Bringing your guest list over from Joy, Zola or The Knot

If your replies are coming in through a wedding website like Joy, Zola or The Knot, export the guest list from it as a CSV file and import that. You say which column is which, see exactly what will change, and nothing is saved until you agree. When more replies arrive, export and import again: the people already on your list are updated, not added twice. This is written for UK weddings, but it works for a list from anywhere.

Export a CSV

Each of these sites can download your guest list as a spreadsheet, and the menus move, so look for Export in the guest list. If it gives you an Excel file, open it and save it as CSV. A spreadsheet you kept yourself works the same way.

Say which column is which

On the Guests page, press Import guests and choose the file. Knotwork guesses which column holds the first names, the last names or a whole name, the email, the RSVP, dietary needs, the main course, the side and the notes, from the column headings. Check each guess, and leave any field blank that you do not want brought over. The only one you must give is the names.

Every site words its RSVP answers differently, so Knotwork lists each answer it finds in that column and asks what it means: coming, not coming or no answer yet. If there is a column for whose side a guest is on, it asks the same about that.

See what will change

Before anything is saved you see how many guests are new, how many are updated and how many are unchanged, and rows with no name are skipped. A guest already on your list is matched by email first, then by a name nobody else on the list has. If a name matches more than one guest, none of them is changed, and you can tick the ones who are someone new.

Anyone on your list who is not in the file is shown to you and kept, unless you tick them. Nobody loses their seat in an import.

Doing it again

Import as often as you like. Each time, the new replies update the guests you have, and the seating plan, the place cards and the rest of your wedding read the same list, so there is nothing to copy across.