According to The Knot 2025 Real Weddings Study, the average wedding cost for a wedding in the United States in 2024 is $33,000, slightly lower than the average cost in 2023 ($35,000), and while lower than in 2023, $33,000 is also a significant asset. If you can control the wedding budget to $10,000, it will save a lot of money, and today I am here to teach you how to control the wedding budget and complete a perfect wedding, so that you can have both and more.
The main cost of the wedding is the point
Here are the main points of cost for weddings in the United States, which are succinctly listed:
1. Venue rental and wedding catering
2. Wedding Planning & Personnel Services (Planner, Photographer, Band/DJ, etc.)
3. Clothing & Accessories (Wedding Dresses, Suites, Wedding Rings, etc.)
4. Flowers & Decorations
5. Wedding cake and dessert
6. Invitations and gifts
7. Transportation & Incidental Expenses (Wedding Car, Insurance, etc.)
8. Honeymoon (optional)
In order to make it easier for you to calculate your wedding budget more accurately, I have specially made a wedding budget calculator
I'm going to walk you through how to make the wedding happen for $5,000 or less
I, Appropriately reduce the number of invitees
When planning for a wedding, if you want to accurately control the number of people without losing decency, you can follow the following strategies: first, clarify the inner circle, use "intimacy" and "two-way giving" as the screening principles, and only invite people who have been in frequent contact with you in the past 1-2 years and have given support at important moments in your life. Prepare appropriate words for different groups, such as frankly admitting to colleagues or ordinary friends that "the wedding scale is small, only inviting core relatives and friends", and for distant relatives, expressing "the space is limited, and the follow-up special visit is grateful"; Finally, you can naturally filter through the "sense of ceremony", such as choosing a special venue with inconvenient transportation or setting a theme such as retro and camping, and indirectly filter out guests who are used to joining in the fun or are unwilling to cooperate. This combination strategy can not only maintain the intimate boundaries of the wedding, but also minimize interpersonal friction, so that the list selection is both scientific and humane. For this reason, I have created a wedding invitation evaluation system to help you screen who must be invited and who is not. Wedding Invitation Evaluation System, click this field to jump to the system details page.
II, Affordable Wedding Venue Options
Usually, the cost of a wedding venue will account for half of the entire cost, so if you want to control your budget, this is the most important thing, so I have made the following table to help you choose the right venue.
| venue type | Cost Range | Features | Visual reference |
|---|---|---|---|
| town Hall | $25 - $100 | the first choice for simple ceremonies, and the cost-effective choice is |  |
| Religious Places | free or for a small fee | churches/mosques/synagogues, etc., suitable for newcomers with religious backgrounds |  |
| Educational institutions | free or alumni discounted price | university auditorium/campus view, full of academic romance |  |
| Parkland | Free (Pavilion $50-$200) | natural landscape, pay attention to the weather plan |  |
| Coast beach | free ($100-$150 license) | romantic sea view, pay attention to the tide time |  |
| Private Club | members are free or | high-end intimate space for small and delicate wedding |  |
III, Choose flowers that are of good quality and low price
For flowers, I will recommend the following ones, which are also suitable for your budget
1，Flower Wall
2，Garlands
3，BRIDAL BOUQUETS
4，Wrish Corsages
5. Aisle chair flowers
6. Flower box
7. Dining table centerpiece
These are all the flowers and accessories that I recommend to you for your wedding.
IV, Invitation Fee
In order to save your budget for wedding invitations, I recommend that you use electronic invitations, this website has specially made a wedding invitation generation function, which can be sent directly to the inviter's mailbox after the generation is completed. Click on the wedding invitation production page to enter the relevant function page. In addition to e-invitations, you can also choose to contact us directly by phone, which will also save you a budget.
V, Budget Catering Scheme
🍴 5 Ways to Budget for a $75 Wedding (and Save Money!) ）
Heard that $75 per person for a traditional wedding catering can make you bankrupt? Don't rush to draw lots to decide who won't have anything to eat! Remember – the more waiters≠ the better the experience, choose your plan wisely, and your wallet and stomach will be able to smile!
🍔 Plan 1: Takeaway Crit ($15-20 per person).
Action: Contact a local restaurant (pizzeria/barbecue/sushi bar) and deliver food directly to the venue!
Pros:
- Guests choose their own dishes, and they are no longer afraid of "I am taboo", "I am vegetarian", "I only eat fried chicken"
- Leftovers? Inexistent! Pack it all into your post-wedding supper
- Budget: 800 for 50 people)
🥗 Option 2: Buffet Breakout ($25 per person).
Action: Talk to a local catering supplier about a "buffet package" and remember to cut these:
- 🚫 High-end tableware (with disposable eco-friendly tableware, 0.3)
- 🚫 Waiter (let relatives and friends act as "buffet guides")
- 🚫 ∗∗∗∗
🚚 Plan 3: Dining Car Romance ($16 per person).
Operation: Rent a retro food truck (search for "food truck for wedding") and make TA your wedding influencer check-in point!
Bonus points:
- Food truck as a photo prop (save $500 decoration fee)
- Menu customization (e.g. "Burger for Couples" or "Anniversary Special")
- Budget: $800 for 50 people (the food truck can also be extended by 1 hour)
💡 Money-saving tips
1️ ⃣ Staggered Magic: Saturday Wedding? Change to Friday/Sunday, food and beverage costs will drop by 20%⃣
2️Bulk purchase: go to Costco to buy drinks (40% lower than the price quoted by restaurants)⃣
3️Time management: Afternoon tea during dinner time (14-17 o'clock, the cost of ingredients is cut in half)
📊 Ultimate Budget Table (50-person version).
| project | scheme | expenses | 省下 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Catering | Food truck + self-service drinks | $1,500 | $2,500 |
| beverage | Costco bulk purchases | $300 | $500 |
| venue | Park Pavilion (free) | $0 | $800 |
| ornament | Shopping in the second-hand market | $100 | $400 |
| total | $1,900 | $4,200 |
Final Crit: Upgrade these experiences with the money you save!
✅ 2 more hours of photography (record more touching moments)
✅ Customized drinks for the bride and groom (exclusive LOGO cocktail)
✅ Post-wedding travel plus 1 day (Hawaiian surfing is more fragrant than the banquet hall!) ）
Remember: the wedding is yours, not the caterer's! With the right method, 100 happiness~ 🎉
VI, choose to buy cheap cakes
🍰 6 tips for choosing a cheap cake
The cake shop won't tell you, but learning these can save you 30%-50% of your budget!
1️,Choose the right purchase channel
-
Supermarkets/Club stores (e.g. Costco, Sam's Club):
✅ 6-inch animal cream cake 30-40, 50%
✅ less than the bakery The shelf life is short but the date is fresh, suitable for same-day consumption -
Takeaway platform:
✅ Search for "expiring cake" and "afternoon discount", and pick up $50+ cakes after 16:00
2️,Size traps to avoid
- 6-inch cake: actually enough for 8-10 people to eat (cut into 1.5cm thin slices)
- Double-layer cake: the lower layer uses a fake cake model, and the upper layer puts a real cake, and the cost is reduced by 70%
- Cupcakes: Instead of large cakes, $2-3 per person, they can also be used as souvenirs
3️,Taste determines budget
-
Money saving:
▫️ Fruit Cream (30/6 inches) <Chocolate Ganache (50/6 inches)
▫️ Avoid multi-layer fillings, flowing fillings, and fondant decorations -
Hidden Tips:
Buy a Basic Cake + Arrange Your Own Fruit/Flower Decorations ($10 Props to Cover)
4,Tips for getting the best deal
-
Wedding Benefits:
▫️ Registered members will receive coupons (e.g. $30 coupon for Haagen-Dazs' birthday)
▫️ Credit Card Benefits (Amex Free Godiva Cake) -
Staggered purchase:
▫️ Order cake on weekdays to save 20% compared to weekends
▫️ Buy after Mother's Day/Valentine's Day, the price is cut in half
5️,Quality judgment method
- Look at the cut surface: uniform stomata = freshly made, large stomata = frozen for too long
- Touch the base: cardboard = factory goods, soft pallet = handmade
- Taste the cream: melt in your mouth = animal butter, sticky throat = margarine
6,The Ultimate Money Saving Tip
-
Semi-finished product DIY:
buy cake base (10), 6 inches cost $15 -
Fake cake real props:
put real cakes on the top layer, use foam models on the lower layer, and cut them after taking photos (suitable for 50 people + weddings)
VII, Pick the right photographer
When it comes to choosing a photographer, consider finding amateur photographers or contacting student photographers on campus, who tend to be good at their skills and cheap. You can also join the local photography enthusiast group and send a demand for "low-cost wedding follow-up". 📸 The ultimate low-cost wedding photography solution: recruit relatives and friends who can take pictures as a second camera (red envelope 10 Lightroom presets for one-click color grading, and then spend 140 can make wedding photos blow up the circle of friends! Remember to test your device ahead of time, back up the original, and prioritize capturing real moments like your parents' expressions – the best photos aren't flawless, they're the ones that will look good years later. 💖
VIII, Draw a beautiful makeup
Because Bunsen doesn't take up much of the budget, I recommend finding a professional makeup artist to do it, and if you really want to save money in this area, then you can find friends and relatives with high makeup skills to do it.
IX, Other Fees
The rest is the cost of the master of ceremonies and some other props, such as tables and chairs, rentals, taxes, freight, travel expenses, etc., which should be considered according to the actual situation of your own local situation, but do not worry that these expenses are very small in the total budget.
That's all I know about a $10,000 wedding, and you can get a perfect wedding within a $10,000 budget.
