Wedding and function invitations in Bengaluru: cards, e-invites and video

What both cost together. By our sum, a designer's e-invite image at ₹1,500 to ₹2,000 and 100 plain printed cards at ₹14 each (₹1,400) come to about ₹2,900 to ₹3,400. That doesn't count insert cards, names on envelopes, any design charge for the card or GST (question 3).

How many cards. A card goes to a household, so a wedding of 400 guests needs far fewer than 400 cards. Add a few for the temple or the family deity, and a few for the names you'll remember late.

• The minimum order is 100 cards at one Bengaluru chain, 25 or 50 at one Bengaluru press (its pages differ), and 10 at one online printer.
• Our advice: print a few spares now, since a reprint later is a whole new order.

One design for both. Ask for the card and the e-invite from the same designer at the start, so they match. Kiana, a Bengaluru studio on mytribe, makes both printed suites and animated e-invites.

A designed card costs more. The same press's ready wedding designs, set with your details, run ₹80 to ₹120 a card at 50. The ₹14 card is for a design you bring.

Why the count matters. At a press, setting up the job costs about the same for 50 cards or 500, so the price of each card falls as you print more. That's how offset printing usually works, and the table shows it: ₹17 a card at 50, ₹9.50 at 500. So ask for the quote at your real count.

At Avenue Road or Chickpet. We found no press there that publishes a price online. Go with your count, a card you like, and your text already checked. Ask for the price per card with envelopes and GST, written down, and compare it with the table at your count. An online printer starts its wedding cards from ₹18.

The cheapest printed card. Design it yourself in a free app like Canva or Adobe Express, and take the file to a print shop near you. Ask for the price per card in writing before they print.

Laser-cut prices spread widely. Ask what makes the price (the paper, the size of the cut-work, a padded cover, an insert), and hold two before you choose.

Ask the press about each of these, in writing:

• The design. Is it in the per-card price, or charged on its own? Can you have the file, to make the e-invite from?
• Envelopes. Are they in the price?
• Insert cards. Each function (mehendi, sangeet, reception) can add a card and a price. To save, give the full set to close family and a reception card to office friends.
• Names on envelopes. Ask whether printing names is extra. Someone in your family types out every name and title, so give them time.
• A sample. Ask to hold a printed sample before the full order. Gold and maroon can look different on paper than on a screen.
• GST. It's 18% on printed cards, as tax sites report the rule. One chain's prices include it. Most printers' pages don't say.

Two things can go wrong with free. A cousin may send the same template for her own function, and nobody checks the Kannada or Telugu but you. If you're happy with both, free is fine.

One family wrote to us for a digital baby shower invitation in English, needed within the week, for anything within ₹2,000. That buys a designer's image, or the cheapest video from a ready design.

A ready cartoon couple

About ₹1,500 to ₹4,500

The two of you, drawn

About ₹4,500 to ₹9,000

The seller's own cartoon bride and groom, the same for every couple

An artist draws your faces, clothes and pose from 3 or 4 photos of each of you

Four slides: the two of you, the wedding, the reception and a closing slide

The same four slides, with your names, dates and venue

Your names, dates and venue typed in, and one song

The same one song; one free round of changes at two sellers, three at the third

One round of changes free, ready in 2 or 3 working days

48 working hours at one seller, 7 to 9 days at another

What the extra pays for: the drawing. It runs about ₹1,200 to ₹6,000, depending on how much is drawn new. One seller charges ₹1,200 to ₹2,000 to give its ready cartoon couple your faces, which takes 3 to 4 more working days, and from ₹3,000 to ₹6,000 to draw a new couple from scratch, with your faces, clothes and pose. Another adds ₹2,500 for a cartoon of the two of you to its ready designs, and says the drawing is why that job takes 7 to 9 days, where a ready design's first draft takes 48 hours. A third delivers its custom cartoon video in 48 working hours, the same as its ready ones. None of their pages says the animation or the song is any different.

Who on mytribe works each way. A ready design: none of our makers sells these, so ask us. The two of you, drawn: Kiana, a Bengaluru studio, draws couples into its animated e-invites. Ask for the price, and whether it draws from your photos: the studio told us its price depends on your brief, the style, the number of pages or functions, and the format (in its words, "static format or PDF format").

Above both. One studio's top level starts at ₹25,000: a meeting, a storyboard, an original drawing and its own music, in 3 to 4 weeks.

A video in a real voice. Jyoti Kochatta, a Bengaluru host on mytribe, makes video invitations at ₹20,000 to ₹30,000 a video, fully made for you, she told our team in September 2026. She writes a script, often in rhyme or shayari, and she and her husband make the voice, the lyrics and the music themselves. Your family's names and the function times are read out, in 2 to 3 minutes at most, in Hindi, English, Marwari or Kannada. Ask her for the all-in price with GST.

No photos of the couple? The ready cartoon couple needs none. One family asked us for a one-minute wedding video in modern animation, with no photographs of the couple at all.

Some boxes are heavy. A ₹6,175 box at that chain holds two acrylic inserts, an acrylic nameplate and two glass jars, and weighs 3.3 kg. Its heaviest boxes weigh over 5 kg. Ask the weight of any box before you choose, if it has to go by courier to another town. If you want sweets or dry fruit with it, ask whether the box has room and who fills it.

In between. A laser-cut card, from about ₹19 at that chain, is the step between a plain card and a box (question 2). Ask the press for a sample to hold first.

A box made for you. Arch, a gifting store in Basavanagudi on mytribe, sells invitation boxes and hampers, like a pink box with gold detail and a 3D acrylic mandap inside. He quotes from the reference pictures you send. For custom work he takes 50% up front and the rest before dispatch, sends photos of the finished piece before it leaves, and you pay the shipping, he told our team.

Checking the script. One online studio charges ₹1,200 for a card in two languages and has Kannada temple designs from ₹5,200. For a script not on its list it charges ₹1,500 and has someone who reads it check the text. A ₹499 seller's page doesn't say who checks. One Bengaluru printer lists Kannada, Tamil, Telugu and Hindi. Ask any press whether someone there reads yours.

On the proof, check: every name, title and spelling, the date, the time, the venue and the map pin. Whose names go first, a gotra, a parent who has passed: that's your family's call, and the designer follows your draft.

• E-invite: 24 hours to 48 working hours at the ₹499 sellers. One studio sends a first draft in 48 hours and says a fortnight is comfortable and a week usually works.
• Printed cards: 1 to 7 working days at three presses, longer for foil, laser-cut or a box. One chain says 8 to 10 days after you approve the text in the wedding season. One press prints simple cards the same day.
• A cartoon of the two of you: 48 working hours at one seller, 7 to 9 days at a studio, and 3 to 4 working days more than a ready design at a third, for your faces on its ready couple.
• A video drawn from scratch: 3 to 4 weeks at one studio.

A month is our advice, so a late proof or a wrong name still has time to be fixed. Have the cards in hand before the house visits start, and keep the first one for the temple or the family deity. If the muhurtham or the venue changes after printing, every card is wrong, and the e-invite is the easy one to fix.

• WhatsApp shrinks photos and videos. Send the card as a document if you want it sharp.
• Put the date, time and venue on one still frame or the first page. An elder may not watch a two-minute video to the end.
• Every seller we read delivers a file (a video, an image or a PDF) or a link. None says it sends an app.
• The fake invitation was an Android app file sent as a wedding invitation. A plain message with the details typed in helps a careful guest trust yours.