Photographer - How many hours should you hire for?

Sometimes email the photographer as they may not state that on their site but they may do less.

I would email a photographer you’re interested in and ask for a bespoke package. That’s what I did with my photographer.

We did 7 hours and I didn’t think it was enough

We will be doing 8 hours

We are doing 6 hours to keep costs down.

We are doing 6 hours but you also have to consider if you want pictures of everyone getting ready, if you do, you should make sure yoy dont cut your time too short! Cut corners in other places and shop around I found an awesome photographer that's local a one man show with awesome pictures for 875 ! Some photographer also offer payment plans leading up to the wedding day!

We did a 4 1/2 hour to save money but we did have a second shooter for 90 minutes. Very happy we had TWO.

Since you're having a smaller wedding, you're not really doing a bridal party and you don't want getting ready photos, see if any photographers will put together a 4 hour package for you to accommodate your day. Most photographers will if you ask.

My FH and I are having a wedding party and are doing "getting ready" photos. We're getting married at 4pm but we have our photographer from 12:30pm to 8:30pm (our reception ends at 9). She will be with me and my bridesmaids in the hotel suite from 12:30 to 1:45 (my FH will be golfing the morning of the wedding so she won't see him until he's showered and gets to the venue), and then she will head to the venue with me to take the remainder of the getting ready photos with my FH and his groomsmen. We will go into our first look around 2:30 and take a majority of our bridal party photos and couple photos before the ceremony. After the ceremony we will take photos with family while our guests find their seats in the reception hall (we aren't doing a cocktail hour), and then she will continue to take photos of the reception until 8:30pm when we do our group shot on the dance floor and then she will leave.

I think a lot of it’s going to depend on your timeline for getting ready, if you’re doing a first look/pictures before the ceremony, and what time the ceremony starts.


If you want getting ready photos I would suggest having the photographer come towards the end of your hair/makeup time and they’ll stage the shoot so it would need maybe 30 min max. Don’t forget to account for travel time between places. We’re doing a first look and photos with the bride/groom party before the wedding because we won’t have time once it all gets started and we wanted photos in our city vs just in the venue. So there’s a lot to take into account.
Four hours might be enough for you if you’re not doing a reception, but if you are I would get at least 6

We are having a photographer for two hours. She will start at 4pm, ceremony is at 430pm, and cocktail hour from 5-6pm . Then she’s done. This timeline works perfectly for us as we don’t have a bridal party, or want tons of posed photos.