Who should be invited to the rehearsal dinner when 90% of guests are from OOT?

I'm in the same boat as you, but 100% of my guests are OOT (destination wedding). We plan on only having members of the BP and immediate family attend the rehearsal dinner, so it will be about 25 people.

We're just doing wedding party and immediate family for the rehearsal dinner. That's all who needs to be there and we're keeping the dinner wicked casual. After the rehearsal dinner we're having a welcome event for any guests who are arriving Friday night. It's basically just if you're here come to the hotel bar with us!

We're doing immediate family and bridal party (with their SOs and families) due to this problem. We're going to try and put something in our hotel welcome bags about being at the hotel bar at a certain time (just a "the bride and groom will be at ___ from _ to _") but that's dependant on rehearsal dinner timing. Which is a different problem for us as FMIL has decided on a murder mystery thing (ugh, but not my circus, not my monkeys).

Just do WP and parents. We're only inviting OOT guests because we only have like 6 guests from out of town.

I never knew OOT invited to RD was customary, but we're absoluetely not doing that. All 92 of our guests are OOT guests, but our RD will consist of our wedding party, their SO's, our parents, our siblings, Jay's grandparents, and probably Jay's closest aunt. That's it.

Its outrageous to have what would essentially be another wedding, so don't worry about it.

You don't need to inculded all OOT guests, only those that need to there for the rehearsal. I have a similar situation but just 100% of FHs family are from over 1000 miles away so I'm leaving it up to his mom to say who's invited since she offered to pay

There is always a compromise, if you choose. You could have a traditional guest list for the RD and extend an invitation to the OOT's to join you for coffee and dessert at a later time.

You could just have a RD with just bridal party and siblings/ parents that would be fine and have a relaxed evening afterwards. It would be crazy expensive to feed everyone dinner two days in a row!!

Like yourselves the vast majority of our guests were out of town and checked into the hotel the day before. We didn't have a rehearsal dinner (they are not done here) instead we told everyone that we would be in the hotel bar from 7/8pm having a few drinks if they wanted to join us. About 50-60 people came, they went out for dinner and met us after they ate. We did arrange for finger food to come out and bought everyone a drink when they arrived. But as it was causal in a bar, people were mostly buying their own drinks and wouldn't let us buy them too many. It didn't cost us too much.

Our RD will be just the bridal party/SO's, our parents, and the parents of our flower girls and ring bearer. These are the people that we need at the rehearsal, so they're going to be the ones that come to dinner and celebrate with us!

I thought it was traditional for anyone who was out of town to be at the rehearsal dinner

I'm having the same issue. So we're just doing bridal parties and their spouses, our parents and grandparents!

No Cassidy, it's not. That's why it's called a Rehearsal Dinner.

You are correct ... it would be a 2nd reception. Leave it with just BP, BP SOs and immediate family.

That is very generous of your FILs to foot the bill. All the more reason to stay true to what a rehearsal dinner is really meant for.

I'm in a similar situation. Over half our guests are coming in from out of state. We are having a dinner with JUST the wedding party and our parents- THATS IT. And then I'm inviting a few of the out of town friends and family to see us at the restaurant after dinner (so like 8:00PM) if they wish.

We arent having a rehearsal. However, FILS and my parents decided we should have a dinner because of their etiquette. Sure, okay, whatever. FILS are paying and since everyone is out of towners, theyre all invited. Its about 60 people or so that we are expecting. Otherwise, FH and I wouldn't have done it.

ETA: sense making

We are just inviting the wedding party and SO's. ours is a DW also, but we can't afford all guests at rehearsal. One thing we did was make it a rehearsal lunch. We are doing welcome cocktail hour for everyone that evening for an hour.

We aren't having a WP at all and only my FH, myself and our officiant are NOT from OOT, but since our wedding and reception are at a hotel that has a restaurant/cafe/bar, we are inviting everyone to meet us in the cafe after the rehearsal. We will pay for our officiant and his wife if they choose to stay - everyone else is on their own to pay.

I agree it should be a rehearsal although I don't know that one is necessary. Just it was my understanding that- we aren't doing one because we aren't doing a rehearsal. But based on what I've seen in the past- at least in my family it was sort of expected.

I'd never heard of OOT guests being invited to the RD until I got here.

I'd never heard of it either, and we had catered rehearsal dinners for years...