Seating Chart Cards

Escort cards, place cards, or a single alphabetical poster — the right answer depends on your guest count, your formality, and how much handwriting you can face.

Cards, place cards, or a poster?

Three different things get called “seating chart cards”. Escort cards — the tent cards in a tray at the entrance — carry a guest’s name and table number, and guests take theirs to the table. Place cards wait at the seat itself and assign the exact chair, which formal dinners need and most weddings skip. A printed seating chart poster replaces both: one board at the door lists everyone alphabetically. The trade-off is arithmetic: 150 guests means 150 escort cards to design, print, cut, and alphabetize, versus one poster print and a frame.

Use your A–Z list as the card-writing worksheet

If you do choose cards, the fastest workflow starts with the alphabetical chart. Build your seating plan in the tool, print the A–Z view on Letter paper, and you have a worksheet with every guest’s name and table number in writing order. Check names off as you write cards, in alphabetical sweeps, instead of jumping between table groups — the same list doubles as your final proofread before anything goes to the printer. The printed list is also your insurance policy: if a card goes missing at the venue, the poster backup is one more print away.

When cards win, and when the poster wins

Cards win at plated dinners with meal choices (the card color or icon carries the entrée), at venues where a poster board would block a narrow entrance, and at weddings small enough that 40 cards feel like place settings, not paperwork. The poster wins at 80+ guests — an alphabetical board scales to any headcount without extra cutting — and at outdoor or historic venues where wind and doorways punish paper trays. Many couples split the difference: cards on the table for the meal choice, and a poster at the door so guests confirm their table in one glance.

Designing the card itself

Whatever you choose, the card is typography, not decoration. One name (or couple) per card, table number in a larger or bolder face than the name — guests hunt for the number first — and no script fonts below 14 point, because tent cards are read at arm’s length under reception lighting. Black ink on white or cream card stock photographs cleanly and prints true; metallics and pastels photograph as glare. Print a test sheet and fold one card before the full run: a tent card scored wrong stands crooked all night, and it is much easier to fix the template with forty cards left to print than after. Finally, count twice: one card per guest, plus roughly five spares for the ones that walk away in a pocket.

Common questions