How Auto-Seat works

Auto-Seat does the first pass of your seating chart for you. It takes everyone who doesn’t have a seat yet and places them at your tables, following the rules you’ve set. Then it tells you what it did. It’s free on every plan.

Run Auto-Seat

1. 1

   Open Floor plan

   In your wedding, go to Floor plan. Add your tables first if you haven’t.
2. 2

   Click Auto-seat

   It’s the first button in the toolbar, and it works whether or not the layout is locked. There’s no confirmation step. It runs straight away and opens a summary called Here’s how I seated everyone.
3. 3

   Keep it or undo it

   Click Done to keep the result, or Undo auto-seat to put everyone back where they were.

Who gets seated

Auto-Seat places guests who:

• don’t have a table yet, and
• have their RSVP set to Attending or Maybe.

Guests marked Invited or Awaiting are skipped. New guests start as Invited, so if Auto-Seat seats fewer people than you expected, check their RSVPs first. See track RSVP status.

If you have tables with free seats but none of your unseated guests are Attending or Maybe, Auto-Seat tells you how many haven’t replied yet and offers Include N guests. Click it to seat them too. Guests who Declined are never seated.

What it pays attention to

Households and plus-ones

If a household has Keep this household at the same table ticked, its members always sit at one table. A plus-one always sits with their guest.

Relationships

• Must sit with: always at the same table.
• Keep apart from: never at the same table.
• Would like to sit with: at the same table if there’s room. This one is a wish, not a rule.

You set these in a guest’s details, under Relationships. To see every rule at once, go to Guests⋯Seating rules. Read more in keep guests together or apart.

Groups

Guests in the same group, like College Friends, are placed together where possible.

Seating needs

If a guest has a seating need (for example Wheelchair space), Auto-Seat puts them at a table tagged to match, such as Wheelchair accessible. You tag tables under Table attributes in the table’s details. A need only counts once at least one table is tagged for it.

Head table and reserved tables

• If you have a head table, guests marked VIP are seated there and everyone else at the other tables, as long as there’s room.
• Tables set to Reserved — keep empty are left empty. You can still seat guests there yourself.

Reading the summary

The summary starts with how many guests were seated, across how many tables. If everything worked out, it says Every seating rule was respected. Otherwise you’ll see:

• What I respected: for example “Kept 3 households together” or “Kept 1 keep-apart pair apart”.
• Needs your eye: guests it couldn’t seat and why, such as “no table has enough free seats”. It also lists “would like to sit with” wishes it couldn’t meet.
• Couldn’t resolve — fix these rules: rules that can’t all be true, like two people set to both sit together and keep apart. Everyone else is still seated.
• Table by table: one line per table explaining who’s there.

When nothing happens

• “Add a few tables first”: there are no tables to fill. Reserved tables don’t count, because Auto-Seat keeps them empty.
• “No one has replied yet”: your unseated guests are all Invited or Awaiting. Click Include N guests to seat them anyway, or set their RSVPs first.
• “Everyone who’s coming already has a seat.” There’s no one left to place.
• “Your tables are full.” Guests are waiting but there are no free seats. Add a table or more seats.
• “Auto-seat found a problem”. Your rules can’t be met, so nothing was changed. For example, a group that must sit together is bigger than your largest table. Fix the rule it names, then run Auto-Seat again.

Undo and run it again

Undo auto-seat in the summary reverses the whole run in one step. You can also press ⌘ Z on a Mac or Ctrl Z on Windows.

Running it again only seats people who still don’t have a seat. To start over completely, choose Unassign all from the toolbar’s More menu first. That clears every seat, including locked ones, so only do it if you really want a blank chart. See undo Auto-Seat and re-run it.