Dinner parties
Find a night everyone at the table can make
A dinner for eight is only a dinner if eight can come. A poll finds the night before you've shopped for the wrong one.
Jonah hosts dinner for six or eight friends every couple of months, and the hard part was never the cooking. Before he plans a menu he needs one Saturday everyone can make, settled early enough to shop and cook without a last-minute change. Here's how that goes with a poll.
You pick the nights
Get your link
Name the dinner and tap the Saturdays you could host. That's the whole form.
You share the link
whenworksforyou.com/e/dinner-at-oursCopied ✓whenworksforyou.com/e/
Text it to your guests, or paste it into the group chat. Anyone with the link can vote. No account needed.
You pick the night
- Sat Nov 144 yes · 2 maybe
- Sat Nov 217 yes — leading
- Sat Nov 283 yes · 1 maybe
Pick the date ✓
Votes land in one tally as they come in. When one night has everyone, lock it in and plan the menu.
- Pick the nights
- Share the link
- ✓Pick the night
Why a poll beats the group chat
"Dinner at ours soon, when's good?" gets you two Saturdays, a "depends," and a thread about someone's kitchen renovation. A poll turns the same question into a grid: the Saturdays you could host down one side, every guest's answer next to them, and the night the whole table can make lit up in green.
Nobody installs anything. A guest opens the link, types their name, and taps the nights that work. Thirty seconds, right from the chat you sent it in.
Which nights to offer
- The nights you'd actually cook. If Saturdays are the only nights you'd host eight people, offer three Saturdays, not a Saturday and two Tuesdays to be fair.
- Look three or four weeks out. Weekend evenings fill early. A Saturday ten days away is a Saturday half your guests already promised to someone else.
- Simple title, useful description. "Dinner at ours" is the title. What you're cooking, and whether anyone should mention an allergy, go in the description.
What your guests see
One page with the dinner name, the nights you offered, and three buttons for each: Works, Maybe, Can't. A comment field catches "we'd be late from a matinee." Once they've voted they see how everyone else answered, so the winning night is obvious to the whole table.
A dinner with a start time
A free poll marks each night as an evening, which is usually plenty between friends. If you'd like the invitation to say half past seven, an exact start and end time comes with an event pack or Plus, and the confirmation says it too.
Locking in the night
When one Saturday has everyone, lock it in! The poll link then shows the decided night to anyone who opens it, so a guest checking the date a week later finds it without asking you. On Autopilot, every guest gets the confirmation by email, and next time the same people are already in your address book.
What if someone can't make the night that wins?
They tap Can't and say so in a comment. If the table isn't the table without them, add another Saturday to the live poll and send the link around again. Otherwise lock in the night that works for everyone else and invite them to the next one.
Where Autopilot helps
On Autopilot, we email each guest their own invitation, read replies written in plain English, and send up to two reminders to whoever hasn't voted yet. You hear from us the moment a night works for the whole table.
Part of Autopilot — see pricing.
- From
- When Works For You
- To
- mei@…
- Subj
- Jonah is finding a date for Dinner at ours
Hi Mei — Jonah is finding a date for Dinner at ours. Which of these work for you?
Vote on the dates
Or just reply to this email with the days that work.
Find a night for your next dinner.
A free poll takes a minute to set up. Your guests never need an account.