Written by Menswear Style in Tips & Advice on the 29th October 2019

If you just got engaged, you must be wondering when to set a date for the wedding. How long should a couple ideally wait to get married? What is the ideal timespan between engagement and wedding? While you can start preparing for the wedding as soon as you get betrothed and are done showing your round diamond ring to your friends and family, the wedding date should be set for a time when you and your partner are fully prepared to take the next step.

Don’t Rush It 

People often rush to tie the knot soon after engagement, and while that works for many, it is not the best decision for two reasons. First of all, engagement, as magical as it is, does not prepare you for a life together. That takes some serious making up of mind. Friends and family can only do so much. It is the person getting married who has to get himself/herself in that frame of mind where they find themselves prepared to start a life together with the other person. Secondly, there is the matter of finances. For the wedding, both the partners need to arrange their finances, and set up a fund jointly for the big event.

Everybody’s Story Is Different 

Candidly, there is no specific period that can be prescribed to all as the right interlude between an engagement and a wedding. It changes from one couple to another. Understand that everybody has their own priorities and those priorities make the decision different in each case. But the most helpful advice would be to not rush it. Now that you are engaged and heading towards marriage, the best thing to do is to sit down and start a discussion. Some like to have a long engagement while others have short ones hopping from engagement to marriage in just a matter of weeks. Either is okay as long as the partners are comfortable. Whatever your decision is, make sure that you don’t feel pressed to deliver a wedding soon now that the engagement has been made official and people are coming to you with direct questions and glaring hints about an upcoming wedding. GS Diamonds recommends to enjoy both the engagement and the wedding. So, the right thing to do would be to take some time to savour the feeling of being engaged and just when it starts to peter out, get married. That length of time can vary from one to another, but 6 months to 1 years sounds more like a reasonable berth. Before you call the shot, let’s weigh the two options. Let’s find out more about long and short engagements.

Long Engagements 

Long engagements are a luxury not many can afford. It gives the partners a wide window to relax and breathe and take things slowly. The point is to not let the stress of the wedding hit you right the day after the engagement, or you will have no time to celebrate the engagement at all, much less savour it. A wedding is a big event and you need ample time to arrange everything. So, depending on that, you need to decide on a timeframe that both of you are comfortable with. Wedding planning is stressful and complicated, 16 to 18 month sounds like a healthy break between the two events.

Short Engagements 

Now let’s look at short engagements. A short engagement is where you go from engaged to married in less than 6 months. It can be quite a whirlwind if you are up for it. It is totally fine to get hitched soon after the engagement if you can bear the stress of it. It really is a matter of personal decision. But be advised that short engagements give you very little preparation time which makes it imperative that you get things started even before the engagement.

Whether yous is a Long Engagement or Short Engagement, this blog post looks at How Soon to Set a Date after the Engagement.