Wedding insurance: what it actually covers, and when it's worth buying

Wedding insurance sits in the same category as travel insurance: easy to skip, cheap enough that skipping it rarely saves much, and the one purchase you'll be relieved to have made if something goes wrong. Most policies fall into two types, and it's worth understanding the difference before buying either.

Liability insurance

Covers injury or property damage at the event itself, and many venues require couples to carry it before they'll hand over the keys. If your venue has this requirement buried in the contract, it's a fixed cost either way, not a discretionary one.

Cancellation and postponement insurance

This is the one people usually mean by "wedding insurance." It reimburses non-refundable deposits if the wedding has to be postponed or cancelled for a covered reason: vendor bankruptcy, extreme weather, venue closure, military deployment, and in most policies, illness.

What it won't cover

• A change of mind by either partner
• General guest cancellations
• Anything disclosed as a known risk before the policy was purchased

When it's clearly worth it

Large non-refundable deposits, an outdoor ceremony with no indoor backup, a venue or vendor you have any doubt about financially, or a wedding date more than a year out where a lot can change before the day. At that point a policy costing a few hundred dollars against tens of thousands in deposits is an easy call.