason, in the invitation, in the same sentence as the date. "Let me know by Sunday the 7th, the venue needs final numbers on the 9th" gets answered. A bare "RSVP by 7 December" reads as paperwork. And put the deadline on a weekday evening rather than a Friday or a Saturday, because weekend messages get read and not answered.

• Catered or ticketed event: deadline 2 to 3 weeks before, two days ahead of the supplier's cutoff.
• Restaurant booking: deadline 1 week before, so you can adjust the table size.
• Home cooking: deadline 3 to 4 days before, the day before you shop.
• Casual drinks: deadline 2 days before.
• Kids' party with a venue per-child charge: deadline 10 days before.
• Name what the deadline is for, in the same breath as the date.

Reminders: two messages, maximum

A reminder is not a chase. It carries information, which is what makes it welcome. Send at most two, and make the second one a set of details, not a question.

Seven days before, send one message to the people who have not answered, one at a time, out of the group thread. Then 24 to 48 hours before, send a short note to everyone who said yes, with the address, the start time, the parking and anything you want them to bring. That second message is where late cancellations surface, which is better than finding out at the door. For anything with a strict start, like a surprise party, a restaurant booking or a game that kicks off at a fixed minute, add a morning-of line with the one time that matters.

A worked example for a Saturday 13 December dinner for ten: save-the-date on 25 October if guests are travelling, invitation on 7 November, reply deadline Monday 1 December with the reason attached, nudge the non-repliers on Saturday 6 December, shop on Thursday 11 December, and send the address-and-time message on Friday 12 December in the early evening.