Who sits where, sorted in an evening.Who sits where, sorted in an evening.

The list, by household

Each invitation is one line. “The Smith family, 2, 2” is two adults and two children, even if you don’t know the children’s names yet: they’re counted now and you can name them whenever you like. “Anna Brown” on her own is one guest. If the list already lives in a spreadsheet or a message, paste the whole thing, with commas, semicolons or columns, and you see beforehand what goes in and which lines were left out, with the reason beside each.

Tables and seats

Ten round tables of ten go in with one press. Then change them one at a time: a long table for the friends, a head table for the hosts and their family, a name for the table that shouldn’t just be a number. Each one is drawn from above with its chairs, and they fill as you seat people. Put eleven at a table of ten and it turns red. Nothing stops you, because you know whether one more chair fits.

Seating

Tap a family, then a table, and all four sit together. If your uncle has to be next to his brother-in-law, tap just him. On a computer you can drag them. Anyone already seated is picked up from their table the same way, to move them or take them off. The bar along the bottom keeps the count: how many guests, how many seated, how many tables have too many.

What you print

Three pages from the browser, on any printer at home or at work, and the list for a spreadsheet:

• The seating board for the entrance: every table and who sits at it.
• The list for the door, A to Z: every name with its table. Anyone without a seat yet is on it too, so you catch them before the day.
• Table cards, two to an A4 sheet, with a dotted line to cut along.
• The guest list as a CSV file, with each person’s household, age and table.

The plan stays with you

We don’t ask for an account or an email address. What you type stays in the browser on your phone or laptop and never reaches us. To carry on on another device, download the plan, one small file, and open it there. That is also the one risk: clear your browser’s data before downloading it and the plan is gone. Download it now and then.