How do you ask wedding guests to share their photos?
Give them one route, one line, and ask three times: on the wedding website or invitation, on the table, and in a message the morning after, with the same QR code and link each time. Write a request, not an address: “Scan to add your photos to our album. No app needed.” With a QR gallery the upload happens in the phone browser, so there is nothing to install and no account to make; the free plan takes 20 photos per guest from any number of guests for 14 days, and $19.99 (£15.99 in the UK) once opens unlimited photos and videos kept 12 months. The wordings for each of the three asks are below.
What it costs
- Free: 20 photos per guest, kept 14 days from when you create the event
- Paid: $19.99 (£15.99 in the UK) per event for unlimited photos and videos per guest, kept up to 12 months
- One-time payment. No subscription and no fee per guest.
Why don’t guests share photos on their own?
Not for lack of goodwill. Three things get in the way. The first is friction: a method that needs an app, an account, a password or a long web address loses most guests at the first screen, and the older the guest, the sooner. The second is the assumption that someone else has it covered: there was a professional there all day, so the photo of the flower girl asleep under the table stays on an aunt’s phone. A shared gallery does not replace your photographer; it collects the pictures taken where the photographer was not standing. The third is that nobody asked. A guest who was never told where the photos should go will not go looking.
So the ask has to remove all three: one route that works in the browser, one sentence that says their photos are wanted, and a reminder at the moments when phones are already out. The rest of this page is that sentence, written for each place it goes.
What should the invitation or wedding website say?
One line, near the practical details, and the same line in both places if you use both. Its job is to set the expectation, not to collect anything yet: guests should arrive knowing their photos have a home.
“We would love your photos from the day. Scan the code or open [link] on your phone: it works in the browser, with nothing to install and no account.”
Put the link on the website and the QR code on printed things; a code on a screen is scanned with the phone you are holding. And mind the clock: a free event lasts 14 days from the day you create it, so a code on the invitations needs the paid plan, whose 12 months count from the upgrade. On the free plan, keep the ask on the day itself.
What should the table sign say?
The sign is the ask that works, because it sits where guests sit down and get their phones out. Keep it to one line above the code and, under the code, the event code typed out for the guest whose camera will not cooperate. Five wordings that have the three things a sign needs: a verb, a reason, and “no app”.
- 1“Scan to add your photos to our album. No app needed.”
- 2“You saw things we missed. Scan, pick your photos, done.”
- 3“Our wedding, your camera roll. Scan to share. It takes ten seconds.”
- 4“Photos from tonight go here. Scan with your camera. No sign-up.”
- 5“Help us see the day from your seat: scan to add your photos.”
The sign designer lays any of these out with your colors and your event’s real code at table-card, A5 or A4 size, and a plain printed sheet with the code comes with every event. Where else the code earns its place is on the wedding QR code guide.
What should the MC or DJ say?
One sentence, once, at a moment when people are seated and not eating: right after the welcome, or just before the speeches. Said twice it becomes a nag; said during dinner it is not heard. Hand it to whoever holds the microphone on a card.
“If you’ve taken a picture tonight, there’s a code on your table. Scan it with your camera and add your photos to the album. It takes less time than this song.”
Upload a few photos of your own from the morning first, so the first guest who scans sees an album, not an empty page.
What do you send the morning after?
The message that brings in the most photos, because guests are on the sofa with time and a full camera roll. Send the link, not a picture of the QR code (a link in a message is tapped, a photo of a code is not), and give the end date so the ask has an edge.
Thank you for yesterday — we’re still smiling.
If you took any photos or videos, please add them here: [link]. It opens in your browser (no app, no account) and stays open until [date].
The album is shared, so you can see everyone else’s photos there too.
The end date is the one your host page shows: 14 days from creation on the free plan, 12 months from the upgrade on the paid plan, and guests upload until that day. If the photos are still arriving as a free event nears its end, upgrade it and the same link keeps working. The windows of the other services, and what happens when they close, are on how long guests have to upload.
On the free plan, drop “or videos”: it takes photos only.
Does it work without a QR code?
Yes. The code is only the fastest way in. The event link does the same job in a message or on the website, and the short event code typed on the Eventphoto.io homepage does it for a guest who has neither. What does not work is a hashtag, which collects only the posts guests choose to make public and never hands you the original file; the hashtag alternative page goes through why. Every method, from a shared album to film cameras, is compared with its setup steps on how to collect wedding photos from guests.
The same three asks work for the parties around the wedding. An engagement party or a bridal shower gets its own event and its own code, and a message to the group the morning after.
Asking guests, the questions couples ask
Is it rude to ask guests for their photos?
No, as long as the ask is small and the route is easy. Guests who took a nice picture want you to have it; what stops them is not knowing where to put it, or a method that needs an app or an account. A line on the table and one message the morning after is normal, and most guests are glad to be asked.
Should I ask before or after the wedding?
Both, and during. Before: one line on the website or invitation, so guests know their photos are wanted. During: the table sign and one sentence from whoever holds the microphone. After: a message the morning after with the link, because the photos that come in from the sofa are often the best ones.
Do guests need to download anything?
No. The QR code opens the event page in the phone browser, where guests pick photos from their camera roll, add a first name and upload. No app, no account, no login, on iPhone and Android alike. The free plan takes 20 photos from each guest for 14 days; the paid plan ($19.99 (£15.99 in the UK) once) takes unlimited photos and videos for 12 months.
Can guests see each other’s photos?
Yes: everyone with the code sees the shared gallery, which is part of why guests join in. It is never indexed by search engines, you can lock it with a PIN, the host link alone downloads everything or deletes any photo, and a guest can delete only their own uploads.
What if guests text us the photos instead?
Some will, and that is fine, but ask for one place anyway. Photos sent by text or chat can arrive smaller than the original and have to be saved one at a time from a thread. In the gallery they arrive at full size, in one place, with one download of everything.