Open bar at your wedding: complete guide and pricing

Key takeaways

• An open bar can cost between £15 and £65 per person depending on the package; for 100 guests on a standard option, the line item typically lands between £2,500 and £4,000.
• Always ask for a complete list of included drinks. The package name tells you nothing; the breakdown tells you everything.
• Lock in the price of any additional hours before you sign. Leaving it "to be agreed on the day" is a mistake that tends to be expensive.
• The premium package only pays for itself if a meaningful proportion of your guests are genuinely going to use the bar.
• The drinks reception and the evening open bar are separate line items in many quotes. Review both independently.

The open bar is a genuine source of stress for many couples, and with good reason: it hides far more small print than it appears to. What exactly is included in that price? When does it start and when does it end? Is the premium package worth it or is it money wasted? Here is everything you need to know before signing with your caterer.

What an open bar at a wedding actually means

The term "open bar" refers to an unlimited drinks service running for an agreed period of time, either included in the per-head price or offered as a supplement. What that looks like in practice varies enormously from one venue to the next: from a basic spread of soft drinks, house wine and beer, to something far more considered with imported spirits, signature cocktails and a carefully curated selection of wines with protected designations of origin.

The first thing to do when you receive a quote is to ask for the complete list of included drinks. Without that breakdown, comparing quotes from different suppliers is close to impossible.

What an open bar costs: realistic price ranges

Pricing varies considerably depending on geography, venue type and service duration. The most common tiers look like this:

Basic package (wine, beer, soft drinks, water): between £15 and £25 per person. This covers the essentials and tends to suit more intimate celebrations or tighter budgets.

Standard package (the above plus spirits and mid-range mixers): between £25 and £40 per person. This is a widely booked option at weddings of between 80 and 150 guests.

Premium package (imported spirits, champagne, signature cocktails and a selection of wines with designation of origin): between £40 and £65 per person. This makes sense when food and drink are the centrepiece of the day and your guests have discerning tastes.

For a 100-person wedding with a four-hour standard open bar, the line item can run anywhere between £2,500 and £4,000. It is worth putting that figure in the context of your overall budget.

Duration and timing: a detail worth nailing down early

In our experience, the duration of the open bar is the point that generates the most tension between couples and suppliers, and also the easiest to resolve if you negotiate it before signing. Most packages include three to four hours, typically beginning around dessert or the first dance and ending before the agreed finish time.

The problem arises when the celebration runs long. Some venues charge for each additional hour at a per-person rate that can effectively double the proportional cost of the base package. That figure needs to be fixed in the contract. Trying to negotiate it on the wedding day, when you have no leverage whatsoever, can be very costly indeed.

Something else worth clarifying upfront: does the open bar include the drinks reception? In many quotes, the welcome drinks are a separate line item. Reading both sections of the contract independently avoids some genuinely unpleasant surprises.

How to negotiate the open bar with your caterer

Ask for the breakdown before you negotiate

Before any conversation about price, you need to know exactly what is on the bar. Many caterers present packages with appealing names that, on closer inspection, include a limited selection of entry-level spirits and house wine with no designation of origin. There is nothing wrong with that if the price reflects it, but you need to know what you are buying.

Understand the difference between a fixed package and consumption-based pricing

Some venues offer the option of paying for actual consumption rather than a fixed per-head rate. If the majority of your guests do not drink alcohol or are older, consumption-based pricing could work out more economical. For weddings with a younger crowd who plan to dance late into the night, the fixed package tends to make more financial sense.

Negotiate the extra-hour rate before you sign

The price of any additional hour must be written into the contract. A clause that leaves that point open for discussion on the day removes your negotiating power at exactly the moment you need it most.

Corkage: when it is worth considering

If you have access to wines or spirits at a good price, some caterers will allow you to bring your own drinks for a corkage charge. The typical fee sits between £3 and £10 per bottle. Run the numbers: if the saving per bottle exceeds that charge plus the logistical effort involved, it may be worthwhile. If the difference is marginal, simplify and save yourself the headache.

What is typically included and what is not

A standard open bar in the UK and US generally covers domestic beer, house red and white wine, soft drinks and still or sparkling water, and a couple of base spirits with their standard mixers, usually whisky and gin.

What tends to fall outside the standard package is anything that drives up the ticket: quality champagne or prosecco, imported spirits such as agave tequila or bourbon, digestif liqueurs and crafted cocktails. These can usually be added as a supplement or booked as a separate service.

A detail that is often forgotten when reviewing contracts: are tea and coffee after dessert part of the open bar or a separate line item? In many contracts, coffee comes with the meal and the bar service begins afterwards. Confirming this avoids confusion during service.

Open bar and responsibility: what you need to know

Legislation around alcohol service at private events has been tightened in recent years, and many caterers have incorporated shared-responsibility clauses into their contracts as a result. In practice, this means service may slow down if bar staff judge that a guest has consumed too much, and some contracts place limits on the number of spirits served per round.

These clauses serve a clear purpose: they provide a legal safeguard that protects both the supplier and you as hosts. It is worth reading them carefully before signing and making sure the front-of-house team has the judgement to handle it with discretion.

When the premium package is actually worth it

The honest answer is: it depends far more on the profile of your guests than on your personal preferences. If a good proportion of your list plans to dance until the small hours and genuinely appreciates a well-made drink, the premium package will pay for itself. If your guest list skews towards families, children or people who do not drink, that money will work harder elsewhere on the menu.

A useful way to calibrate it: think about the ten guests who are most likely to make use of the bar. If those ten are representative of a meaningful share of your list, premium makes sense. If they are the exception, it does not.

For weddings working with a tighter budget, there are ways to trim without it showing.

The open bar in the context of your total budget

The drinks line as a whole, including the welcome drinks reception and the evening open bar, can represent a significant portion of your total spend, particularly at larger weddings. If the per-head price your venue has quoted already includes drinks with the meal, the evening open bar is a supplement on top of that base.

Before making any decisions, it is worth seeing the full budget with every line item together. The Wedded wedding budget calculator is free and lets you distribute spend by category so you can see where the real weight of each decision falls.

Conclusion

The open bar is, at its core, a statement about what kind of celebration you want to give your guests, and it deserves the same attention as the menu or the music. For a 100-person wedding it can represent anywhere between £2,500 and £6,000 depending on the package and duration, so the difference between a good decision and a costly one lives in the details of the contract: the actual list of drinks included, the locked-in price for any extra hours and the package level matched to the real profile of your guests. There is no universally correct answer. Some couples prefer to put that money into an exceptional menu and serve genuinely good wine throughout dinner. Others know their friends will be dancing until four in the morning and want no one to have to think about the price of a drink. Knowing your guests is, honestly, the most useful piece of advice for making this call well.

Related Reading

• Drinks reception at a wedding