For the host buried in incoming texts
The texts reply fast and then scatter. Send one message carrying a live link, and the yeses arrive on a single list with names beside them, so you stop tallying replies in the margins.
A text invitation is quick to send, which is why everyone does it. What follows is slower. Forty messages arrive, some say yes, some say yes if the weather holds, some ask what time, one asks whether they can bring a friend, and two you cannot place at all. You become the system that remembers, copying answers into a note before bed.
A live link inside that same message ends the copying. Guests tap the link instead of typing an essay, and the reply arrives already sorted: attending, not attending, who is with them, whether they can eat the fish. Your phone stops being the guest list, because the list now lives somewhere it can be read at a glance.
Both are a yes. Only one of them is something you can count.
Instead of "yeah sounds great, is it the one by the station", you get a ticked name, a place held, and any note kept in its own field, so nothing is guessed.
A guest adds who they are bringing within the limit you set, so the extra place carries a name rather than surfacing as a surprise beside you on the night.
The list shows who has replied and who is still quiet, so a nudge goes to the right people instead of one more broadcast text to everyone.
There is no trick to the delivery. You paste the link into the message you would have sent anyway, into the group or the individual chats, exactly as you do now. What changes is only what happens on the other side: the text opens a page that answers for itself, and reminders to the guests who never tap go out from inside your list rather than as another apology you type by hand.
How it works
Enter the date, the place, and what time to arrive, or tell Jitabi in a line. The invitation and the reply system come up together as a draft.
Load your guest list so each incoming reply ticks a known name, and the still-open places are visible rather than something you estimate.
Choose the plus-one limit and any meal options. Guests fill them on the page, so the extras and the notes arrive counted instead of described.
Send it as you always do. Confirmations gather against names, and you message the quiet guests from the list rather than the thread.
Questions
No. You share the link through the messages you already send, to a group or one at a time. The counting happens on the page it opens, not in a texting service you have to learn.
Add their answer to the list yourself. The point is that one place holds the count, so a phone reply and a tapped reply both end up on the same names rather than in two heads.
None. The link opens in the browser already on their phone, and they reply in a couple of taps. Nothing to install stands between a yes and your list.
Yes, within the limit you set on the invitation. They name the companion on the reply, so an extra place arrives with a name instead of appearing at the door.
The list separates the replied from the silent at a glance, and reminders to those still outstanding go out through your messages without another group text.
Get Started
Put the live link inside it and let the replies fall onto a list, so the count is settled long before you would have finished reading the messages back.
