3 Pros Answer the Age Old Question: How Long Do Wedding Photos Take?

When you're working out your wedding timeline, the question of how long do wedding photos take should be one of the first topics that come up. While the ceremony, cocktail hour and reception are the top priorities, you have to fit the photos around each event, and the timeline for photos can determine how the transition flows from one stop to the next.

Experienced wedding photographers, who you can find on The Knot Vendor Marketplace, have seen it all in terms of timeline. They've spent hours shooting every possible combination of wedding photos and formal portraits of both sides of the family. They've tried to squeeze in a first look with guests anxiously awaiting the couple's arrival. And they've encouraged their couples to extend cocktail hour by just a few minutes to allow time to grab golden hour shots just as the sun starts to set.

This is why, when your wedding planner starts chatting timeline, the first person you should consult is your photographer. They want to make sure you have ample time to capture photos of each and every memory and beloved guest without interrupting the celebration or making you feel as if you're a ping-pong ball, constantly bouncing from one photo to the next.

Here's exactly how much time wedding photographers say you need for wedding photos on your big day.

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How Long Do Wedding Photos Take?

"The photo timeline is and should be unique to every wedding and couple to best fit their needs, so no guide can be one size fits all. Your photographer, working in tandem with your planner, should customize it to fit the needs and desires of each celebration,"
says Justin McCallum, owner and lead photographer at Justin McCallum Photography based in NYC.

But don't expect it to be a quick process if you want stunning photos. While it's split up throughout the day, you should expect that you're going to spend a significant amount of time with your photographer on your big day. "If the couple are doing a church ceremony and are having a reception later on in the day, we sometimes have up to two to three hours for shots. An hour would be the absolute minimum and probably only possible for small families and wedding parties," says Kari Bjorn, owner and lead photographer at Kari Bjorn Photography in West Hartford, Connecticut.

To keep the wedding photo shot list running on schedule, make sure everyone is prepared. Micah Chaffin, one-half of the destination wedding photographer duo The Chaffins, explains. "The best time for family photos is soon after the ceremony because everyone will already be gathered in one place and won't have yet gone into party mode for the reception."

How Long Do Family Photos Take at a Wedding?

Most wedding photographers recommend 30 minutes for family photos before or after the ceremony. However, if you want a more specific formula, Chaffin recommends budgeting two minutes for each combination of family members on your family wedding photo shot list. This adds up quickly when you're running through individual shots of each sibling or cousin with the happy couple, but it's often not the actual photography time that eats into your timeline—it's the wrangling of people. "Make sure you inform everyone who will be part of family photos ahead of time so that they're expecting it. So often family members will have to be tracked down from other parts of the venue in order to start family photos," Chaffin says.

How Long Do Wedding Party Photos Take?

"Formal wedding party photos follow a similar structure," Bjorn says. "Most often, I am working with about 8–16 people in total with the couple, their wedding party, a ring bearer and flower girls." Typically, he recommends 30 minutes to run through the shot list for this size group. This would include large group photos, casual and formal, as well as each partner's wedding party and individual shots of each member of the wedding party with their person.

How Long Do Formal Wedding Photos Take?

After you've weighed the first look pros and cons, the next thing to consider is the timeline for how long formal wedding photos take. The timing will generally remain the same whether you're taking the photos before or after the ceremony, with a few more minutes for the surprise of a first look. McCallum advises, "The couple should try to complete as many portraits as possible before the ceremony if they are comfortable seeing one another then. It is a great time in the hustle and bustle of the day to focus on your partner and recenter yourselves, plus you're not as concerned about things to do later on."

He recommends a couple allocate at least 30 minutes for portraits just of the two of them, and that number can be bumped up to 45 minutes or an hour if they want to shoot in multiple locations. "If that much attention on just you two with a camera seems intimidating, it can also be nice to break it into two 20-minute chunks—one before the ceremony to make sure you get things covered, and another chunk later close to sunset for dynamic, different golden hour lighting," McCallum says.

Bjorn echoes that sentiment of breaking up the formal wedding photos of the couple. "They get a better variety of portraits to choose from in their final gallery. We usually do one session prior to the ceremony in mid-afternoon light, one short session after the ceremony, another short one during golden hour and then I'll grab them for some after-dark portraits during the reception.

How Long Do Pre-Wedding Photos Take?

For larger groups where the wedding parties include eight or more bridesmaids or groomsmen and families beyond parents and immediate siblings, McCallum recommends 30 minutes for pre-wedding photos. "This is best tackled before the ceremony if folks' customs and expectations allow them to be seen before then. This allows one of the times with heightened stress and expectations to be tackled early, so then everything else is smooth sailing," McCallum says, who notes, it's easier to corral people before the bar opens up at cocktail hour.

But it also doesn't hurt to build in buffer time. "I always suggest that VIP group photos, like wedding party and family, should be allocated at least 15–20 minutes more time than folks expect because folks are always running a little behind getting glammed up for the occasion and it's one of the few times soonly-weds get the chance to actually connect with their nearest and dearest," McCallum says.