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The day itself

Planning the service

There is no required form of words and no minimum standard to meet. A funeral can be an hour of hymns or twenty minutes and a single song, and the second is not a lesser thing.

Published 4 min read

Deciding what kind of service

Four broad options, and plenty of ground between them:

Religious. Led by a minister, priest, imam or rabbi, following the form of that faith. If the person belonged to a congregation, ring it directly and early — clergy will usually visit the family, and they know how to do this.

Humanist. A non-religious service led by a trained celebrant, with no prayers or hymns. Built around the person’s life, usually after a long conversation with the family. Humanist celebrants are booked through the humanist organisations directly as well as through funeral directors.

Civil celebrant. The pragmatic middle — a service that can include a hymn and the Lord’s Prayer alongside a rock song and a reading from a novel, if that is what the family actually is. Most families are somewhere here.

No officiant at all. A family member leads it, or several do, or there is simply music and silence and a committal. Crematoria are entirely used to this.

Practical planning

Time it. A crematorium slot is short and includes the entry and exit of everybody in the room. Read the readings aloud with a watch. Two hymns, three readings and a eulogy will not fit into half an hour, and being hurried is worse than leaving something out.

Music. Give exact titles, artists and versions in writing. Crematoria mostly use a digital system that can find almost anything, but “that song from the film” produces the wrong recording surprisingly often. Traditionally there are three pieces: entrance, reflection, exit.

Readings. A poem, a passage, a letter, a piece of the person’s own writing. Ask two people rather than one, because people withdraw at the last minute and it is not a failing when they do.

Bearers. The funeral director’s staff, or family and friends. If family are carrying, somebody has to think about heights, backs and the weight of the coffin — see coffins .

Flowers. Family flowers only, with donations to a charity instead, is now the commonest formula in the UK and it says so in the death notice.

Afterwards. A wake in a pub back room, a hall, a house. It is where most of the actual comfort happens, and it does not need to be catered by anybody professional.

Writing a eulogy

The most feared job at any funeral, and the one where the advice is most consistently useful:

  • Five minutes. About 700 words. Longer is not better and nobody has ever complained that a eulogy was too short.
  • Be specific. Not “he was generous”, but the time he drove ninety miles on a Sunday to fix somebody’s boiler. Three concrete things beat any amount of summary, and they are what people repeat to each other afterwards.
  • You may be funny. People laugh at funerals with enormous relief. If the person was funny, it would be a strange tribute that was not.
  • Do not attempt the whole life. A chronology from birth to death is the commonest and dullest structure, and it leaves out everything that mattered.
  • Write it out in full, print it at 16 point, and number the pages. Do not work from bullet points; your memory will not be reliable that day.
  • Give a copy to the celebrant. If you cannot get through it, they will pick it up and carry on, and this happens at funerals constantly. Knowing that in advance makes it far easier to start.

The order of service

Optional, and worth knowing that the funeral director’s printing is usually the most expensive route. A local printer costs less; a home printer and good paper costs almost nothing.

If you do print one, the conventional shape is: name and dates on the front, the running order inside, a poem or a photograph, and the details of the wake and any charity collection on the back. Print more than you need — people take them home and keep them for decades, which is a better argument for printing them than any other.

Hearses and funeral transport · Coffins · Burial or cremation · Children and grief

  • You have less time than you think

    A crematorium slot is typically 20 to 45 minutes including everyone arriving and leaving. Time the readings out loud — most families over-fill it and end up rushed.

  • Someone else can read your words

    Writing a eulogy and delivering it are two different jobs. Write it, hand it to the celebrant, and sit down. This is normal and nobody will think anything of it.

  • The order of service is optional

    Printing is far cheaper from a local printer or at home than through a funeral director, and a funeral with no printed sheet at all is a perfectly ordinary funeral.

Questions people ask us most

Who can lead a funeral service?
A minister, priest, imam or rabbi for a religious service; a humanist celebrant for a non-religious one; an independent civil celebrant for something in between, mixing readings, music and a hymn if the family wants one. Or a family member — there is no requirement for any official at all. Crematoria will provide a simple committal with no officiant if that is what you want.
How long is a funeral service?
A crematorium slot is usually 20, 30 or 45 minutes, and that includes people coming in and going out. A church service can run as long as the church allows. Time everything out loud beforehand: three readings and two hymns will not fit in twenty minutes, and being hurried by an attendant is the thing families remember with most annoyance afterwards.
What goes in an order of service?
Conventionally: the person’s name and dates on the front, then the running order — entrance music, welcome, hymn or song, reading, eulogy, reflection, committal, exit music — and often a photograph, a poem, and details of the wake and any collection. None of it is required. Some families print nothing; some print a single sheet; some make a small booklet of photographs that people keep for years.
How do I write a eulogy?
Five minutes is plenty — roughly 700 words. Pick three or four specific things rather than attempting a biography: one story, one habit, one thing they said, one thing they were wrong about. Specifics carry; summaries do not. Write it out in full rather than working from notes, print it in a large font, and give a copy to the celebrant in case you cannot get through it.
What music can be played at a crematorium?
Almost anything. Most UK crematoria have a digital music system with access to a very large catalogue, and popular music is now more common than hymns. Give the exact titles and artists well in advance — the wrong recording of the right song is a common and entirely avoidable mistake. Live music is usually allowed, subject to space and time.
Can we hold the service somewhere other than a crematorium or church?
Yes. The burial or cremation must happen at a lawful place, but the gathering can be anywhere the owner permits: a village hall, a club, a garden, a beach, a woodland burial ground, the house. A short committal at the crematorium followed by the real service elsewhere is increasingly common, and it removes the tyranny of the thirty-minute slot entirely.
Should children come to the funeral?
Usually yes, if they want to and somebody prepares them properly for what will happen. Children who are kept away frequently resent it later; children who attend, with an adult whose only job that day is them, generally cope better than the adults expect. Give them a role if they want one and permission to leave at any point. See children and grief .

Keep reading

Other pages in this guide

  • Registering a death

    The deadline, who can do it, what to take, and how many certificates to buy.

  • Tell Us Once

    One conversation that notifies most of government, instead of twenty separate letters.

  • Choosing a funeral director

    How to compare firms in fifteen minutes, what to ask, and what you can refuse.

  • Burial or cremation

    The one decision that changes the cost most — and what each option actually involves.

  • What to do with ashes

    Where you may scatter, what needs permission, and why there is no hurry at all.

  • Help with funeral costs

    Every route to help paying for a funeral, and the deadlines that catch people out.

You do not have to work this out in one sitting

Very little has to be done on the first day, and almost nothing has to be decided tonight. Start with the step-by-step guide, and if you need a person rather than a page, the helplines are free and answered by people who do this every day.

Start with the first steps Where to get help