01 Where the money goes
The full cost breakdown
Typical ranges by category. The banquet is the giant — usually 40–60% of the whole budget — but it's also the part your guests help pay for.
| Category | Typical range | Worth knowing |
|---|---|---|
| Banquet (per table) | $1,200–$2,000+ | Add ~19% (10% service + 9% GST) |
| Actual-day photo & video | $700–$2,500 | Video often priced separately |
| Pre-wedding shoot | $600–$2,500 | Entirely optional |
| Bridal package (gown, suit, photo, makeup) | $3,000–$6,000 | One-stop; or buy parts separately |
| Gown alone | $500–$3,000 | Rent off-the-rack vs custom-made |
| Hair & makeup | $500–$1,200 | Across pre-wedding + the day |
| Rings & jewellery | $2,000–$10,000+ | The widest range of all |
| Decor, favours, misc. | $1,000–$3,000 | |
| Buffer | 15–20% | Overtime, upgrades, surprises |
For your money: almost every line spans 3–4×, which means the total isn't a price — it's a set of choices. The single biggest lever isn't on this table at all: it's the guest count, because every name is a ~$150 seat and every ten names is another table.
For your life: the guest list is rarely a negotiation with the caterer — it's a negotiation with your parents. Agreeing early how many tables belong to each family (and who pays for theirs) prevents the most common wedding fight, which was never really about money.
02 The bit nobody frames
The banquet roughly pays for itself
At a mid-range dinner, each seat costs you around $150 (including service and GST). The typical ang bao at that tier runs $260–330. So per guest, you're usually net positive:
Mid-range hotel dinner. Lunches and budget venues shift both numbers down.
For your money: the ang bao arrives on the night — but the deposits are due up to a year before. You still need the full banquet sum as cash up front, so the "it pays for itself" maths helps your final tally, not your cashflow.
For your life: be careful not to let this table justify upsizing. "Guests cover it" is true at a mid-range dinner you'd have held anyway — it stops being true the moment you upgrade the venue because guests cover it.
03 Putting it together
A worked example: 200 guests
| Banquet, 20 tables (incl. ~19% charges) | $30,000 |
| Ang bao collected (200 × ~$290) | +$58,000 |
| Net from the dinner | +$28,000 |
| Everything else (photo, attire, rings, decor) | $20,000–$40,000 |
| Your real out-of-pocket | roughly $0–$12,000+ |
Illustrative. The dinner can fund much of the production — your true cost is mostly the production you choose to add, not the party itself.
04 The other side of the ledger
The trade-off worth seeing
"It's once in a lifetime" — so the spend is justified, whatever it comes to.
You're rarely overpaying for a meal — you're choosing how big a production to wrap around it.
None of it is wrong if it's genuinely what you value. But every $10,000 you don't spend proving something for one evening could be:
- A meaningful dent in your flat's cash downpayment
- Or ~6 months added to your shared emergency fund on day one of marriage
- Or, invested at a steady 5%, about $26,000 in 20 years
Spend on the moments you'll remember. Quietly skip the line items you're only buying because everyone else does.
Want to go deeper?
Sources & notes
Figures as of June 2026. Wedding totals ($30–85k), banquet ($1,200–2,000+/table, +19% charges), category ranges and ang bao rates ($260–330/guest mid-range) are from published Singapore wedding-industry guides. The worked example is illustrative.
General information, not financial advice. Costs vary widely by venue, date and choices — treat these as planning ranges, not quotes. Jonathan Wong is a licensed financial adviser representative in Singapore, currently between firms — during that period he is not able to provide financial advice. You can check his registration yourself on the MAS Financial Institution Representatives Register at eservices.mas.gov.sg/rr.