Short answer
The median budget among the 22 couples who have written to us about Greece is 14,460 EUR for 50 guests, roughly 341 EUR per guest. That is more than Croatia (287 EUR) and less than Italy (414 EUR) and Portugal (456 EUR). But those 22 range from 31 to 2,680 EUR per guest, and almost all of that gap comes down to two things: which island you choose, and how many of you there are.
What these numbers are
We do not see invoices. We see what a couple writes in their own enquiry before a single quote has been requested. That is a budget, not a cost. Add ten to twenty per cent to get close to what it actually lands on.
Together the 22 enquiries state 331,531 EUR. The lowest is 870 EUR for twenty-eight guests, the highest 35,000 EUR for seventy. The mean is 15,070 EUR and the median 14,460 EUR. Mean and median sitting this close together is unusual in this material, and it means Greece is not being dragged upward by a handful of luxury weddings. The spread sits somewhere else.
The 22 budgets, by size of the party
| Guests | Couples | Median budget | Per guest |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5-12 | 6 | 3,500 EUR | 493 EUR |
| 20-30 | 4 | 6,850 EUR | 343 EUR |
| 50-60 | 8 | 22,780 EUR | 380 EUR |
| 70-90 | 3 | 25,460 EUR | 286 EUR |
| 170 | 1 | 19,141 EUR | 113 EUR |
Read the right-hand column from the bottom up. A large wedding is cheaper per guest, not dearer. The couple writing about a hundred and seventy guests sits at 113 EUR per guest, a quarter of what the smallest parties pay.
A small wedding costs more per guest, not less
The six couples writing about twelve guests or fewer have a median of 493 EUR per guest. The twelve writing about fifty or more sit at 341 EUR. The reason is that a large share of a wedding is fixed items that do not care how many of you there are: the photographer, the celebrant, the paperwork, the ceremony flowers, the venue fee. Those are split across five people or across seventy.
So a per-guest figure is a poor way to budget a small wedding. Count the fixed items first, then add food and drink per head.
The island is the other half
| Place | Couples | Median budget | Per guest |
|---|---|---|---|
| Crete | 10 | 11,700 EUR | 286 EUR |
| Mykonos | 4 | 24,790 EUR | 419 EUR |
| Santorini | 1 | 26,100 EUR | 522 EUR |
| No island stated | 7 | 13,920 EUR | 325 EUR |
Mykonos runs 47 per cent higher per guest than Crete. That is not a small difference in taste, it is the difference between fitting sixty guests in and not. Santorini has only one couple behind its figure, so 522 EUR is an example rather than an average, but it points the same way as everything else we see: Santorini is the most expensive place in Greece to marry, and Crete gives the most for the money.
Crete is also the only one of the three large enough to hold both cheap and expensive options. Ten of our twenty-two couples chose Crete, and their budgets run from 1,340 to 25,000 EUR.
What is not in the number
Your guests' flights and your guests' beds. Flying time to Greece is three to four hours from most European cities, so the journey is cheap compared with a wedding in Thailand or Mexico, but the guests almost always pay for it themselves and it therefore never appears in the couple's budget.
Beds are the item that moves the figure most. We only started asking about it recently, and just two of the twenty-two Greek enquiries have answered, so for Greece we cannot show how much it moves. For Croatia we can, and there it is the single biggest reason couples with the same guest count end up eight times apart. Assume it holds here too, and decide early whether you are paying for accommodation or not.
The date
May to June and September to October. July and August are extremely hot and full of tourists, and that is also when the room bill peaks. If you want both the weather and the price, aim for the edges of the season.
One more thing specific to Greece: if you choose the islands, plan the logistics carefully. Ferries can run late and flights between islands are limited. Build in a spare day before the wedding, not after.