Is Evite Free? What the Free Plan Includes in 2026
Yes, Evite is free for a basic invitation. As of October 2026 you can pick a design marked Free, invite up to 750 guests and collect RSVPs without paying anything. The trade is advertising: free Evite invitations show ads to your guests, and removing them costs between $17.99 and $99.99 per event depending on the size of your guest list.
Whether Evite is free for your event depends on what you add in the editor, because a free design can turn into a paid one partway through. I read through Evite's pricing and help pages this week to find exactly where that happens, and every Evite number below comes from those pages.
What you get on Evite for free
Evite labels each design either Free or Premium. A Free design costs nothing to send. Evite's help centre says free invitations support up to 750 guests, which is more than nearly any party needs.
The free version includes the parts that make an online invitation useful:
- A customizable design from the free part of the gallery
- Delivery by email or by text, plus a shareable link you can paste into a group chat
- RSVP tracking
- Read receipts, so you can see who opened the invitation (they don't apply to people who arrived through the shareable link)
Texting has one limit to know about before you build a guest list. Evite's help pages say text invitations work for U.S. and Canada numbers only, so guests elsewhere need the email or the link.
For a casual get-together where nobody will care what the page looks like, that is a complete product at zero dollars. If that describes your event, you can stop reading and go send it.
What a free Evite costs your guests
Free Evite invitations show ads to your guests. Evite's own comparison of the two versions lists "No ads" as a Premium feature, and its pricing article lists "ad removal" as a paid upgrade.
Free invitations also carry Evite's gift guides. Removing those "gifting suggestions" is on the same list of paid upgrades.
Whether that bothers you depends on the event. For a block party, most guests won't think twice. For a 50th anniversary dinner or a baby shower, an ad next to the date and the address looks out of place. I wrote about how that feels from the guest's side in Evite vs Lemonvite.
This is the first place Lemonvite, the platform this blog belongs to, does something different. It has no ads on any invitation, at any price. It also has no free tier for sending: publishing an event costs $5. So the choice between the two is $0 with ads or $5 without them.
Where a free Evite stops being free
You can start with a Free design and still end up at a checkout page. Evite's pricing article lists six upgrades that apply the Premium charge to a free design:
- an envelope or a stamp
- a sticker
- a background
- ad removal
- text on the back of the invitation
- removal of the gifting suggestions
Add any one of them and the whole invitation is priced as Premium. Evite shows a crown icon at the top of the editor once that has happened, so watch for the crown if you intend to pay nothing. The fair part is that one upgrade unlocks every Premium feature at the same price. You aren't billed separately for the envelope and the sticker.
Designs that carry a crown in the gallery are Premium from the start and always have a charge.
Lemonvite's editor has no equivalent of the crown. Nothing you add to a design changes the price, and designing is free to start. A new account gets five design generations, and uploading your own image costs nothing. The $5 is charged when you publish. You can build the whole invitation and look at it before deciding whether it's worth $5.
How much Evite Premium costs
Premium is sold as a package per event, sized by guest count. These are the prices in Evite's help centre:
| Package | Guest list | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Silver | up to 12 | $17.99 |
| Gold | up to 30 | $36.99 |
| Platinum | up to 75 | $68.99 |
| Diamond | up to 750 | $99.99 |
Each package covers a single event and can't be moved to another invitation. So taking the ads off a 25-person birthday dinner costs $36.99.
Besides removing the ads, Premium unlocks the exclusive designs, animated effects, envelopes with stamps and stickers, a host photo gallery and double-sided invitations.
Look at the jump between tiers. A list of 12 costs $17.99 and a list of 13 costs $36.99. If you're near a boundary, count the plus-ones before you choose. Evite's pricing pages don't say what happens when a list grows past the package you bought, so I'd settle the guest list first.
What the same event costs on Lemonvite
Lemonvite charges $5 per event. That covers up to 150 guests, 50 of whom can have a phone number and get their invitation by text. Each additional batch of 50 phone guests is another $5, because sending texts costs money. Email guests don't add to the price.
| Party | Evite Free | Evite Premium | Lemonvite |
|---|---|---|---|
| 12 guests | $0, with ads | $17.99 | $5 |
| 30 guests | $0, with ads | $36.99 | $5 |
| 75 guests, all by text | $0, with ads | $68.99 | $10 |
| 150 guests, all by text | $0, with ads | $99.99 | $15 |
Read receipts, co-hosts, RSVP questions and text delivery are included in that price, with no higher tier to buy. The pricing page has the full terms.
Evite still wins on two counts. Its free plan is free, and its ceiling is higher: 750 guests against Lemonvite's 150. If you're inviting 400 people and ads are acceptable, Evite is the right tool.
The products also work differently. Evite gives you a gallery to browse. Lemonvite has no gallery; you describe the party in a sentence or two and the design engine produces an invitation for that event, or you upload your own image. Guests RSVP from their link without creating an account.
Evite Pro, the annual option
For frequent hosts Evite sells a subscription called Evite Pro at $249.99 a year. It covers unlimited Premium invitations with up to 2,500 guests each, along with logo uploads for a school or a business. Against the package prices above, it pays for itself at the third Diamond-size event or the fourth Platinum-size one. For a family that throws two birthday parties a year, it doesn't.
I found no free trial of Premium or Pro on Evite's pages.
Lemonvite has no subscription to compare it with. You pay per event, nothing renews, and credits you've bought don't expire.
So, is Evite free enough for your event?
Use free Evite when the event is casual and ads on the page won't embarrass anyone, or when the list is bigger than 150. Stick to designs marked Free and leave the paid extras alone.
Pay for Evite Premium when you've found a specific Premium design you love and the list is 12 or fewer. At $17.99 that's a reasonable purchase.
Use Lemonvite when what you want is an invitation without ads and the list is 150 or under. Paying $68.99 to take advertising off a 60-person invitation is hard to justify when $5 or $10 gets you an ad-free one with a design made for your event.
If you're comparing more widely, the other two big names have their own pricing quirks. Paperless Post is free only for the first 50 guests and only on some designs, and Punchbowl has no free plan for new events. My longer list is in the best Evite alternatives roundup.
The quickest test costs nothing. Describe your party at Lemonvite, see the design that comes back, and compare it with the free Evite you were about to send. Then pick the one you'd rather your guests open.