How Many Guests Is a Micro Wedding?

Elopement vs minimony vs micro wedding

Three sizes, three different kinds of days. Each one unlocks different venues, food formats, and budget shapes, and each maps to a package tier priced for that scale.

Elopement

Up to 10 guests

Your vow exchange belongs entirely to you two. Maximum freedom, minimum logistics. Coastal bluffs, a redwood grove, a vineyard corner, a city hall balcony. Any of it opens up at this size.

What it unlocks: Ceremony sites no group can access. A budget that goes almost entirely toward experience, the place, the dinner, the photos. Private chefs. Restaurant back rooms. One great night.

SF City Hall ceremony · dinner at a private restaurant

Minimony

11–25 guests

Your absolute inner circle, parents, siblings, the friends who are basically family. A ceremony with the people who actually matter, then one great table at dinner.

What it unlocks: Private dining rooms, winery tastings as reception, chef's counters. One table means one conversation everyone is part of. This is the most underrated size we plan.

Vineyard ceremony · long table dinner for 20

Micro Wedding

26–50 guests

A real wedding at its most concentrated. Everyone you'd genuinely miss, nobody you'd have to introduce yourself to. This is the size most of our couples land on.

What it unlocks: The full arc, from ceremony and cocktail hour through dinner and toasts, with dancing if you want it. All of it in spaces built exactly for this scale, from barrel rooms to estate terraces and winery long tables.

Estate winery · dinner and dancing for 50

The 50-guest line

Fifty is our cap, and it's honest. Children under 10 don't count toward the total. Beyond 50 adults, we build in a grace of 2 guests (late RSVPs happen); past that we can quote a small per-guest add-on up to the cap, which we confirm with you on a free consult.

Past 52, you're describing a traditional wedding, different venues, different pricing structures, a different kind of day. We'd rather tell you that now than squeeze 70 people into a plan built for 30.

No two weddings look the same, that's the whole point. But the guest count is where every downstream decision anchors. Get this right first, and everything else gets easier. See how pricing works across sizes →

How to cut the list without a family incident

The concentric-circles method: write out your innermost circle first (just you two → your parents → your siblings → your closest friends), then expand one ring at a time until you hit your number. Stop expanding. That's the guest list.

The honest framing: “we kept it very small” is one of the only guest-list explanations nobody can argue with. It works because it's true, and because it signals intentionality, not exclusion.

Every name you cut buys back venue options. At 20 guests, you can book a private dining room at a Michelin-recommended restaurant. At 50, you're looking at full venue buyouts. These experiences don't scale to 150 guests. They work beautifully for 20.

Many of our couples host a casual backyard party for the wider circle a few weeks later, that one plans itself.