Another wedding is around the corner, and this time it’s your best friend’s, or maybe your relatives’ marriage ceremony. You received the honor of being the best man. It is now time to plan an epic bachelor party and prepare to write a legendary best man speech.

Based on statistics, over 77% of people have public speaking related anxiety. If you are one of the 77%, I will be sharing helpful tips on writing a best man speech to help you less anxious about presenting your toast.

You can watch this video for some help to overcome your fear of public speaking: https://youtu.be/qYGB_vPLKtA.

In addition to having a virtual speech coach app, Orai’s specialty is in the art of public speaking. It goes without saying that we will help you get your best man speech structure and presentation organized.

If you aren’t particularly interested in:

• Understanding the intricacies of a remarkable best man speech
• Getting essential tips for best man speech ideas
• Creating your best man speech template
• Best man speech examples brother

And you are only interested in my final tips and notes; you can scroll on till the last subheading before the conclusion.

Basic Best Man Speech Tips

The honor of being the best man comes with some responsibilities, although not as much as a maid of honor. However, compared to giving a speech on your best friend’s most memorable day, the task of planning a bachelor party seems trivial.

So, how do you start and ace your best man’s speech? You do it like every other speech type, except with some nuances that I will discuss next.

Here are some helpful tips that will ensure smooth delivery and reduce your chance of getting jittery.

1. Early Preparation is Crucial

You will need to avoid procrastination. Just because the wedding seems far doesn’t mean you should not start preparing.

It will be best to avoid the “words will flow when I am out there mentality.” If it’s possible, start writing your best man speech two to four months before the wedding. 

This timeframe seems unrealistic, so why? 

As the wedding approaches, more events line up, keeping you very busy. One of the worst things to combine at a wedding is a lack of preparation and anxiety.

Some ways to start preparing include:

• Think of stories that show how a groom is a great person
• Ask for how they met if you weren’t there.
• You can also prepare to reminisce on the first time you met the bride before or after they became a couple.
• Think of jokes and quotes you will share

2. Open With a Cool Line

An excellent way to boost your confidence is to grab your audiences’ attention in a friendly and calm manner. The best man speech opening lines set the tone for the speech, so go for an excellent one-liner.

The opening line of your best man speech gives your (most likely tipsy or drunk) audience a reason to listen to you and stay intrigued.

3. Make Best Man Speech Joke with Tact

For the best man speech joke, here are some helpful tactical tips.

1. Avoid teasing the bride, except when you all run in the same circle.
2. Since you are closer to the groom, he can be the center of jokes.
3. Try to avoid inside jokes until you are alone with the groom.
4. Being sensitive while joking is helpful to avoid the air of awkwardness

4. Practice Makes Perfect

Let’s start this section by looking at this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neWMJPLmL60

Having a well-written speech is only a minute part of the best man speech delivery is crucial. One best practice for delivery is a rehearsal.

Try to present your speech before an audience, one that can relate to it, like another groomsman or other wedding guests. It is best to ensure that the person you are practicing in front of can give you honest feedback; otherwise, try the Orai app.

Practice will help you get rid of fillers. You could also get tips to reduce using fillers from this video: https://youtu.be/Rml3GlWSCzE.

5. Writing is an Excellent Memory Aid

As excellent as your memory is, writing down your speech or the toast highlights always helps. Why?

• A written speech helps you feel more confident. 
• You can stay on track when you write down your major points.
• Being nervous can make you forget a carefully planned speech, so writing it out will help.

You don’t need to write out every last detail of your speech, so a large piece of paper may be unnecessary. You can use a notecard or your mobile phone notes app to write.

6. Be Creative with Variety

One of the ultimate weapons of a remarkable best man speech is variety. It is quite anticlimactic to have a boring presentation that isn’t:

• Funny
• Sad
• Romantic

An excellent best man speech will let you feel all these emotions and more. Your speeches’ emotional multitone makes the couples’ love story more beautiful and makes your toast heartwarming.

7. Enunciate Your Words Properly for Clarity

When you receive the mic as a best man, you should take charge completely. Avoid mumbling, monotonous tones, being inaudible, talking too fast, or too slow. 

Think “Zac Efron” vibes, speech pacing, and confidence when giving your best man speech. A monotonous speech will bore the guests, and if people start straining to hear you clearly, they become uninterested.

Even if you are introverted, you can try being confident and apply these tips in your way. If you feel like you need a shot for a boost of confidence, have one, but avoid being drunk or intoxicated.

This video may help with pacing: https://youtu.be/LFvqK_SWkYs.

8. Have a Plan-B

There is a high chance that your incredible and well-prepared speech isn’t well-received. Or maybe you made a bad joke that only you find funny. 

A plan-b phrase becomes very helpful at this point. Since the day is all about the lovely couple, you can throw in a few compliments at them to get your audience gushing again.

If a joke you made ruined the mood the first time, it’s best to avoid them until you have your audience full attention. 

How to Write a Best Man’s Speech?

Whether you have writer’s block or not, the duty of the best man’s speech has been entrusted to you, so you have to deliver. 

The best way to write your speech is to follow the best man speech template that we will discuss in the next subheading as a guide. 

A rule of thumb is to personalize your best man speech template to fit the bride and groom of the day. Without further ado, let’s move on to the outline.

Creating the Best Man Speech Template

Writing anything from scratch without a template or an outline is a leading cause of writer block. It is quite overwhelming to start writing a best man speech from the beginning. Therefore we will share the best man speech template or a toast writing design.

An essential idiom to remember as you organize your best man speech template is that “a rough sketch is better than no picture at all.”

Here is an excellent best man speech template to follow:

1. Make an outstanding one-liner to open with
2. Express gratitude to the couple and the speakers before you
3. Congratulations are in order, so congratulate the newlyweds.
4. Say something nice about the bride, but avoid flattery.
5. Tease the groom a bit with a tactical joke
6. If it’s part of your duty, read the messages of guests that could not attend the wedding.
7. Finish your speech with a lovely poem, quote a book, or share some famous lines (this could end up being an inside joke on their ten years vow renewal if everyone isn’t too drunk to remember.)
8. Don’t forget to propose a toast to the newlyweds.

How Long Should a Best Man Speech Be?

Since the best man speech is informal, there is no need to be extremely serious about it. However, that doesn’t mean you should talk the ears off from the wedding guests. 

The length of your speech will depend significantly on the type of wedding event. A long formal wedding may call for a longer toast than a wedding on a trip to vegas.

A five-minute speech can convey all the things you want to say and still be meaningful and entertaining. If you need more time, try to keep things brief because your guests may not enjoy your sentiment if they aren’t drunk.

Tactical Topics to Avoid

Although the married couple may know everything about each other, and you may know all about the groom, some topics are off-limits.

Even some topics you and the groom find extremely funny may be offensive to someone else. So, here are some topics to avoid.

Best Man Speech Ideas for Your Remarkable Toast

When coming up with a best man speech, brother ideas and all, you will need to consider:

1. The groom’s personality: is he someone that can take or joke, or is he sensitive and serious? 
2. Will their guests enjoy a lighthearted joke?
3. Can you tell a lovely story about him that the guests may not know?
4. A bit of embarrassing the groom is welcome, especially with stories from his youth.
5. If you aren’t a standup comedian, don’t force it. It always ends up being a pitiful sight to watch.

Best Man Speech Opening Lines

After the best man speech opening lines, the speech intro comes next. The direction you decide to go with your introduction depends entirely on you; hence, I will share my best man speech template for introductions.

1. Start with an address directed at the audience, thank them for their attendance, and if you feel nice, you can give some compliments.
2. Next, you can thank the couple for the opportunity to give your speech and express gratitude to their parents.
3. Next, introduce yourself and share how you know the groom; this is the perfect place to share a memory or tell a joke if you can (no pressure).
4. You can give credits to the previous speaker and add open loops to prepare your audience for your speech.

One-liners and Best Man Speech Jokes

If you want yours to be a funny best man speech, you can start your one-liner with one of the groom’s funny quirk.

The trick here is to ensure the joke is relatable and funny to everyone so they can all appreciate it.

Here are some inspirations

If you thrive on dark humor, I’d advise you to avoid making jokes during weddings to keep everyone happy.

Best Man Speech Examples for Brother

There are many examples of a best man speech, like the one in this video: https://youtu.be/BYEXCPFfoPM.

Unlike the best man in the video, you may not be the bride’s brother, so you may not make the bride and groom go through an emotional roller coaster.

However, here are some best man speech examples.

Speech for Different Types of Best Men

There are different types of best man speeches and many categories of best men, so your approach may vary.

A helpful tip is to watch wedding movies where the best man wasn’t high or drunk during his speech. It may inspire you on what to add and things to avoid.

Example Best Man Speech for Best Friend

The best man speech for best friend is unique and can take any direction. You can enjoy the effect of an emotional rollercoaster and go for funny, heartfelt, romantic, or a combination of all.

The Short Speech

With a short speech, you can go with a metaphorical theme like a spark, a sign, or any cute thing people say about relationships.

Here you can give a quote, talk briefly about the couple, and make a toast.

A Heartfelt Speech

With a heartfelt speech, you can make a joke about the effort it took to try writing and a decision to wing it and speaking from your heart at the beginning.

Next, you can go for stories about watching them fall in love each day or of how they became your family. Here the main deal is to give your best man speech from your heart.

Funny Best Man Speech Example

Funny best man speech examples are quite challenging to represent since the jokes depend on you and your audience. However, you can make jokes about your relationship with the groom or imply that he wrote your speech.

What is the Best Wedding Speech for the Brother 

Just like the best friend, the best man’s speech brother has a large room of opportunities. You can make jokes or share heartwarming memories of your childhood with the groom.

You can choose to be sentimental or take a funny path. To end, you can express your gratitude for getting a new sister and finish on a light note.

More on the Brother’s Speech

Some helpful best man speech brother tips are:

1. Since it’s your brother, you can be as personal as you want.
2. Don’t avoid practice because it’s your brother. Take time to practice.
3. Your whole speech doesn’t need to be centered around jabs.
4. Nerves and emotions are typical, so practicing will help you keep them in check.

Final Memorable Best Man Speech Writing Tips and Notes

As promised at the beginning for those that skipped, here are some crucial points to note when writing and presenting your best man speech:

1. Be Prepared
2. Alcohol may help take the edge off, but being drunk or wasted may make you say things you will regret later.
3. Don’t forget to express gratitude
4. Stories are helpful
5. Creating controversy isn’t right, so avoid topics that could cause disputes.
6. Inside jokes are annoying.
7. Be brief. Rambling will get tiring since there are other people to listen to
8. A nice quote is an excellent way to end.
9. Propose a toast with a raised glass
10. Be original, and you can let out a sigh of relief for theatrical effects.

Conclusion

Giving a best man speech may be a daunting task, but you can ensure yours is memorable and remarkable. You can study public speaking tips ahead of time and check out Orai to practice your speech: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hL4-n5pWvMA.

References