37 Terrible, Terrible, Terrible Wedding Guests

Buzz Feed

19-05-2025

Recently, this photo of terrible wedding guest behavior went mega-viral on Reddit, and it got me thinking – what other terrible wedding guest behavior have entitled people been guilty of? So I ran to r/weddingshaming to comb through the worst of the worst!
Here are 35 terrible wedding guests who, frankly, deserve our shaming.
"A friend was getting married last year, and finally, the big day arrived. Guests started arriving, and one guest — we'll call her Sarah — has her plus one, her BF, but she also brought a second plus one, which she never informed anyone about...her own photographer she had fired to follow her and take pics for her Instagram. This girl isn't famous or even Insta-famous (she has 2–3k followers), but all the photos on her Insta seem 'professional.'"
"During the reception, the groom's auntie managed to get hold of the mic and gave this sobbing, lamenting speech about her son who'd died in infancy 30 years before. We got to hear about his illness and passing (in uncomfortable detail), and then she led the whole reception hall in a rousing rendition of the hymn they liked to sing to honour him. Like, several times over. Pretty sure we had to sing it in a round at one point, too. As soon as she was done, her tears disappeared like magic, and she sat back down with a big, smug smile on her face."
"This happened over 12 years ago. My boyfriend at the time (now husband) brought me to a wedding as a plus one. During the reception, the bride and all the single ladies gathered so the bride could toss the bouquet. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, a guy came up behind the bride, who was holding the bouquet up over her head, poised to launch it into a crowd of hopeful women, and grabbed the bouquet from the bride. Then he got on one knee in front of a bridesmaid, offered her the bouquet, and proposed."
"I had a private courthouse wedding and then a month later a reception party at a beautiful banquet hall. The attire requested was cocktail, as we would be getting fully dressed up again in his custom suit and my gown. Guests showed up at the venue, and we had a great time taking pictures, eating, drinking, etc. However, I hadn't had the chance to take a picture with my whole family yet. About an hour into the reception, all nine of my nieces and nephews (aged 12-20) disappear. Weird, but whatever, I'll get the family photo when they reappear. Well, when they finally reappeared two hours later, along with one of their fathers, they had all changed from their formal clothes into basketball shorts, jeans, and t-shirts, including the father. Apparently, they were complaining they were bored, so he decided to take them back to the hotel to change so they could go MINI GOLFING in the middle of the reception. No words."
"I attended the wedding of friends several years ago. A woman in our social circle, who was kind of infamous for being offended at the drop of a hat, was upset that the bride, with whom she was not particularly close, hadn't asked her to be in the wedding party. So she asked one of the bridesmaids what they were wearing, drove to David's Bridal, and showed up at the wedding wearing the same gown as the bridesmaids. Talk about an awkward reception."
"I had my wedding and handfasting ceremony this weekend. My fiancé and I purposely kept it very small with close family and friends only. I have had a complicated relationship with my dad since my parents divorced when I was 12, and I moved with my mom. Because of this, I invited him as a guest, but very specifically did not want him to walk me down the aisle. When the ceremony was about to start, he asked where he should go, and I told him to go and sit with the guests. He disappeared, and I went to my location for the final preparations to make my grand entrance. My music started, I descended the staircase of the venue, and there was my dad waiting for me in front of everyone. He took my hand, said, 'Let's go!' and led me down the aisle. I was too stunned to know how to respond in this situation. All eyes were on me, I was in the middle of the aisle, and I'm scared of conflict, especially with my dad."
"A guy that we (the bride and groom) had never met before proposed to his girlfriend at our wedding. We were cutting the cake, so everyone had been ushered in, and the photographers were going wild, telling us to pose, how to cut it, etc. Everyone was watching. And this guy jumped into the space between the wedding party and everyone else and proposed to his girlfriend. She was a former colleague of my husband, and I had only met her the day before. She is not a super close friend of us as a couple or my husband individually. And we had never met that guy before. He met us at our wedding reception."
"About fifteen years ago, I was a guest at a big New York-New Jersey wedding. The church wedding service went off without a hitch, and the bride, groom, and their families were doing some quick group photos outside. That was where the first sign of trouble started. The bride's mother started throwing a fit that the bride's family should have priority for photos. She actually physically stopped the photographer from taking a group shot of about fifteen people to make them wait for her family to be ready. The bride looked mortified, and the bride's father and groom's parents had to step in and keep mom from causing a scene."
"I recently attended a wedding with my boyfriend. They had a nice ceremony and cocktail hour, and we all sat down to eat. Here's where it gets good. The first two speeches from the best man and the bride's father were fine. Nothing wild; just your standard speech at a wedding. Then came the maid of honor (the bride's older sister). She walked up to the front and grabbed the mic. First thing she said was, I didn't write anything down; I figured I'd wing it.' She then said, 'Honestly, we've heard enough about my sister for one day. I'm a little sick of it,' then proceeded to thank both parties and a few others. She didn't say a word about her sister (the bride) or the groom. She then ended the speech by saying, 'Can't wait to meet the little one.'"
"I met this girl at the gym in 2018. We were both in long-term relationships (hers nine years, mine eight), and we bonded over that. I got engaged in 2019 and got married this April. By December '22, she and her fiancé had broken up after almost 14 years together, and her personality changed from tree-hugging girl to femme fatale (she's indeed beautiful), dating married men and bragging about it. After my ceremony ended, she asked one of my best friends if she knew who was single at the party. Before my husband and I finished our pictures, she was already at the back of the venue with Guy #1."
"I got married last weekend. My brother invited his new girlfriend. She's got her own online business where she sells makeup and perfumes or something. She's a 'work from my phone' girl. Anyway, our venue had a strict no-phone policy during the ceremony, and I asked for nothing to be posted on social media about the wedding due to family drama. Today I received an email from her with an 'invoice' for £500."
"In the short gap of time between my ceremony and reception, when my ex-husband and I were taking some more pictures, etc, my ex-step FIL gave my ex-MIL a huge new diamond ring. Sitting at their table with all their friends and family, he gave a little speech and presented her with this big ring. She was crying; the whole deal. Everyone made a whole scene and my whole side was like...what the actual fuck. My ex's father and his whole side also thought it was awkward. This was at her first child's wedding — her oldest son. My photographer's assistant was so thrown off and took a bunch of pics of it, so I had to actually see it, not just hear about it. I had a fairly good relationship with my MIL and her husband, but I never really got over that."
"I have now been married for almost thirty years. But everyone who attended my wedding only remembers one event that occurred. And it has nothing to do with my actual nuptials. So my brother had a long-time female best friend. She actually chose my wedding reception to declare her love for my brother. He was already engaged at that point to his college girlfriend. This led to a confrontation in the middle of the reception.
"My MIL isn't quite horrible. She toes the line, but for the most part, she isn't interested in us, and we take that as a blessing. When we got engaged, she suddenly became interested, because this woman loves a party. She went wedding dress shopping with me, and I found this gorgeous sheath dress, but ultimately, I didn't feel comfortable in it. It is the type of dress that will cling to your tummy if you have one, but I was heartbroken, and I loved it. MIL really liked it too, though I didn't know how much until I saw her wearing it on my wedding day."
"I went to a friend's wedding last weekend, and wow. The wedding itself was lovely. The couple was gracious and polite to everyone, the food was good and plentiful, the venue was beautiful, and everything was running smoothly. Then the bride's sister got up to make her speech. A bit of backstory: the bride and her sister are fraternal twins. Growing up, her sister was always more popular and considered to be prettier. In eighth grade, the groom had a crush on the sister and wrote her a letter declaring his feelings. She wasn't interested and embarrassed him by reading the letter out loud during lunch. Everyone laughed at him; he cried, and it must have been awful. The bride felt bad for him, since she was used to being bullied by her sister, too. She walked home with him that day to console him, and they eventually became best friends. They started dating in high school, lived together all through college, and got married after nearly fifteen years together."
"My husband and I chose to have a simple, cheap wedding due to both going through University. Most of the guests loved the relaxed daytime atmosphere of being at a park and being surrounded by friends and family. But we had issues with one guest: a former close friend. First, he showed up late, and we held the wedding until he arrived so he wouldn't miss out. He later complained of the cheapness of the wedding, stating, 'it doesn't cost enough to be a real wedding.' He made a few other remarks we tried to ignore...until I was informed he was trying to invite my friends to a karaoke night at a random pub that night, and didn't want to invite my husband or me. "
"I attended a beautiful wedding this weekend in Boston. The grooms both come from money, so the venue was gorgeous and the decorations tasteful (white orchids, guests and wedding party wore black). Everything was just stunning, and there were no hiccups (that I was aware of) until around 10 p.m. They had an amazing live band that kept everyone dancing throughout the night, but I guess someone had too much fun on the dance floor. I see a staff worker with a broom and a tablecloth run out onto the dance floor, throw it over something, and quickly scoop it up. He left quickly. And then the smell. Someone, I swear to god, pooped on the dance floor. (Or as my sister said, sharted)."
"I went to a wedding for a friend this past winter. Let's call her WB for 'winter bride.' WB has decorated her venue (a small church) with dried florals incorporated within Christmas trees. It actually looked very pretty. Imagine my surprise and a few other guests' surprise when we found out where they came from. In the fall, WB had been a guest at her childhood friend's wedding. We'll call that friend FB for 'fall bride.' FB has asked that at the end of the night, her flowers be donated to a local nursing home. FB found out at WB's wedding that WB had collected a car full of FB's flowers, taken them home, and dried them for her own wedding. WITHOUT ASKING."
"We got married in Las Vegas and planned on heading to the strip or Fremont Street after the reception. On the shuttle bus, we realized a friend of ours got way too hammered. He actually fell off of the bus and had to have a group of our guests, including the groom, carry him to the hotel lobby. He shit his pants while passed out on the hotel lobby couch, so we had our EMT friend checking to make sure he was breathing, etc. The entire group was hanging out in the lobby, and a couple of the guests went to shower him off in their room. The rest of us went up to our hotel room (the bride and groom's room) and were going to take a shot to get the night restarted, and suddenly, the drunk guy and his girlfriend came into our hotel. The drunk guy passed out in the bride and groom's bed. 🤢"
"My fiancé and I are having a very casual wedding at his family's hunting property in Northern Michigan. We are having a tiny ceremony (12 people, immediate family only) and a 100-person reception. Both are at the hunting property. We didn't want to have a wedding in the first place, but my fiancé is an only child, and his family really pushed for it, so here we are. He has a great aunt I've never met in the five years we've been together. We invited her to the reception only, just like the vast majority of the family. When she sent back her RSVP, she wrote on the card, 'No ceremony, no attendance, we are family!!'" and declined the invite."
"I received my cousin's RSVP with four other people's names in the name field for their plus one. She wanted to invite her mom, dad, daughter, and daughter's fiancée. I only invited this one cousin per my dad's request since I hadn't talked to her in over five years, and he already had a small list of his family members he wanted to invite. My dad called her and told her that her mom and dad were okay to come, but her daughter and her daughter's fiancé could not since we were not having a huge wedding. I also texted her to let her know the same thing."
"A couple of years ago, one of my best friends since middle school got married. For her wedding party, she chose her sister as maid of honor, and then the groom's sister and I as bridesmaids. Planning the bachelorette party fell to me and the groom's sister because the maid of honor was still in high school. I went over to the sister's house one day and we planned everything out. It was a normal afternoon right up until I went to leave. She asked if I could stay a few more minutes so she could show me the wedding gift she got them. I said ok, and she disappeared from the room for a few minutes. When she came back, she had a karaoke machine with her. I assumed that was the gift because I knew the couple both liked to karaoke. But then she hit play and started singing at me. In her living room. With a microphone."
"October last year, I was the photographer at a wedding. Now, this couple was from a not-so-nice area north of Adelaide, and they decided to have their wedding at a nice winery south of Adelaide. Red flags were starting to come up even before the wedding. The groom punched the FOB at the engagement party, and there were other fights, too! Now the wedding went okay. Until later on in the evening, when a staff member from the venue came in like she had seen a ghost. Nearly in tears, she explained that she had seen the bride's brother having a wank behind a dumpster."
"Less than a week before the wedding, we had a guest text my fiancé asking to show up to the venue early to take pictures for us and to continue to take pictures during the ceremony and reception. We informed her that we have already booked a photographer and videographer and that it would not be necessary. My now-wife first texted her back saying, 'No, thank you, we hired professionals,' and after she persisted, I had to step in and give her a firm 'No, do not do this.' This guest was a courtesy invite as she did take our engagement photos and is an old family friend, but she was more of an acquaintance to the family at this point. We honestly never even expected her to accept the invitation."
"I'm not the bride, but a guest. Apparently, a couple's babysitter fell ill the morning of the wedding, as in, they had to go to the hospital. Scary stuff, things happen. In polite society, perhaps they'd text the wedded couple and send last-minute regrets. Nope! These folks were C L U E L E S S and showed up with their (uninvited) three-month old infant… who then cried during the ENTIRE ceremony and said clueless parents just…stood there, in the back of the space, letting that baby wail the whole fucking time: processionals, blessings, vows, glass breaking and all."
"My sister had a beautiful ceremony. Everything went off perfectly, and then the bar opened for guests whilst pictures were being taken of the bridal party and anyone else they wanted photographed. Well, it turns out the best man made good use of the bar during this time (perhaps 90 minutes), because by the time we were ready to sit down to dinner, he was three sheets to the wind. I don't know if he was trying to drown his nerves because he hadn't written his speech or something, because when he stood up, he pulled a receipt out of his pocket and pretended it was his speech."
"I've been married for a few months now, but every time I think about my dad's speech, I get so angry and upset. I have already asked the videographer not to include it in my video. My dad and I were close when I was growing up. I was definitely a daddy's girl. We aren't close now. He's in his sixties and can be sexist; I'm a bit of a feminist, and he knows this. Now onto his speech — this man didn't bother to mention me or my husband, apart from saying, 'She's all grown up now, and I'm glad.' His next statement was 'If you don't think jokes are funny you shouldn't be here' I instantly thought 'Guess I shouldn't be here' when he started to read off the old ball and chain jokes he got off Google and made jokes about not listening to his wife and asking her, 'What did you say? I wasn't listening.' Not a single guest laughed."
"My fiancé has a friend he wanted to invite to the wedding, but I did not. She's a hot mess express, but we had some extra room, and I didn't want to be a bridezilla, so whatever. She was invited. Let's call her W. Cut to the wedding day. We were getting ready, and guests started to arrive. My fiancé went to greet people before the ceremony, and I stayed hidden for my big reveal down the aisle. He came back up to our room where I was getting ready and said W is wasted. Then my wedding planner came up and asked who she was, saying they could not serve W. The ceremony hadn't even started!"
"I had an intimate wedding with only 50 guests: only family and very close friends. My uncle was going to attend the wedding with his girlfriend, but he had a fight with her that week, so he took his male best friend as his plus one. The best friend thinks he is a singer, but he only screams and makes an unbearable noise. Also, he 'sings' at every family gathering he attends. He carries CDs with the songs he knows everywhere he goes. When I saw him at my wedding, I was afraid he might want to perform, but I thought the DJ would say something to us if he asked him to play his CDs. At some point, my husband and I had a photo session with our parents and his siblings. When we got back to the party, this guy was 'singing' and the DJ was playing his CDs. Back then, I didn't know how to set boundaries, so I didn't say anything. Everyone was very confused. He 'sang' for about an hour and a half."
"My (I'm the groom) mother is a tricky one. When she asked what colors she should wear to my upcoming wedding, I just said to avoid white and light blue (the bridesmaids' color). She went and bought a white dress with some line-work light blue floral print on it. I haven't actually seen it; I just heard the description. So I asked her if she could send me a pic of it. After a day of leaving me on read, she replied with 'No, that's not appropriate for you to ask me.' She then stopped responding to my texts."
"I married the man of my dreams. We had a dream wedding. We decided to invite his long-lost sister. After the ceremony, she had some sort of breakdown, running around screaming, 'This should be my wedding!!' First off, she was single. She somehow thought from the fact that we had a fancy wedding, that it would have been hers if she hadn't been adopted. It's rather a sad story, but holy hell, she was screaming like it was Jerry Springer, and it was hard for us to try to explain it to everyone. She hasn't spoken to us since, as if she still believes it should have been her wedding. Bonus...my mom brought her new boyfriend and took pics in their underwear in the bathrooms. We had disposable cameras that these were found on. Double bonus...a cousin stole $100 bill from a relative's purse and put it in a wedding card to us."
"I just got married! At our wedding, my MIL complained to her son, the groom, and put complaints in the family group chat. The complaints ranged from her being too hot (outdoor ceremony), her feet hurting, and complaints about the planner. At the end of the night, she left without saying goodbye because she felt unappreciated for decorating the vehicle. She decided to take ALL the decorations off the car that she and her family from both sides spent 30 minutes doing in the rain. I never got to see the car decorated, and she specifically did it for me in my favorite color. We did not ask for the car to be decorated, but she offered, and I was really excited about it. After doing that, she left the wedding crying and took two family members with her that was supposed to stay and help us pack up the decor."
"This is about a wonderful wedding I went to yesterday. The bride and groom are the absolute sweetest couple you could ever meet. When we first arrived, we all waited on a terrace before the ceremony began, and that's when I saw it: this lady (who I found out later was the groom's aunt-in-law) was wearing a full-length, completely white sundress. All her accessories were white, including the shoes."
"When my sister was planning her wedding, one of our cousins told my sister not to invite part of our family: two of my dad's cousins and their family. She recently had her wedding, and they got super drunk and were a big problem. Cool, we never see them anyway...Both of Dad's cousins and their families crashed the wedding. Whatever, it was a big party. Just ignore them. Until the son of one of the cousins came up to my sister (the f*ing bride) and told her, 'I can't believe you forgot about us, you don't even remember my name.' My sister just replied, 'Oh, no Stephano, I know who you are. I didn't forget you, you just weren't invited,' and went on her merry way. Needless to say, they all got super drunk and annoying. They weren't kicked out; my family isn't about drama. (Unfortunately.)"
"This woman was a bad friend to start with and generally a rude guest. She didn't like the meal option she chose when she saw someone else's option, so she demanded a different meal. Of course, the caterers didn't have any spares, as it was only a small wedding, so she sulked and pouted her way through the meal. The bride and groom had put a few bottles of wine on each table to go with the meal. Once the meal was done, she hid a few half-full bottles under her cardigan and took them back to her hotel room so she wouldn't have to pay for drinks later on. That was rude behaviour in and of itself, but the icing on the cake was how she neglected her kid. The kid was ill, so they shouldn't have been at that wedding anyway. After the meal, she put her kid to bed in their hotel room (same venue as the reception) and left them alone for the next six hours."
"This happened a while ago when my twins were just over a year old or so. My husband's cousin got married in a medium-sized outdoor ceremony. The invitation said adults only, which we were completely okay with. We were going to leave our twins with our nanny. The bride told me that she wanted us to bring our twins. The family wanted to meet them, plus I was also doing her and the bridesmaids' makeup. So we said okay, we'd love to bring them. The bride also said that she would make sure the catering company brought two high chairs for our kids, and they would be with our seats (assigned seating)."
And finally, we'll end on a silly one: "A friend gifted his bride professional pictures of only himself. This friend is super self-absorbed about a lot of things, but this one was the most ridiculous to me. He hyped this gift up to people like it was something he had 'made' for her, to then reveal he had gotten professional pictures of himself done (they were very well done — the photographer is great!!), put them in a book, and gave them to her as her wedding gift day gift."
Who's the worst wedding guest you've ever witnessed or heard about? Let us know in the comments below or via this anonymous form!
Submissions have been edited for length/clarity.