Enter your guest count, how many hours you'll be serving alcohol, and roughly what share of guests drink, to get a bottle count.
Event bar planning typically assumes each drinking guest has about one drink per hour. Multiplying guests × hours × share of drinkers gives total drinks needed, which this calculator splits across wine, beer, and liquor using a common 40/40/20 mix, then converts each into bottle counts (5 glasses per wine bottle, 1 beer per bottle/can, about 17 drinks per 750ml liquor bottle).
Source: Based on the common event-planning rule of one drink per guest per hour, with a typical 40% wine / 40% beer / 20% liquor mix used by wedding and catering planners.
Event planners typically estimate about one drink per hour per drinking guest, which this calculator uses as its baseline — actual consumption varies by crowd, time of day, and whether it's an open bar.
A common starting mix is about 40% wine, 40% beer, and 20% liquor, which this calculator uses by default — adjust it in your head if your crowd skews strongly toward one type.
It's common to add a 10–15% buffer, especially for wine and beer, since many venues and stores allow returns of unopened bottles but running short mid-event is hard to fix.
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