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Brides / Kevin Liang
While you're not required to give out wedding favors on your big day, it's a sweet way to add a custom touch to the celebration. If your budget allows, thank the family and friends who traveled to celebrate you with a small gift. You can choose something reflective of you as a couple or a fun element that ties into your wedding theme, destination, or décor.
According to Liz Curtis, the founder of the party planning site Table + Teaspoon, guests always appreciate useful items. She adds that making guests feel more comfortable during your wedding weekend is a great idea. Think individual sunscreen for a beach wedding, miniature bug spray bottles for a woodland event, or an edible gift for late-night snacking. Lynette Dow, an event coordinator with Amy Abbott Events, encourages couples to consider a favor that ties into the location of the wedding—such as a small bottle of maple syrup for a Vermont wedding or a mini bottle of tequila for a wedding in Mexico. If you have an extensive guest list, keep your budget in mind when looking for favors and look for ways to save by buying in bulk or doing some of the assembly yourself before the event.
To help you find a wedding favor that will delight your guests, we researched and rounded up the best wedding party favor ideas for every wedding style and venue.
Love gardening and flowers? Send guests home with these seed packets that they can use to grow their flowers, complete with cute verbiage and packaging. Choose from 16 different watercolor design options for any wedding decor theme. And if you want to up the ante, pair each packet with a mini pot. We love this little gift because it will continue giving long after the celebration.
Shipping: Delivery within 5 business days
Pick up these personalized coffee bags to house a few scoops of your favorite coffee beans or grinds. They’re great to give out as a party favor the night of the wedding or add to a hotel wedding welcome bag when guests arrive for the big event. Or perhaps you might even give these out as a favor at the post-wedding brunch–your guests will need it!
Shipping: Delivery within 8 business days
For wedding favors that will make your guests’ experience much more enjoyable, these are great to have on hand (er, foot?) when they want to ditch their fancy shoes and stay on the dance floor all night. These customizable flip-flops are especially fun for a beach wedding. Your guests will undoubtedly appreciate a thoughtful favor that prioritizes their comfort during the festivities.
Shipping: Delivery within 8 business days
Cute and practical—especially if it’s a tropical destination wedding or just an outdoor summer soirée—these mini sunscreens can be customized with the text of your choice and come in four mod patterns. Plus, the attached carabiners ensure your guests will never lose them. These are perfect for keeping your guests comfortable and helpful if they forget to pack their own SPF.
Shipping: Delivery within 8 business days
Who couldn’t use an extra matchbook—especially one that reminds them of a fun weekend with friends and family? This pretty and practical gift can be personalized to make it feel extra custom and special. To that point, there are over 75 different paper options to choose from across a wide array of colors and finishes.
Shipping: Delivery within 8 business days
An adorable idea for a destination wedding, these tags (which come in an incredibly wide array of different backgrounds and font color combos) are something guests can use almost immediately. These high-quality pieces are handcrafted out of bonded leather and foil-stamped.
Shipping: Delivery within 10 business days
Pair these personalized popcorn boxes next to a big batch of freshly popped popcorn and assorted seasonings and let guests go to town making their to-go munchies. Although, we’re willing to bet it’s more likely to get quickly eaten up on the spot as a late-night snack. This savory snack is an especially affordable yet fun favor for budget-conscious couples.
Shipping: Delivery within 9 business days
We’re willing to bet that most people will be very happy to receive a bottle of wine as a favor. The only thing that could make it better? When it’s personalized with a label like this one, which you can customize with any photo of your choosing. And they also have beer bottle labels if that's more your style.
Shipping: Delivery within 5-7 business days
Cookies are a surefire crowd-pleaser, and happily, these iconic New York City cookies can be shipped nationwide. Plus, they’re so big that you can easily plan on giving out one per couple. Choose from any one of their four flavors—or mix and match—and contact them to help coordinate individual packaging, complete with custom ribbon colors and tags. That means one less thing for you to do. Your guests will appreciate the scrumptious late-night snack after all that dancing.
Shipping: Determined by location/availability
The celebratory script of this bottle opener feels oh-so wedding-appropriate. We love the idea of setting one of these across the napkin at every place setting for a piece that doubles as both a décor piece and a great take-home favor. Guests can enjoy using it again and again for their own celebrations.
Shipping: Delivery within 2 days with Prime membership
If florals and greenery are priorities at your wedding, incorporating some kind of plant-themed favor is a nice way to tie everything together. Give these white, modern planters on their own or pot them with a succulent, air plant, or herb. It's a fairly inexpensive gift that will bring further enjoyment once guests return home.
Shipping: Delivery within 2 days with Prime membership
What better way for a couple to share their love of their dog(s) and include their pet in their wedding than by setting up a dog treat bar for guests to take as favors for their furry friends? Your guests will have something special to bring home to their beloved pet, and it's an affordable favor idea as well. This family-owned company hand-makes all of its treats with only super high-quality ingredients. You can mix and match the different treats from their cookie bar, then set them out for guests to take at your wedding.
Shipping: Delivery within 5 business days
Hangover kits make excellent wedding party favors. This pre-filled pouch comes with electrolyte drink powder, vitamin C, ibuprofen, antacid, eye masks, makeup remover, hand sanitizer, and breath mints to boot.
Shipping: Delivery within 7 days
You can't go wrong with m&m's. These mini champagne bottles are filled with candies you can personalize with your wedding date, names, or even custom images. Instead of bottles, you can opt for little bags or tins.
Shipping: Delivery within 7 to 10 days
What to Consider When Buying Wedding Party Favors
- Budget: When it comes to budget, think about how many guests you have—a small wedding might afford to feature custom tote bags or other higher ticket items as wedding party favors, while a larger guest list might need more affordable options. Pay attention to the price per piece, then multiply that by your estimated guest count.
- Usefulness: The best wedding party favors are ones that guests will use again or will enjoy at the moment (think donuts, candy, or a mini bottle of vino). Curtis says anything that will make guests feel more comfortable during your wedding weekend is a good idea. Rather than saving a favor for the end of the event, she suggests giving guests a favor box with small items that are both fun and practical—think candy, Advil, and playing cards—at the beginning of the wedding weekend. Or, choose something that you and your spouse-to-be collect as a couple, such as magnets or Christmas ornaments, Dow says. If that’s the case, she recommends setting up a prominently displayed wedding favor table that guests will have to pass at the end of the night, along with signage indicating that these are favors that everyone should take.
- Wedding Location: Another option is to get wedding party favors that nod to the location of the event. For instance, you might offer leis if you get married in Hawaii or cactus candy for New Mexico nuptials. Or if it's a destination wedding, your guests might appreciate a travel item.
Why Trust Brides
Brides contributor Melanie Rud has nearly 15 years of journalism experience covering the beauty and lifestyle space for some of the biggest magazines and websites out there. She’s also a bride-to-be, currently planning her wedding, where there will be a dog treat bar...as well as some other type of wedding favor that’s still TBD. Additional research and product selection was done by Theresa Holland, a commerce writer specializing in travel and lifestyle.
- Liz Curtis is the founder and CEO of Table + Teaspoon, an online service that allows you to rent complete packages of everything you need to throw a great party.
- Lynette Dow is a coordinator with Amy Abbott Events, a premier wedding planning and event company that creates celebrations throughout Mexico.