San Francisco city hall is a very popular place to have your Civil Ceremony. Its combination of beauty, convenience and affordable pricing makes it an ideal venue for anyone looking to get married. For engaged couples who are on a strict budget it is the perfect place. This is true even if you want an elegant wedding. All of this is possible with San Francisco city hall weddings! Approximately 25 couples celebrate their nuptials at San Francisco city hall on a daily basis. Our website provides lots of good information related to this so feel free to check out City Hall wedding photography to learn more about wedding planning and photography.
The immense popularity of having your wedding at city hall makes it necessary to have a reservation system. However, this may be one of greatest things about choosing City Hall for your Marriage Ceremony. You can actually book a date and a time to get married and be fairly confident that your wedding will take place very close to your scheduled reservation. This is NOT the case at many other City Halls across the country, where couples show up early and hope to get married at some point that day. At other civil ceremony locations, you have to just walk in and they give you a number. Then you could wait up to an hour or longer depending upon how backed up they are on that particular day. This makes it very hard to plan for guests, wedding photographers and some sort of celebration after the wedding. Not so with San Francisco city hall weddings! You schedule your date and time 90 days or less in advance and then when you show up for your scheduled time, you are generally married within 20 minutes. We have put together a very detailed article discussing the affordability of SF city hall weddings and photography, please click the link to learn more.
San Francisco City Hall Wedding Fees
This all sounds great, but just how much does it cost to get married at San Francisco city hall? If you want to have your marriage at this historic building, the SF County Clerk has an online reservation system that allows you to book and pay for both your marriage license meeting and the actual civil ceremony. This link for City Hall’s Online reservation system makes it remarkably convenient and fast to obtain both of these bookings. The cost for your marriage license as of February 4, 2024 is $120 and the Civil Ceremony will run you $103. Here is a complete fee schedule from the County Clerks office. As mentioned, all of this can be paid with a credit card online when you make your reservation.
One fact that is not that well known is that San Francisco city hall will also allow you to have your civil ceremony off-site on a weekend or a holiday for the low price of $321. $171 of this fee is due when you make your reservation with the County Clerk and the other $150 is payable directly to the Marriage Commissioner (Wedding Officiant). This provides brides and grooms with a very flexible option to have their wedding for a low price in San Francisco. All you have to do is supply the location and you are all set! Ever since San Francisco city hall reduced the number of civil ceremonies performed per day, it has been tougher to obtain reservations for certain months. This Off-site option give you another way to book your wedding in San Francisco. The price is reasonable and you get to decide where the wedding is!
Deputy Marriage Commissioner for a Day!
Another great thing that is offered by the County Clerk is the chance to be temporarily licensed to perform a wedding ceremony by a friend on any given day. This benefit is offered by the Clerk’s office and can be fun for the entire family. The cost for this privilege is $171 and it allows the recipient to perform a civil ceremony that day (only) at San Francisco city hall. So for example, you could have one of your family members register for this early in the morning and they would end up being your SF City Hall Wedding Officiant!
Other County Clerk Fees and Costs
The County Clerk will issue you a Duplicate copy of your Marriage License for $25 if it lost or stolen. In addition, you might need a copy for legal reasons. It is often a good idea to make a copy to send to someone, especially if you are unsure if it will be returned. Other services offered by the County Clerk include printing a souvenir marriage certificate for $8 and processing a Domestic Partnership filing for $63. To see a summary of all these County Clerk services related to marriage, click the link.
Optional Costs for your Wedding at SF City Hall
San Francisco City Hall Wedding Photography
You probably knew this was coming… Yes, Professional Wedding Photography! If you are having your wedding at San Francisco city hall then you owe it to yourself to hire the best wedding photographer you can afford. There are a great many photographers who specialize in photographing newlyweds in this amazing building and they are quite easy to find by searching Google or Yelp.
Reserved Ceremonies at San Francisco City Hall
Other options available at San Francisco city hall include renting out the Mayor’s Balcony or 4th Floor Gallery for the price of $1,000. these reservations can be made up to 1 year in advance through the San Francisco City Hall Events Department. Also available through the Event Department are Saturday weddings, the cost is $5,000 for a 2 hour wedding and then can accommodate up to 200 guests! If you need to go over the 200 guest mark you are able to pay for additional guests. The price for this is $4 per additional guest and $3 for their insurance coverage. With any of these reserved weddings, you will need to find and pay for your own Officiant to perform the ceremony. Officiant prices vary, but are usually in the $150 to $350 range. We can offer quite a few recommendations for officiants if you need it. Marriage Licenses are NOT available through the Events Department. You can obtain a license for a reserved wedding at any County Clerk’s office in California, including in San Francisco.
Private Wedding Ceremonies at San Francisco City Hall
One option that is becoming increasingly popular is having your civil ceremony at City Hall and hiring your own private officiant. This option is available to everyone who has a valid California marriage license in their possession. You do not need to make a reservation with San Francisco City Hall. All that is needed is to hire a wedding officiant to perform the ceremony. As mentioned above, the price for this can range anywhere from $150 to $350. As your San Francisco City Hall wedding photographer, we can help you set all this up. We’re also very good at finding private places in the building to do the wedding.
