Registry & Gifts · 4 min read

The Complete Save-the-Date Timeline

When to send, what to include, and the address-collection trick that saves weeks.

Send save-the-dates 6–8 months out for a local wedding, 8–12 months out if people will book flights. Destination weekends get a 12-month heads-up and a lodging hint, not a full itinerary — that comes later with the site.

What belongs on the card: your names, the date, the city, and the wedding website. What does not: registry links as the hero, a dress code, or a poem. The job of this piece of paper is to occupy a fridge and collect a yes in someone’s calendar.

Collect addresses before you design anything. A shared form on your Knotly site (or a ruthless group text to parents) will save you from the week you spend hunting apartment numbers. If you cannot get an address, you do not have a guest yet — you have a wish.

Order 10–15 extra. People move. People appear. The 3FREE sample code in Knotly Paper exists so you can feel the stock before you commit to 180 of them. Mail them on a Tuesday. Track nothing except the ones that bounce, and update the list before invitations go out.