The 3 Best Ways to Get Your Guests to Share Photos of Your Wedding with You
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Still in 2025, when everyone is equipped with pro-level smartphones, professional photographers are one of the key investments for weddings for so many people. In a way, they provide the artistic lens, the creative direction that tells a story and captures key moments throughout the entire day.
But that’s not to say your guests’ photos are obsolete. On the contrary, some of the best, most special shots come from the people who know you best – the ones laughing with you on the dance floor, or tearing up during your vows.
When the wedding is done and the celebrations have quieted, these are the memories you’ll want to treasure, and so it’s important to get your guests to share them. There are numerous ways to do this, but we’re going to walk through a few of the best below, helping to ensure every moment that was captured is a moment that stays with you forever.
Create a Shared Online Album
Perhaps the most popular way is to set up a cloud-based album – think Google Photos or Dropbox – before the wedding and share the link with your guests. Make it simple and stress-free – one click, and they can upload all their favourite shots.
Also emphasise speed. The faster guests can upload their photos, the less likely they are to forget or procrastinate – or even worse, start freeing up space on their phone by deleting the ones they don’t feel were ‘good enough’.
With speed in mind, however, you might want to remind any guests who have travelled to use a cell phone VPN if they’re uploading over public wifi (or are staying in a hotel or airport lounge before travelling back home). Yes, the photos are important, but you want to make sure they’re not sacrificing their safety for your sentimentality!
Use a Wedding Hashtag
It’s a common thing for guests to upload their photos to social media, but not all of them will remember to tag or mention you in the posts. With this in mind, another good way to get guests to share photos of your wedding is to introduce a unique wedding hashtag that collects them all in one place.
For the wedding day itself, you can even remind people of this, perhaps with a small sign at the entrance, a note on the programme, or a quick mention during your welcome speech. That way, the hashtag becomes second nature and all your guests are on the same page when it comes to sharing their photos in real time.
Make it Fun
As well as cloud-based albums and wedding hashtags, there are numerous other methods of sharing wedding photos, be it a specific wedding photography app or a shared folder on a messaging platform. But if we’re talking about how to get your guests to do it, sometimes a little extra incentive is needed – no matter where you’re hosting the photo-sharing.
One of the best methods we’ve seen in this regard is to introduce a little friendly competition. For instance, you could encourage guests to capture the ‘most candid moment’, the ‘funniest dance move’, or the ‘best detail shot’ and award small prizes in a follow-up post.
It might sound a little cheesy, and, hey, maybe it is! But it’s a great way to add an extra layer of engagement and excitement to the wedding experience, while giving you a broader, more diverse collection of memories in the process – memories that are far more likely to be shared, too!
Conclusion
The key is to make it easy and make it fun. Sure, professional photographers will capture the major moments, but your guests’ photos will add just a little extra magic that will make your photo album – or albums! – complete. So choose the method that works best for you, and make sure to get the ball rolling before the big day comes!
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