For most parties, plan on about 150 g of cooked-ready meat or fish per adult for a main meal, roughly 6 canapés each if a meal follows, and two drinks per drinker in the first hour then one an hour after that. Those are rule-of-thumb figures rather than laws, and you should add about 10% as a buffer. The right amount depends on the length of the party, the time of day and who is coming.
Note: these quantities are rough guides for planning, not catering or food safety advice. Every crowd is different. Ask your caterer or venue what is included, think about dietary needs and allergies, and check Food Standards Agency guidance on storing and serving food safely.
Start with the type and length of the event
The first question is not “how much food” but “what is the food for?” People eat far more when a party spans a mealtime than when it is a two-hour drinks gathering at 4pm. These are the main types, from lightest to heaviest:
- Drinks and nibbles (2 to 3 hours). Canapés and bowls of snacks, with no meal. Guests usually eat a meal later, so they want a light bite, not dinner.
- Drinks and canapés as the meal (2 to 3 hours around 6pm). The canapés replace dinner, so the number per head roughly doubles.
- Buffet (3 to 4 hours). A main spread plus dessert, often with a few starters or snacks on arrival.
- Sit-down meal. A set number of courses, so you can count each portion exactly, one per person.
- Wedding or all-day event. Reception drinks and canapés, a meal, then evening food. The House of Calculator tool has a wedding setting for this, with a toast and evening food.
Decide which of these you are running and write down the start and end times. The length matters most for drinks, because consumption grows with each hour, while for food it matters mainly whether it crosses a mealtime.
Food per person: a rule-of-thumb table
The figures below are commonly used planning amounts for adults at a buffet or a family-style meal. They are not exact, and appetites differ. Use the upper end if the party is long, the guests are hungry (for example after a sports event) or you want leftovers.
| Item | Per adult | For 30 guests |
|---|---|---|
| Cooked-ready meat or fish | 125 to 150 g | 3.75 to 4.5 kg |
| Rice (dry weight) | 60 to 75 g | 1.8 to 2.25 kg |
| Pasta (dry weight) | 80 to 100 g | 2.4 to 3 kg |
| Potatoes | 200 to 250 g | 6 to 7.5 kg |
| Vegetables or side dishes | 100 to 150 g | 3 to 4.5 kg |
| Salad leaves | 40 to 50 g | 1.2 to 1.5 kg |
| Bread or rolls | 1 to 2 slices or 1 roll | 30 to 60 |
| Dessert | 1 portion | 33 including buffer |
Meat shrinks and bones weigh something. If you are buying meat on the bone, such as a whole chicken or a joint, a common rule of thumb is to allow more per person, roughly 200 to 250 g bone-in. For a slow-cooked dish like pulled pork, raw weight loses a good share in the oven, so work from the cooked weight you want and buy more. Cooking charts and conversions between raw and cooked weight are in Cooking conversions and oven temperatures.
Where you serve several dishes, the portions shrink. If a buffet has three mains, two salads and two sides, guests take a little of each, so you divide the meat allowance across the mains rather than providing 150 g of each. A simple approach is to plan one full portion per person across all the mains combined, then add a quarter on top for the popular dish.
Canapés and starters
Canapés are small, so counts are higher than people expect. A usual guide is:
- Before a sit-down meal: 3 to 5 pieces per person.
- Before a buffet: 4 to 6 pieces per person.
- Instead of a meal: 12 to 15 pieces per person over a couple of hours.
The House of Calculator catering tool uses 6 canapés per guest as its default, plus a 10% buffer, so 80 guests get 528 pieces. That is 80 × 6 × 1.1. If you are choosing a mix, three or four different types works for most parties, and each type then needs about a third or a quarter of the total. Include at least one vegetarian option for every type of food, and label dishes clearly. Allergens are a real safety issue, so check the labels on bought items and ask guests about allergies in advance.
Starters at a sit-down meal are one per person plus a buffer, and the same is true for mains and desserts. The tool shows 88 portions of each course for 80 guests, which again is the 10% buffer, so you cover a few extra guests or someone wanting seconds.
Drinks: how much per person
Drinks are where parties most often run short or waste money. The tool works on a simple model with editable assumptions:
- 85% of guests drink alcohol, 15% do not.
- Each drinker has 2 drinks in the first hour, then 1 drink per hour after that.
- 20% of a drinker’s drinks are soft drinks or water.
- Of the alcoholic drinks, 50% are wine, 30% beer or cider, and the rest are spirits or cocktails.
- A 75 cl bottle of wine gives 5 glasses, and a sparkling toast uses 6 glasses per bottle.
- Add 10% as a buffer.
Here is a worked example for a 30-guest evening buffet over 4 hours where 70% of guests drink alcohol and there is a toast. There are 21 drinkers and 9 non-drinkers.
- Each drinker has 2 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 5 drinks over 4 hours, so 21 × 5 = 105 drinks.
- 20% of those, 21 drinks, are soft or water. The 9 non-drinkers also have about 5 soft drinks each, which is 45.
- Total soft drinks and water is 66, and with the 10% buffer, about 73 servings, which is roughly 18 litres at 250 ml.
- The 84 alcoholic drinks become 92 with the buffer. Half are wine, which is 46 glasses or 10 bottles. 30% beer or cider is 28 bottles or cans, and 20% spirits or mixers is 18 servings.
- A toast for 30 at 6 glasses a bottle needs 5 bottles of sparkling wine; the tool rounds to 6 with its buffer.
For ice, 0.5 kg per guest is a common allowance for a drinks-heavy party, so 15 kg for 30 guests, though how much you need depends on whether drinks are served chilled and how hot the venue is. Check how many bottles you can return unopened to the supplier, because that makes it safer to over-order.
Alcohol units help with responsible planning. A 150 ml glass of 12.5% wine is about 1.9 units, because units equal volume in millilitres times strength divided by 1,000. A full bottle is about 9.4 units. Alcohol units explained: how to count units in your drinks sets out how units work and the official low-risk drinking guidance, which you can check against your own plans for a long event.
Worked example: a 30-person buffet at home
Imagine a family party for 30 adults on a Saturday afternoon, lasting four hours, with a hot main buffet:
- Canapés on arrival: 4 to 6 each, so 120 to 180 pieces. With a buffer, order 180.
- Hot main: a chilli, a vegetable curry and a baked chicken dish. Plan 4.5 kg of meat (150 g each) across the two meat dishes, plus 3.75 kg of vegetables for the curry.
- Sides: 2.1 kg dry rice at 70 g each, and 6.75 kg of potatoes at 225 g each if you include roast or jacket potatoes.
- Salad: about 1.35 kg of leaves at 45 g each, plus any extras like tomatoes and cucumber.
- Bread: about 45 slices or rolls.
- Dessert: 33 portions, which could be two cakes cut into 16 slices each, or a mix of cake and fruit.
- Drinks: 10 bottles of wine, 28 beers or ciders, 73 soft drinks, and 15 kg of ice if you are serving cold drinks.
Work out your own list with the catering calculator below, which lets you change the guests, hours and share of drinkers. If you scale a recipe up for a crowd, the arithmetic is the same as for percentages and ratios, and How to calculate percentages covers the basics.
Adjusting for who is coming
The standard amounts assume adult guests of mixed appetites. A few changes make the numbers more realistic:
- Children. Count children under about 10 as half a portion, and teenagers as a full adult. Plan simple foods that travel across age groups.
- Mostly men or a very active crowd. Move to the top of each range.
- Long gaps between mealtimes. If the party covers 12 to 2pm, guests expect lunch. If it runs 3 to 5pm, afternoon tea style food is enough.
- Dietary needs. Check for vegetarians, vegans, and people who avoid gluten, dairy or nuts. You do not need to divide the food exactly by percentage, but provide a full main option for each, not just a side. As a guide, keep it simple and ask your guests when you invite them.
- Large groups. For very big events, individual consumption per head often falls a little, since not everyone eats everything. Even so, run out of food and the disappointment is immediate, so keep your buffer.
Safe handling, leftovers and waste
Plan the cooking order and cold storage as carefully as the quantities. Do not leave perishable food out for hours. The Food Standards Agency has guidance on how long hot and cold food can be left out, how to cool leftovers and how to reheat them, so check it when you plan a long buffet. Keep cold food in the fridge or in cool boxes until serving, keep hot food hot, and use separate boards and utensils for raw and cooked items. A smaller number of dishes served in batches is safer than everything laid out at once.
A 10% buffer does not make a large surplus, but it can leave leftovers. Plan for what to do with them: containers for guests, freezing portions you will not use soon, and sensible disposal of anything that has been out too long. Buying shelf-stable items, such as crisps and soft drinks, with the option to return or keep them, is the cheapest way to over-order.
Common mistakes
- Forgetting that the buffer applies to everything, including serving sizes and ice.
- Counting wine in glasses rather than bottles, or the other way round, when ordering.
- Under-ordering soft drinks. Non-drinkers, drivers and children use them, and they also dilute alcohol.
- Not allowing for dietary needs, and finding that the only vegetarian dish is a side.
- Ignoring how long the party lasts. A guest list of 30 over six hours needs far more than over three.
- Estimating in your head at the shops. Write a list first.
Try the calculator
Enter your guests, length of event, type of meal and drinking assumptions in the Party and Wedding Catering Calculator to get drinks, canapés, courses and ice quantities you can take to the shop or caterer.
Frequently asked questions
How much food do I need per person for a party?
For a main meal, about 125 to 150 g of cooked-ready meat or fish, a portion of carbohydrate and vegetables, and one dessert per adult. Add about 10% as a buffer and adjust for children and the length of the party.
How many canapés per person?
Around 4 to 6 if a meal follows, and 12 to 15 if the canapés are the meal. The House of Calculator tool defaults to 6 per guest plus a 10% buffer.
How much alcohol should I buy for a party?
A common planning model is 2 drinks per drinker in the first hour and 1 each hour after, with a mix of wine, beer and spirits. Over four hours that is about 5 drinks per drinker. Add a buffer and check whether unopened bottles can be returned.
How much ice do I need?
About 0.5 kg per guest is a common allowance for a party with plenty of cold drinks, so 15 kg for 30 guests. You may need more in hot weather or if you are chilling bottles in tubs.
How do I cater for vegetarians and other dietary needs?
Ask guests in advance, and provide at least one full vegetarian main rather than only sides. Label dishes with allergens, and check the Food Standards Agency guidance if you are unsure.