Free tool

Invitation
wording generator.

Q: How do you word an invitation?

In this order: who is hosting, the request, whose event it is, then the date, time and place. Formal wording names the hosts in full and spells dates out in words; modern wording speaks in the first person and may use numerals. The host line is what most people get wrong — it comes first, and it says who is inviting.

Choose the occasion, who is hosting and how formal it should be. The wording follows the conventional rules — and tells you which rule it is following, so you can depart from it on purpose.

How do you word an invitation?

In this order: who is hosting, the request, whose event it is, then the date, time and place. Formal wording names the hosts in full and spells dates out in words; modern wording speaks in the first person and may use numerals. The host line is what most people get wrong — it comes first, and it says who is inviting.

Build your wording.

Ocasião

Who is hosting

Host nameAs it should be written

Whose event it isThe names on the invitation

A starting point, not a rule. Runs entirely in your browser.

The four lines every invitation has.

The host line. Who is inviting. It comes first because it establishes who is welcoming the guest, and it is the line most often left out or muddled.
The request line. "Request the honour of your presence" for a religious ceremony, "request the pleasure of your company" for everywhere else, or plain speech in a modern suite.
The names. Whose occasion this is, written as they should appear — which is a decision worth making deliberately rather than copying from a contacts list.
The particulars. Date, time, place. Formal suites spell dates and times in words; modern ones need not.

"Honour" or "pleasure" is not a style choice. By convention, the honour of your presence is used for a ceremony in a house of worship, and the pleasure of your company everywhere else. It is a small distinction and a genuinely old one, and the people who notice it are the people most likely to be at a formal wedding.

Common questions

Who should be named as host?

Whoever is paying, traditionally — but modern practice is simply whoever is genuinely welcoming the guests. "Together with their families" is the usual solution when everyone contributes and nobody wants to be listed first.

Should dates be written out in words?

On a formal suite, yes: "Saturday, the fourteenth of June, two thousand and twenty-seven". On a modern one, numerals are perfectly correct and often sit better in the layout.

Where do dress code and RSVP go?

Not on the invitation card. They belong on the details card and the reply card — the invitation itself is the announcement, and loading it with logistics unbalances it.

What about a second marriage, or a divorced parent hosting?

Both have established conventions, and both need more nuance than a generator can carry. They are on the list for the wording library — for now, the shape above still applies: host line first.

Set this wording into a design made for it.

Wording sits differently on an engraved card than on a modern one. Evorrah designs the suite around your event, then sets your words into it — invitation, details and reply as one piece of writing.

See how a suite is designed The wording library

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