Search finds one person. It will not find the fourteen you actually need. The question a guest list has to answer at nine in the evening is rarely “where is Nadeesha” - it is “who on my mother’s side still has not replied”. That is what the filters are for. One thing to know before you lean on them: the search box matches guest names only, not phone numbers.
What you can narrow the list by
The controls sit above the list, and they stack. Each one you add narrows the same set of people rather than starting a new query, so a view is built by choosing two or three things and reading what is left.
- Which invitation, when you have more than one.
- Which ceremony, on an invitation that takes a separate reply for each ceremony. That is a switch in the editor and it is off until you turn it on, so an invitation running over three days shows no ceremony row until you do.
- Their reply: pending, accepted or declined.
- Their group: family, friends, office, VIP, neighbours or other.
- Their side: the bride’s, the groom’s, or both.
- Whether their invitation has been sent.
- Whether they have opened it.
A counter shows how many filters are on and clears them all in one tap. That is worth more than it sounds. A filter you have forgotten about is a list that is quietly lying to you, and the moment you notice is usually the moment you have already counted the chairs.
Search matches the name, not the number
Type part of a name and the list narrows as you type. It matches anywhere in the name rather than only the start, so a few letters of a surname will do, and capitals make no difference.
A phone number typed into that box returns nothing. This catches people out, because the number is printed under the name on every row, so it looks like something the box should find. It is not. If a number is what you have - an unknown WhatsApp message, a missed call the night before - finding its owner is a different job.
Filtered views that are really to-do lists
A filter is only useful if the list it leaves behind is a job you can finish. Four combinations do most of the work.
- Not sent yet. Tonight’s sending list. Each send opens one chat for one guest and you tap once, so it helps to have exactly the right people in front of you and nobody else.
- Sent, not opened, one group. The people to follow up. Filtered to family, it is also the list you read out to whoever in the family will know why they have not opened it.
- Pending, one ceremony. The phone calls. Narrower than pending across the whole wedding, and far less alarming.
- Accepted, one side. The number your mother keeps asking for, without doing the arithmetic in your head.
Set the filter first, then work through what is left. Scrolling the full list and remembering who you have already dealt with is the part that goes wrong, because replies keep arriving while you scroll.
Filtering to one ceremony moves the numbers as well
Once separate replies per ceremony are switched on, choosing a ceremony narrows more than the rows. The three counts at the top of the page - attending, declined, pending - recount for that day alone, and so does the export. So “who is coming on the Sunday” becomes something you tap rather than something you rebuild in a spreadsheet.
It also reads the allowance you set for that day rather than the whole party. If the Fernandos are six on the invitation but hold three chairs at the morning ceremony, the ceremony view counts three of them. That is the difference between a number the hall can seat and a number the reception can.
The view you are looking at is the file you hand over
The CSV export takes the list exactly as you have filtered it: names, WhatsApp numbers, group, side, head count, reply, attending count, and whether the invitation has been sent. Filter first, export second. When a ceremony is selected, the file is named after that ceremony, so the caterer for the Sunday lunch gets a file about the Sunday lunch rather than the whole wedding with a note attached.
What the filters will not do
There is no filter for “replied but not seated”. That question lives on the table arrangement page, which keeps its own list of guests who still need a seat and its own filters for side, group and reply. Answering it means moving to that page rather than building the view here.
Groups are a fixed set of labels rather than tags you invent. If the division that matters to you is the cricket club or your father’s old colleagues, you will have to map it onto one of the labels or carry it in the names. And filters are not saved. They hold while the page is open and reset when you come back, so a view you use every evening is a view you set every evening. Three taps, but it is three taps.
A short list needs none of this. Sixty names for a single reception fit inside a few flicks of the thumb, and setting three filters to isolate four people takes longer than reading past them. Filtering starts to win at the point where you can no longer hold the list in your head: three hundred names, or a Friday ceremony and a Sunday one whose lists barely overlap, or two sides of a family who each want a count that is only theirs. Under that, the search box and scrolling will do.
Frequently asked questions
Can I search my guest list by phone number?
No. The search box matches the guest’s name only. The number does appear under each name in the list and in the CSV export, so a browser find on the page or a search inside the exported file are the two ways to get from a number to a person.
Do the filters change the totals at the top of the page?
Two of them do. The attending, declined and pending tiles follow the invitation and the ceremony you have chosen, so a ceremony scope makes them describe that day rather than the whole wedding. Narrowing by reply, group, side or delivery, or typing in the search box, changes the rows underneath while the tiles stay where they were. The line directly above the list does count what is showing, which is the quickest way to notice a filter you forgot to clear.
Why is a guest missing when I filter to one ceremony?
Usually because they are on a different invitation, or because they have been ticked into other ceremonies and not that one. A guest with no ceremonies ticked at all counts as invited to all of them, so they appear under every ceremony rather than none. The guest list page is where those ticks are set.
Related: Wedding guest list manager