Delivery guide
How to deliver wedding photos to clients, and how long to keep the gallery online
Wedding photo delivery is the last thing the couple sees of your work and the first thing they show everyone else. This guide covers the timeline from the sneak peek to the full gallery, how to set that gallery up so parents and guests can use it without help, and the question every photographer eventually faces: how long should client galleries stay online.
From the wedding day to the gallery
Couples do not measure delivery from the day you finish editing. They measure it from the wedding, and the weeks in between are where most of the anxiety lives. Four dates keep it in hand.
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Within 48 hours
The sneak peek
Ten to twenty finished images while the wedding is still the only thing the couple talks about. Send them as a small gallery rather than a message thread: the couple gets a link they can forward, and they see how your gallery looks before the full set arrives.
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1 to 2 weeks
Cull, then start the edit
Cards backed up in two places, then the cull. This is the point to tell the couple when the full gallery is coming, because silence between the sneak peek and delivery reads as delay even when you are on schedule.
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4 to 8 weeks
Full delivery
Many contracts say up to eight weeks, and the date in the contract is the one the couple remembers. Deliver earlier if the edit allows, but never later without a message first. The full set goes out as one gallery, one link and one short note.
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12 months
Review what stays online
Around the first anniversary, look at the gallery again. If your platform expires galleries, warn the couple before it does and tell them what to download. If it does not, the only decision is whether the storage is still worth it to you, and usually it is.
Setting up the wedding gallery
The upload is the quick part. The five decisions below are what make a wedding gallery work for the couple, their parents and a hundred guests, and they take about twenty minutes once you have made them twice.
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Group the day into subsets
Getting ready, ceremony, portraits, party. Several hundred photos in one scroll are a wall; the same photos in the order of the day are a story, and the guests can find the dance floor without scrolling past the vows. Four or five sections is enough.
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Choose the cover and apply your preset
The cover is the first frame the couple sees and the one they screenshot, so pick a portrait that stands on its own. A saved preset carries your fonts, colours, layout and download rules from one wedding to the next, so the fourth gallery of the month takes as long to set up as the first.
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A password for the couple, a link they can share
A password keeps the full set out of search results and away from anyone who guesses a link. The couple passes it to their parents and the wedding party themselves. An email gate or guest list on top tells you who has opened the gallery, which is exactly what you need when the lost-link email arrives.
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Decide download sizes and add a PIN
Full resolution for prints and albums, a web size for phones and social media. It is fine for everyone with the link to take the web size. Keep the originals behind a download PIN that only the couple has, so full-resolution files do not circulate on their own.
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Write the message that goes with the link
Keep it short: what is in the gallery, who may download what and at which size, the password, how long the gallery stays online, and how to order prints if you offer them. Write it so the couple can forward it to their parents without changing a word.
What goes in the gallery
Three questions come up on every wedding, and the answers change what you export and how much storage the gallery takes.
How many photos
There is no fixed number. For a full day, somewhere between 600 and 800 finished images is common and covers every part of the day without padding. Deliver the edit, not the take: near-duplicates make the set feel longer, hide the good frames and double the storage for nothing.
What size
Two sizes cover every request you will get. Full-resolution sRGB JPEGs at quality 90 or higher for printing and albums, and a 2048px long-edge version for phones, social media and the guests. At 2048px a wedding weighs about 1 GB; at full resolution, with files of 5 to 8 MB each, closer to 5 GB.
The film
If there is a wedding film, put it in the same gallery as the photos. An H.264 MP4 at 1080p or 4K plays in the browser on most gallery platforms, and the highlight clip and the full film work best as separate files. Check the plan's clip limit before you promise it: some free plans allow one clip, some none.
How long the gallery stays online
How long photographers should keep client galleries online is the question nobody settles until the first reactivation email. Here are the three common answers, and what each one costs you and the couple.
| What changes | 90 days The transfer-link habit | 12 months The usual contract clause | Until you take it down No expiry |
|---|---|---|---|
| Storage cost to you | Lowest. The space is free again within a season, and that is the only thing this column has going for it. | A year of space per wedding. At 2048px that is about 1 GB each, so a 100 GB plan carries a whole season with room left over. | Storage builds up year on year. On the plans we checked, extra space is sold in 100 GB steps for a few euros a month, so a decade of weddings is a real line in the budget, and a small one. |
| What the couple experiences | A deadline they did not choose. The link stops working around the time the thank-you cards go out, and the first email you get is asking for it back. | The link works through the first anniversary, which is when most couples look again. A note a month before it closes saves the reproachful email later. | The link they saved simply keeps working. A grandparent finds it two years later, and nobody has to ask you anything. |
| What to write in the contract | The closing date, and that the couple is responsible for downloading everything before it. Say whether you offer a paid extension. | The online gallery stays available for twelve months after delivery. Add whether you keep an archive after that, and for how long. | The gallery stays online while the studio operates and may be removed with reasonable notice. Keep that right, so a change of platform does not put you in breach. |
| Reactivation requests | Constant. Each one means finding the archive, re-uploading and re-sending: an hour of unpaid work per request. | Occasional, usually around an anniversary or a new baby. Re-uploading from the archive is still work, so charge for it or price it into the package. | None. The gallery is the archive, and the question never comes up. |
What couples ask for after delivery
Delivery is not the end of the conversation. These four requests arrive after almost every wedding, and each one is easier if you decided the answer before you sent the link.
Guests want downloads
The couple forwards the link to the wedding party, and within a day someone's mother asks whether she can save the photos. If the web size is open to everyone with the link and the originals sit behind the couple's PIN, the answer is yes and you do nothing. If downloads are off, every guest becomes an email.
Prints
A framed print for the parents, an album for the couple. Decide before the wedding whether print sales are part of your business or a recommended lab is enough. Not every gallery platform has a print shop, and Photoglacier does not, so if you sell prints you handle the orders yourself.
A lost link
The most common email of all, usually a year later and usually from a parent. If the gallery is still online, it is a copy and paste, and a guest list tells you who had access in the first place. If the gallery has expired, the same request is an afternoon of finding the archive and re-uploading it.
A re-edit
Can this one be black and white, can the exit sign go. Put your policy in the contract: a small number of adjustments included, the rest billed at an hourly rate. Upload the revised file into the same gallery so the couple does not need a second link.
A wedding gallery that does not expire
Photoglacier is a gallery platform built in Austria and running on servers in Germany, so the couple's photos stay inside the EU under the GDPR. It is made for the handover described on this page: one link the couple opens in a browser, no account at their end, and nothing that switches itself off after ninety days. It has no print shop, no watermarking and no CRM, and the free plan shows Powered by Photoglacier branding.
- Galleries never expire on any plan, including the free one, so the link in the couple's wedding folder still works at the tenth anniversary
- Guest lists and an email gate on every plan: you see who opened the gallery, and the couple shares the link with family as they like
- Password-protected galleries and download PINs from the Starter plan, with full-resolution downloads on every plan
- The wedding film sits in the same gallery as the photos and plays in the browser: one clip on Free, three on Starter, unlimited on Pro
- The free plan's 5 GB holds one wedding at 2048px with room to spare, and galleries and images are unlimited
Questions people are asking
How do I deliver wedding photos to clients?
Through a private online gallery, sent as one link. Upload the finished set, group it into sections for the parts of the day, set a password and the download rules, and send the couple the link with a short note. They open it in a browser, mark favourites, download at the size you allow and forward the link to family, with nothing to install at their end.
How long does wedding photo delivery take?
Four to eight weeks for the full gallery is the common range, and many contracts say up to eight weeks. A sneak peek of ten to twenty images within 48 hours bridges the gap. The date in the contract is the one that counts: deliver earlier if you can, but never later without a message first.
How long should a wedding gallery stay online?
Twelve months is the shortest period worth promising, because couples come back at the first anniversary, at the first baby, and every time a relative asks. A platform whose galleries do not expire removes the question entirely: the link keeps working and the only cost is storage. Whatever you choose, write it into the contract and repeat it in the delivery message.
Should I password-protect a wedding gallery?
Yes, for the full set. A password keeps several hundred photos of a private event out of search results and away from anyone who guesses a link, and the couple shares it with parents and the wedding party themselves. A sneak peek the couple wants to spread widely can stay open.
Can guests download from the gallery?
If you allow it. The usual compromise is a web-sized download for everyone with the link and full resolution only for the couple, kept behind a download PIN. Decide before you send the link and say what you decided in the delivery message, because the first question a parent asks is whether they can save the photos.
What size should I deliver wedding photos?
Two sizes: full-resolution sRGB JPEGs at quality 90 or higher for printing and albums, and a 2048px long-edge version for phones and social media. A gallery keeps the file you uploaded byte-identical, so the print files really are print files; email and messaging apps recompress them.
How many wedding photos should I deliver?
As many as tell the whole day without padding. For a full day, somewhere between 600 and 800 finished images is common. Deliver the edit rather than everything you shot: near-duplicates make the set feel longer and the good frames harder to find, and they double your storage for no benefit.
Should I deliver the wedding film in the same gallery?
Yes, if your platform plays video in the browser. The couple gets one link for the whole day instead of a gallery plus a transfer link that expires in a few days. Keep the highlight clip and the full film as separate files, and check the plan's clip limit and per-file size before you promise it.
Wedding photo delivery and how long to keep client galleries online
Most advice on how to deliver wedding photos to clients is really advice on editing faster. Wedding photo delivery is its own job, with its own decisions: what the couple sees first, how the day is grouped, who may download what, and what the contract promises about the gallery afterwards. The question of how long photographers should keep client galleries online tends to surface in the second year, when the first reactivation emails arrive and it turns out nobody wrote the answer down. Settle it before the season starts and the rest of the handover gets simpler.
Photoglacier is built for this handover. A wedding gallery is a web page the couple opens without an account, grouped into sections for the parts of the day, with a password, an email gate and download rules you set per gallery. Galleries do not expire on any plan, including the free one, so the link the couple saved still works at the tenth anniversary. The photos and the wedding film sit in one gallery, everything is hosted in Germany under the GDPR, and the free plan's 5 GB holds one wedding at 2048px.
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Deliver the next wedding as one link
Galleries that never expire, EU hosting, and a free plan with 5 GB, enough for one wedding at 2048px.
