When starting to plan their wedding, many brides struggle with the budget planning side of things. Saying how much you will spend overall is easy, but it’s hard to make a list of what to spend that money on without skipping some important wedding things. After setting a budget, you still need to make a list of expenses (or budget list) to show what you’ll spend your wedding budget on. I’ve saved you the trouble and provided you a list of the common Nigerian wedding expenses below.
In this post, I’ll give you our printable list of typical things to buy when preparing for a Nigerian wedding; in other words, a list of things to budget for. It’s a complete list of things you need to buy for a wedding in Nigeria. It also includes a list of rental items and vendor services to hire for a wedding. Swipe or scroll down to see it.
Examples of Typical Wedding Expenses in Nigeria (Budget List for Planning)
Below is just an example of a wedding budget list (or expenses list or shopping list), as some couples include more items while others choose to keep it basic – it all depends on whether you plan to have a low-key wedding or big wedding. Feel free to use and tweak this Nigerian wedding expenses list below to arrive at your very own expenses list.
Here, below is a sample list of things (expenses) to budget for and buy for your wedding:
A. Couple’s Wedding Rings
- Wedding rings (bride and groom) ___________
- Wedding ring box or pillow ___________
RELATED: Latest Wedding Rings Designs for Women | How to Choose a Wedding Ring in 6 Steps
B. Bride’s Attire and Accessories
- Buy new or rent a used or pre-owned wedding gown ___________
- Bride’s shoes ___________
- Bridal Accessories: flower bouquet, veil, bridal robe & wedding day underwears/ undergarments, Headties/ Gele, etc. _______
- Bridal beauty: Hair stylist’s charge / Nails/ Makeup artist service charge/ fee ___________
- Bride’s jewelry (necklace, earrings, hair decorations/ accesories) _______
RELATED: 17 Wedding Gown Shopping Tips to Save You Money & Time | 5 Must-Know Things Before Buying a Wedding Gown
C. Groom’s Attire and Accessories
- Groom’s Shoes _______________
- Groom’s wedding suit ___________
- Groom’s Accessories (e.g cuff links, belt etc) ___________
- Flower boutonniere/ pocket handkerchief ___________
- Groom’s Grooming (e.g haircut, beard shaving) ___________
RELATED: Wedding Suit Style Guide for Grooms to Dress Sharper | 8 Must-Have Wedding Suit Accessories
D. Wedding Stationery and Souvenirs You Need to Order or Buy
- (Printing of) wedding invitation cards and program ___________
- Souvenirs/ Wedding favors to gift guests (optional) ___________
- Gifts and gift boxes for your bridesmaids (optional) ____________
- Gifts for groomsmen (optional) ________________________
RELATED: Wedding Invitation Cards: Our Answers to Common Questions
E. Reception Venue and Decoration
- Wedding Venue cost ___________________________________________
- Venue Decoration _____________________________________________
RELATED POST: How to Find and Choose a Wedding Reception Venue | ALSO: What to Look for In a Wedding Venue
F. Wedding Reception Food and Drinks: List of Things to Buy
- Food (ask a caterer for how much it will cost or Buy Ingredients if cooking in-house) __________
- Wedding Cake ___________________
- Small chops (optional) _____________
- Drinks/ Juice/ Water ______________
RELATED: How to Estimate Your Wedding Food and Drinks Cost from Guest Count | 11 Ways to Save Costs on Your Wedding Cake
H. Wedding Day Transportation
- Car and bus hire to transport the bride, groom and wedding party (bridesmaids, groomsmen, parents), close relatives and VIP guests to/ from wedding venues ___________
I. Rentals (You may require some or all items here, depending on whether your venue that has everything or lacing some)
- Chairs and Tables Rental (if the venue has none or does not have enough) _______
- Canopy tents rental (if you’re having an outdoor venues)
- Audio equipment: Speakers, Microphones
- Power Generator (for backup or outdoor venue electricity)
- Other(s): ______________________
J. Vendors: List of Wedding Professions to Hire
- Photography & Video Coverage __________
- Master of Ceremony (MC) _____________
- DJ _____________________________
- Live Music Band _______________________
RELATED: Choosing a Wedding Photographer: 10 Tips to Avoid Dissappontment
- Wedding planner services (optional): Specify whether you want full planning or partial planning (aka wedding day coordination services) ___________
- Ushers ________________________
- Food servers ____________________
- Makeup Artist
- Security/ Bouncers (if you plan to restrict entry by having a strictly by invitations situation) __________
RELATED: Where to Find Makeup Artists and How to Choose
K. Miscellaneous (reserved fund, in case of emergency) _______________ [This is an amount of extra money you should keep aside, in case of emergency or anything that later arises).
So, YOUR TOTAL WEDDING BUDGET is __________________ (Now, add up all the amounts you wrote in the spaces beside each wedding expense name (above). This total amount is the expected total cost of your wedding).
That’s it for our wedding budget checklist of expenses for planning a Nigerian white wedding. Be sure to read the article that covers the traditional wedding budget items list.
HOW TO USE THE ABOVE WEDDING BUDGET LIST (EXPENSES LIST):
- Print out this post
- Do price research to know the actual price of things in your wedding expense list. Don’t guess the price of things. Ask around to get prices for each item in this ‘list of wedding things to buy’. Ensure to ask for varying prices for each item.
- Fill prices in the DASHED spaces beside each list. Write the price range – the high, the low. Some things are usually more expensive for being a better quality or have more features. Note that in your wedding planning book.
- Add up the costs and what you have in your total wedding budget
- If the total cost is higher than the wedding budget you planned, adjust things by picking lower-priced items for some things and add up again to see if the totals are now within your planned budget. Read more 21 tips on how to avoid spending above your wedding budget.
- The easiest way to cut down a wedding budget is to reduce your guest count which cuts down your food and drinks cost. So, try by cutting guest count a bit and see how that pushes down your cost. If needed, do this again until you get a desirable total wedding cost. I explained more about this in another post => How to Reduce Wedding Guest List to Fit Your Budget
Why You Can’t Skip Making a Wedding Budget List
Newly engaged brides always ask me questions like: Now I am engaged, what are the list of things to buy for my wedding? I need a list of items to rent and a list of wedding professionals to hire?’ In my post on ‘how to make a wedding budget‘, one of the steps was to make a breakdown of things you’ll be spending the budget money on – this post gives you that breakdown. You can’t skip this step because you need a budget list (or expense list) to estimate the real cost of your wedding.
Also, making a list of expenses (in advance) will help you know how to manage your spending so that do not overspend. Hopefully this post helps you start off with making a list of things you need for your wedding (budget list). They are the typical things Nigerian brides budget for and buy for weddings.
I always recommend that before spending a dime, couples first breakdown their wedding budget in order to allocate amounts to each expense areas. I created a free wedding budget calculator tool that automatically does this for you. Use it and you’ll find that 90% of the above budget list is filled out for you automatically. All you have to do is type in your budget amount, and it displays your budget breakdown list which you can tweak to suit you.
HELPFUL WEDDING BUDGET PLANNING AND MONEY-SAVING IDEAS:
- How to Set a Wedding Budget in 6 Steps
- Everything About How to Plan a Wedding and Save Cost
- Wedding Pre-Planning Questionnaire/ Quiz for About-to-Wed Couples – this will help you flesh out how to go about your wedding. Highly recommended.
- How to Plan an Inexpensive Wedding in Nigeria (19 Ideas)
- Answers to Common Questions Couples Ask on Wedding Budgeting
How to Know Your Total Wedding Expenses Using Your Budget List
Print out the wedding budget list above and use it to record/ write down every single thing you spend money on. After your wedding, you should add up the costs you had recorded, and the result is your total wedding expenses and the cost of your wedding.
Conclusion: Set a Budget and Make a Wedding Budget List Before Buying Anything
No two weddings can be the same in terms of how much the couples will spend. Different couples have different priorities and differ on how much money they have available to spend on their wedding.
If you want to avoid overspending for your wedding, start from setting a budget. That will give you a spending limit when totaling costs in your wedding budget list. If you haven’t done so already, use the steps in our post on how to set a wedding budget.
So, this wedding budget list is the list of basic expense items in many Nigerian style weddings. Feel free to add more items or remove from the above Nigerian wedding shopping budget list, to suit your personal wedding taste and style.
My advice: It’s a good idea to print this wedding budget list and keep a copy in your handbag so that it will be easy to find whenever you are shopping or negotiating with a wedding service vendor.
MORE WEDDING PLANNING POSTS YOU’LL LIKE
- Complete White Wedding Planning Checklist: 12 Months Timeline
- How to Plan a Wedding in 3 Months (90 Days Wedding Planning Checklist)
- How to Plan a Simple Wedding in 1 Month (30 Days Checklist) – for those who want to get married Sharp-Sharp
- 6 Months Wedding Planning Checklist for those who can’t wait for 1 year
- Nigerian Traditional Wedding Planning Checklist
There you have it on the things to include in your wedding budget list (or expenses list). Now you know what makes up a list of things a bride needs to budget for and buy when preparing for a Nigerian wedding. You can see that it also includes a list of things to rent and wedding vendors to hire for your big day. I hope you enjoyed reading the post.
If you’re yet to start shopping for your big day, just print out the above list of things to buy for a wedding and tick off items when you go shopping. Remember to record the prices you paid beside each item.
Have you already started buying things for your wedding? If so, what is different from your list and the above list in this post? Comment down below to share with us what’s on your wedding shopping list. I’ll be waiting to discuss with you on the comments side.
Uduak Umiom says
I thought, what the heck? Who needs anyone’s opinion with planning their wedding? But after reading some of your posts, I can say everybody needs a little bit of help with planning their big day. Thank you for these amazing tips. They will come in handy for a sister.
Stella Anokam says
Hello Uduak, thanks for that hilarious comment – I love it! Lol.
You’re right, many brides think the same and later change their opinions when their wedding date is fixed and staring them in the face – then overwhelm sets in and suddenly every bit of help is welcomed. NaijaGlamWedding blog is here to help fellow sisters in need. lol.
Hello Good morning. I need an affordable wedding planner. My wedding is in two months in Lagos (ibeju axis)
Hello Feyi, you can find some affordable wedding planners in Lagos from the list of vendors in our FB events professionals yellow pages here ==>http://bit.ly/BridesVendorsGuideNG.
please help me with a budget of 600k, for my engagement and white wedding which is coming up in the next 7 month
Hello Michael, here is an example of how you can spend your N600k wedding budget in Nigeria:
38% 228,000 wedding cake + food + drinks (you should find out exactly how many people this amount can feed, before printing invitation cards. Only invite the few people this amount can cater for, not more than 100 people).
20% 120,000 wedding reception venue hire + hall décoration + Canopy Tents (if it’s an outdoor venue) + chair and table rentals (if venue did not provide)
12% 72,000 wedding rings + bride and groom’s wedding attire + their shoes + bride’s hair and makeup + bride’s jewelry (earrings, necklace)
5% 30,000 invitation cards, programme of events
23% 138,000 entertainment & photography & coordination – DJ/ live music band, MC, photographer, video coverage, D-day coordinator
2% 12,000 Miscellaneous/ anything else that will arise later, or was forgotten
TOTAL AMOUNT: 600,000
Finally, ensure you have bot the traditional engagement and white wedding on the same day, to save cost.
I hope that helps.
Hello ma’am, my name is Mary. My traditional wedding was done last 2months and my wedding will be in 2months time. Pls ma’am what can one come up with with about 1m to 1.5m. Though we’re planning that it should be a night reception so as to curtail crowd and uninvited guests.
Something simple but classy… Thanks ma’am as I await your response
Hello Mary, congratulations on your recent trad wedding. Here’s my reply:
– Your N1m / N1.5m wedding budget can do a lot for you.
– Before starting to spend, do a budget breakdown or wedding shopping list with cost breakdown (similar to what every woman does before going to the market). > A rough guide is to spend half of that money on food and drinks. You’ll have to go around asking wedding vendors for service prices and compile totals, to know what to pay on vendors. >Use the percentages suggested in our wedding budget calculator to guide you in picking vendors your budget can accomodate.
– So, how many guests are you looking at inviting and what kind of food do you want to serve them? You should put a number to it, and that would determine how the wedding would be. Decide on exact number of guests you want – that would give you an idea of the kind of food / menu options and quality of caterer to hire OR how big or small a reception hall to hire. A N1m wedding could decide it wants to spend N500k on foof and drinks BUT wants 500 guests (meaning it would have less menu options and should find a caterer that can do N1k per guest on food and drinks). >Another couple planning a N1m wedding and also spending N500k on food and drinks may decide to invite 100 guests (meaning better food quality, and assorted food for guests, and better quality caterer).
-On your reception timing to keep away uninvited guests: If you’re sure that most of your important guests and family/ friends/ parents would find that time comfortable… >An alternative option that many about-to-wed couples choose is to make the wedding an invite-only, give invitation cards to guests to show at the venue, and hire a few body guards to only allow those that show the IVs.
Hope the above tips help. I wish you all the best.
Thanks so much ma, this is awesome. Please ma help me with affordable wedding planner urgently. Please ma like #300k
Hello Evelyn. Speak to BBVibrant 08069749855 (wedding planner).
Good day madam, kudos for helping others with your great tips. Ma, pls am legally married to my hubby(2016), am from Muslim background, I did my introduction with nikka same day (2015), but engagement isn’t yet done, now am pregnant with my 2nd baby, I and my hubby want to rush our TD before the tommy will start showing, and we are planing of doing it the same day we did our registry. (June30) can you help with budget list of traditional marriage/ reception with just 300k. “I have a very short time to plan”
Thanks and God bless you richly ma. #310318
Dear Anike,
First, let me congratulate you on your upcoming traditional marriage ceremony.
You know that price of things change everyday in Nigeria, and so, the one and best way to get a DEFINITE WEDDING BUDGET is to price things them at the market close to when you want to have your occasion.
However, I can give you a percentage hint that may help with how you divide up your N300k wedding budget. You should reserve about half for the food and drinks, and then work out how many guests that can take care of. Do not guess how many wedding guests to invite. Ask a few caterers how much they charge per plate of food for occasions, AND add that to price of one drink – that should give you an idea of food budget per person. >>Then use that to calculate how many people N150k (half of N300k) can feed. >>That is your guest list and your overall food budget. >>Even if you’re cooking yourself, this gives a bit of idea.
Use the remaining N150k to take care of the rest of wedding things – your outfits, photography, MC, DJ etc.
To find out more about our wedding budget calculator, click here.
Hi, thanks for this write up. please i am planning my traditional and court wedding by july with a budget of 500k please how do i make use of the budget wisely without exceeding my limits and my pride lists is on it too. its an edo wedding.
Hi Betty. Congrats on your upcoming wedding ceremonies. Here’s some tips to help you plan a N500k court and traditional wedding events, and avoid overspending:
-Fix the dates of the two weddings close to each other. (a) You could have both on same day (court in the morning AND traditional immediately after; and reception in the afternoon. In this case, some elders would commence some parts of the traditional wedding while you are away at the court wedding – and you two would come and meet them). >(b) Have them different days- like: one week apart – for example, this week for a quiet court wedding and next week Saturday for the big traditional wedding (morning) PLUS wedding reception (afternoon or immediately after).
Some people also do it a day apart – with a quiet wedding on day one and the big wedding and reception on the second day. Either the court or traditional can come first. The idea is to have very few and closest family and friends at the quiet wedding, so that expenses on drinks and food would be low. >The second day wedding (either court or trad, as you choose) is the one where you invite everybody, and also fix the wedding reception.
The key is to have a wedding programme that carefully flows from one to the other – if it’s a same day wedding.
Hope this helps.
Hi, thanks for this wonderful blog. If we spend so much money in securing a hall and decorating it, food and etc, I think it’s wise to invest in something reasonable in documenting that day. Because it’s only the good memories that are well documented that will linger. So I find photography a must. God bless you all
Hello Tony. You are so correct about making wedding photography a top priority. That is what we tell coupes and have written a couple of articles on. So, yes, do not skimp on it – be sure to hire the best wedding photographer you can find because after the one-day-wedding, record of the memories would last you a lifetime.
wow!!! u have done well I’ve gotten answers to my questions from ur write ups and ur responses. Thank u so much but is it possible to have a Yoruba traditional wedding that will include d bride price rite with 300k cuz I have done my Court wedding
Thanks for the feedback, Bukola. The only way you can know how much the bride price and customary engagement list would cost is to officially collect “THE LIST” from the bride’s family, and then go to the market to ask for price of the items in that list.
Dear stella,
A pleasant evening to you. God bless you for the amazing job you are doing. Am planning to get married by August 2017, how can i plan a small but memorable traditional(igbo) and white wedding with a budget of 1m same day.
Thanks
Chidi
Dear Chidi, thank you for reading our wedding budget article for grooms. Congratulations on your upcoming wedding.
Now, onto your question about tips for planning a small but memorable, same-day, trad and white wedding, below are my tips:
– Decide in advance the number of people to invite (it’s best to keep it small, so that your wedding food and drinks budget can cater for them. More people would mean you would spend more OR some guests would not get food). A good way is to calculate by cost per head, based on cost of plate of food and drinks – ask a few caterers what they charge, and calculate from that to know how many people (100, 200 etc) your wedding catering budget can handle.
– Before you do any spending, divide up your N1m budget into how you should spend it – so that you can avoid over-spending in some areas and discovering you need more money in others. >>You can do this by allocating certain percentage of that N1m to different categories of wedding expenses – Catering (food, drinks), Photography/ Video, DJ/ Live Band, MC, Decorators and so on – we prepared a wedding budget calculator guide (percentages) that you may use (click).
wedding budget calculator guide (percentages) that you may use (click).
– Don’t do everything yourself – get a few friends/ family to help you out and DELEGATE things-to-do to them (traditional wedding checklist and white wedding checklist) and follow them up every few days.
– Have a plan on a few trusted friends/ family or hired hand/ wedding planner to coordinate activities on the day of your wedding – you don’t want caterers, photographers and other wedding service vendors calling you or your bride on that day to ask for where or when to do things. Read our Wedding Coordination planning tips here.
Wedding Coordination planning tips here for ideas you can use to organize your help team.
YOU MAY ALSO SEE MEMORABLE, LOW-KEY WEDDING TIPS BELOW:
– Low-key wedding Tips: for have an unforgettable, celebrity-type small wedding in Nigeria
Low-key wedding Tips
– Making Small Weddings Work and Look Big: Everything you need to know, do or avoid when planning a small Nigerian wedding
Making Small Weddings Work and Look Big
traditional wedding checklist white wedding checklist
– Make good photography a top priority – that’s the only thing that will make your wedding TRULY memorable after that day. Plan and book a good wedding photography team ahead of time (the best ones are booked far in advance, don’t choose just any one last minute). Very tiny weddings look grand in pictures years after, because they had good photography.
Those are tips I can think of this moment. Hope they help.
Hi Stella,
I’m Michael. You are doing a very great and good job here. I have been following your tips but it seems my days are number now. The timing is still around August or September by God’s grace. With the economy situation here in Nigeria, how can I minimise cost and maximise the availabile resources at my proposal. I have less than 500k but still more 300k.
Thank you.
Hello Michael,
Thanks for reading our wedding budget tips. I must commend you – you have done a lot by saving up; most people do not have that much and some have even got married with less than that.
>>First things to think of is hall/ venue and feeding. (1) Get a free venue or a very cheap public garden or hall. (2) Don’t invite everybody, because you can’t feed them all. To ensure your wedding budget of N300k – N400k is enough and gives you an amazing celebration, the most important thing is to not to invite too many people – find a caterer and ask him/ her how much it would cost to feed so-and-so number of guests. That should give you an idea of how much to reserve for wedding food – and use common sense to reduce the planned number of guests until you get a Naira amount that is within your affordability.
>>We wrote some detailed articles with extensive tips on many ways to cut wedding costs and amazing ideas you can use to have a big-looking wedding with small money (click). have a big-looking wedding with small money (click). Be sure to click that link to see the tips, and also read the other wedding cost-minimizing posts that we mentioned inside that post.
Don’t worry, your wedding will be better than you imagined – just follow the advice.
Dear Stella,
Good evening and how is your day going?
Please i need your help, I and my husband don’t have money for our wedding and people are asking us when will that day be?
Now i am planning to have my wedding on December 2017 and i don’t know how to go about it and i want to have my wedding in big way and also i don’t have big money to do it.
Please help me on this matter.
Dear Chika,
Thanks for reading and sending your question. Here are my answers:
Advice #1: Save up – start saving now: You said you don’t have money for your wedding but desire a big wedding: I have to be frank with you, my dear, you need some money to have any kind of wedding at all (even a tiny one). So, the only way is to save up for your wedding plus beg your family/ friends to support you financially. There’s no other way.
Advice #2: Be true to the size of your pocket. Once you save up some money, even small, then plan your wedding, and you can follow our articles on how to have a great wedding with small money and cut down costs. Here on this blog, we are always telling couples to plan their wedding according to their pocket size, and it would still be awesome IF YOU FOLLOW SIMPLE WEDDING PLANNING TIPS. Here’s our tips to having a big girls wedding with small money (click).
Advice #3: Don’t wait too much. Just do it! Start thinking of the next 6 months to 9 months and plan towards that time. Here’s an article on why you should not delay your wedding any longer (click).
Advice #4: Consider having it outside December (choose other months). Know that December is a time when things get very expensive in Nigeria, and since you would not be planning your wedding with much money, you need to think of fixing it at a season that things are not costly – so that you can get a lot of things done with small money.
Read and use over 100 ideas and tips from us on how to save wedding costs and have your wedding in a big way, when planning with small money.
Those are my tips, Chika, and I hope they’ll help you.
good afternoon stella, please i need an affordable wedding planner urgently. please help
Hello Jennie, I’ll send it to your email shortly. Check your inbox in a few minutes.
hello stella could you please recommend a very affordable wedding planner, that can coordinate in the abule egba axis of lagos? many thanks.
Hello Victor, this is coming very late to you (so sorry), but hope it would still serve:
-We have a NaijaGlamWedding community of vendors (including wedding planners) and a LIST of them on this GoogleDoc page (click). Most are affordable. >I suggest you see the list, scroll down and call up some in Lagos to see the one that clicks with you.
-QUICK FINDS on that list: Cherries event, EventRoyale, Radiant Orchids Events — click that link for their contact details, and call them.
Hope that helps.
Pls I need a wedding budget for trad and white wedding.
Hi Mama, we only have sample budgets to guide you and how to do wedding budget for any amount you have. Check out these posts (click the links below):
–How to do your wedding budget yourself
-Traditional wedding list for yoruba weddings (click), for edo wedding, for igbo wedding-5 Sample white wedding budgets
–5 Sample Wedding Budgets
I love ds.great job!I tink I wil folow ds wen planning mine.but can u list d budget of doin both d trad nd white weddn same day?
Thanks, Favour. Feel free to follow our wedding busget list tips; also know that what we provided is a guide and so you should feel free to change things up to suit your personal wedding style. (2) On your request, I will note that in our list of future topics to write on. Be sure to follow us on Facebook, to know when we write any new article and for daily wedding planning tips.
How can I have a low key wedding of 300k. Pls help me and my wife to be !!!
Welcome to NaijaGlamWedding Deric. You can click here to take a look at this sample wedding budget where the couple spent a little over N300k – you may want to model your own budget after that one, but in your case reduce the amounts of items so as to arrive at N300k. In addition, follow our low-key wedding planning advice and tips here (click) and here (click) – AND also read the other related articles we mentioned in those posts – they will show you more ways to cut down your wedding costs to match your budget. I wish you success as you plan the wedding.