Saturday, March 25th
2023 Wedding Planning Software Reviews
Joy
- Free
- Guest-focused features
- For you and your wedding, no planner needed
- Customizable
- Connects to any registry
Joy is a free app designed to help you centralize (and digitize) all your wedding planning needs. With a mobile app, integrated invitations, RSVPs, and guest list, Joy brings all the moving human parts of wedding planning right to your fingertips.
Your own wedding website
The way that Joy helps you pull your wedding together is by building your own wedding site hosted by Joy. The site can be built with templates but remains completely customizable to create an online space that reflects your wedding and your style. Joy offers most of the key parts of wedding planning right on your site:
- Registry
- Guest list
- Dates and calendars
- Invitations
- "Smart RSVP"
These all integrate during the customization, and help you manage different areas of your wedding all together. Along with the mobile app, which helps you manage wedding worries on the go, Joy seems almost too good to be true for a free app.
Integrating guests
One of the strengths of Joy is that it's guest-focused. Not only does Joy offer a guest list, but it makes it easy to search for wedding pages with the "Find a Couple" feature. It allows you to send invitations directly from your site and manage RSVPs, so you can track who's coming, who's not, and who has a plus-one.
How do they make their money?
For a free website that looks this good, they have to pay their staff somehow, right? While they're not charging you for membership or design, they do take a cut of your registry. They make an undisclosed percentage on the products sold.
For the customer, but no support
While everything on this aesthetically-pleasing, streamlined site seems perfect, there are some concerns from reviewers who note that the customer service and user interface are "difficult to deal with." Though it may not be surprising that a free website doesn't have top-tier support, many couples gave up on Joy and managed their wedding elsewhere. Users also noted slow loading times and complained that the photo/memory interface was clunky and hard to use. So, while Joy has rich feature options, not all of them are working at top performance.
Does it spark Joy?
For a free tool, Joy is better than we expected. Despite complaints on loading times, bad customer service, and difficulty with the user interface, Joy is about as good as it gets for a free wedding planning resource. But for the best wedding tools with more features, you might want to look at our higher-rated services.
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Where Can You Find the Best Wedding Planning Resources Online?
If you're ready to tie the knot and feel overwhelmed by all the moving pieces, we understand. Weddings are a huge undertaking no matter if you're coordinating 40 close family and friends or a 400-guest wedding bash. With designs, cakes, venues, registries, vendors, and guests to keep track of, a wedding can feel like you're doing it all alone. We feel you!
While some couples opt for a professional wedding planner, leaning into an expert to manage all the craziness for them, some brides, grooms, and families might not have that in the budget. Or maybe you're a DIYer at heart, and having your personal touch be part of your special day is a must. Luckily, the wedding industry has expanded to include a variety of online options that pull all the different parts of planning a wedding into one place.
Continued from above...
With options for cloud sharing, mobile apps, personalized wedding websites, and more, wedding planning software and toolkits can simplify the process of planning your own wedding (or in some cases, they can help you plan someone else's). The popular wedding website trend allows you to connect with family near and far and bring everyone together for your special day.
So, how do you choose the best wedding planning resource(s) for your needs? There are a lot of things to think about. If you're not sure where to start, consider some key areas that might affect your comfort, style, and wallet:
- Interface. Does the technology do what you need it to in a way that's easy to understand? Does it allow for connectivity between devices? Can your family and friends access what you need them to?
- Price. Are you getting the quality that you're paying for? Does the software fit into your budget? Do the features you want come with the package you can afford?
- Program focus. Are you a DIY wedding planner or are you a professional looking for software support? Consider which features you want to support your individual needs. Do you want something built for weddings or is a more general program okay?
- Reputation. What do other brides- and grooms-to-be say about their experience using the wedding planning software, app, or website? Are they typically happy with it, or are they left wishing they'd gone a different route?
To help you find the right resources for your upcoming nuptials, Top Consumer Reviews has evaluated and ranked today's most popular wedding planning options. We hope these reviews make it easy to say "I Do" to the best wedding planning services out there!
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