Finding your wingman – top tips for choosing your best man

The grooms wingman, second in command and person responsible for delivering an exhilarating, funny and suitably apt speech for the main man. So how do you choose your best man for the big day? Here are some of our top tips to choose a great best man for your wedding day.

Alongside the groom, the best man is up next (arguably ahead of the father of the bride) as the next most important man of the day.

If you’ve read our wedding traditions post, in days gone by you’ll remember the best man was literally chosen as the best swordsman to defend the couple from any troublemakers on the day.

High responsibility indeed. And for grooms once you’ve popped the question – this will be one of the most important choices on your wedding planning journey.

As your second in command on the big day, your number 2 will help you hold it together through the emotional rollercoaster ahead. Knowing you have a calm and reliable side kick throughout the planning and the nuptials really will help.

As such, it cares to put a bit of thought into choosing your best man.

The Robin to your Batman, Rodney to your Delboy or Penfold to your Dangermouse. The best man is the best friend who will join you at the front of the alter before your wife (or husband) to be comes strolling in.

Make no bones about it, this is a high pressure job and you need a fine chap who can rise to the occasion and help the day run smoothly (without outshining you!)

Who should your best man be?

First off, it may be worth identifying a list of contenders. The shortlist may include your dad, brother, best friend from school, uni pal or your partner’s best friends husband aka your new best mate.

As far as your father and brother go – unless you want to highlight your bond for a particular reason or they are truly your best friend, they will already be fairly prominent on the day (with your brother lined up as an usher.) Instead it may be nice to consider one of your friendship options instead.

Speeches work well written by a close friend who knows your best (and worst) sides. But as with everything for the day, this is up to you.

To help choose, it is of course worth considering the responsibilities and obligations they will be expected to carry out as part of the best man duties. 

Your best friend from school Stevo may be the life and sole of the party. But if after a couple of beers and a round of Jager bombs, he descends into drunken oblivion – he may not be the chap you want slurring away and dishing out all the juiciest stories from that distant weekend in Amsterdam to all of your friends and new family. 

Your best man is going to be your head cheerleader before and during the day. With power comes great responsibility, and you need someone who is going to pull you through in style.

Stuck between two choices of best man?

Why not have two – we’ve seen that grooms are now regularly choosing a couple of best pals for the top job.  This could iron out any competition between friends and could also benefit the day by taking advantage of their different skill sets.

What are the responsibilities of the best man?

Before the big day

Your best man will be expected to organise and pull together your friends and male family members to create an epic stag or batchelor do. This could be at home, abroad or both. 

The man in question will need to have good communication and organisational skills to pull this off.  The aim here is to create lasting memories with lots of hijinks you will laugh about long after the day. (Ideally without anyone ending up having to call the British consulate from an eastern European jail.) Bear this in mind when choosing your best man.

Leading up to the big ‘I do’

Just before the big day, your best man may ease your nerves with a couple of drinks the night before (just a couple, mind).

On the day as you step ‘into the breach’.. the best man will help you get ready on the morning as the groomsmen assemble. You will then entrust him with the rings ahead of the big ‘I do’. 

From then on the best man will be the Robin to your Batman as you nervously await the moment of truth. He will help to greet your guests, gather friends and relatives for pictures after the ceremony and step in as the go to guy to iron out any small problems.

Once the formalities are out of the way, either before or after your wedding breakfast, all eyes will be on the best man to deliver the key note speech of the day.  Bear in mind, this is THE ONE that all your guests will be looking forward to.

You want someone who can skilfully hold guests in the palm of their hand as they wax lyrical about how great you are/how little joy you had with ladies before you met your lovely wife and a number of cringey stories that will leave guests in fits of laughter. 

This takes some skill, and as you – hopefully – only want one of these speeches, you want the best man to do you justice. Best friend or not, if your pal struggles to string together a sentence when in front of a crowd, you may want to reconsider his part for this role when choosing your best man.

After the ceremony

Once the speeches are out of the way, the main gig may be over but the best man should still be there to watch your back throughout the rest of the day.

They should continue to help take care of any operational headaches dealing with venue staff, suppliers or family members if you are busy having your pictures taken, or otherwise engaged. 

Beyond the main formalities, the crucial work of the day is done so let loose, kiss (the bride), dance and enjoy your big day, you’ve earnt it.

To summarise

When choosing your best man, the man of the moment needs to have good organisational skills. They will be able to pull together (and generally be liked by) the other gentleman of your big day, write and deliver a good speech, be reliable, good fun, liked by your missus and put you in the odd compromising situation whilst holding you a couple inches away from the precipice. 

With ‘great power comes great responsibility’ so it’s worth highlighting to the main man what the duties are with an overview of what needs to be done. Remember to point him towards The Wedding Man for some top tips on how to write a great speech and outline what the best man’s duties are. 

Good luck sir, we hope our top tips on choosing your best man have helped you to make your decision. Now go and get your wedding wingman!