To run invitation-only event registration, put your invitees behind a gate that outsiders cannot find, then ask each one the questions you need before they arrive. The gate is a private link, an access code, or an application you approve. Platforms differ on which they offer, so check the mechanism before you promise anyone a guest list.
What does invitation-only registration actually mean?
It means the event page does not sell itself to the public. Someone has to be invited, admitted or approved before they can register, and you want a record of who came in through which door. There are three ways to build that gate, and they are not interchangeable.
A private link hides the ticket and shares the address only with invitees. An access code shows the ticket to anyone who types the right word. An application with approval makes the person ask first and lets a human say yes or no. Each one trades convenience for control, and the cheapest is also the easiest to leak.
How do the main platforms gate an event?
The mechanics vary more than the marketing suggests. The table below is drawn from each vendor's own help pages and community answers, read on 15 October 2026, and describes what the pages say rather than what a demo might show.
| Platform | How the gate works | Screening applicants | What the source says |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cvent | Invitation lists and registration paths, with a privacy setting that limits a path to invitees | Approval is set per registration path | A Cvent adviser said in a February 2024 community reply that there is no auto-approval by invitation list; the workaround is a separate path with approval switched off |
| Swoogo | Apply to Attend, with VIPs able to complete registration instantly | Team approves or denies from one report | The registration page also lists unlimited conditional logic |
| Humanitix | Free registration-of-interest ticket plus hidden admission tickets revealed by an access code | Review answers in the attendee report, cancel the order to reject | Help article recommends one ticket per order for the application ticket |
| Ticket Tailor | Hidden tickets with an access code, or a private event URL protected by a code | Help pages describe no approval step | The code sits inside the shared link, so anyone holding the link holds the code |
| eventcloud | Private ticket groups reachable only by direct link, one form per ticket group | Approvals at the door, per the registration feature page | No access codes; capacity optional per ticket group |
Sources: Cvent Community, Swoogo, Humanitix help, Ticket Tailor help on revealing tickets with a code and private event URLs, and eventcloud's registration page.
Which gate is right for which event?
Match the gate to the cost of a stranger getting in. For a members' dinner or a press briefing, a private link is usually enough, because the worst outcome is a forwarded email. For a closed customer summit with sensitive content, you want something a person reviews. For a mixed programme, such as free visitors beside paid exhibitors and invited speakers, you want separate doors for each audience rather than one gate for everyone.
The common mistake is picking the gate first and the audience second. List your audiences, decide what each is allowed to see and do, and only then choose the mechanism. Many events end up using two at once: a public page for free visitors, and private links for speakers and VIPs.
How do you set it up on eventcloud?
Start by creating one ticket group per audience: delegates, exhibitors, speakers, guests. Mark the invitee groups as private, which hides them from the event landing page so they can be reached only by their direct link. Send each audience its own link, and they land on the right registration straight away.
Then attach a different form to each ticket group. Eventcloud supports text, dropdown, multi-select, radio, date, time and country fields, each required or optional, validated as people type, and stored on the attendee record. A speaker form can ask for a bio and travel dates while a guest form asks only for name, company and dietary needs. Named passes allow one registration per email address, which stops the same invitee registering twice and keeps your list clean.
What Would Zero Booking Fees Save You?
eventcloud charges a flat subscription, not a cut of every ticket. Compare it with what your current platform takes.
Set a capacity on any ticket group where the room is finite. Capacity is optional and can be applied per ticket group or per session, and it is the practical way to keep a closed event closed even if a link travels further than you meant. Registrations are unlimited on every plan, so a long guest list is never the thing that moves your invoice.
What happens at the door?
The registration feature page lists approvals at the door as part of the model, and the door is where a private link is double-checked. Each registration has a QR code, and scanning it shows the attendee's name, type, transaction details and their custom form answers. Your door staff can see at a glance whether this person is a speaker, a guest or a paid delegate, without a printed list.
After the event, filter attendees by any form field and export to Excel (.xlsx). The file opens in both Excel and Google Sheets, which is handy when a sponsor wants the guest breakdown. Confirmations can be resent if an invitee loses theirs.
What should the invitee form ask?
Ask for what you will act on, and nothing else. For most invitation-only events that means name, organisation, role, a dietary dropdown, and one or two questions tied to the programme. Every extra field is a reason for a busy guest to hesitate, and with invitees you already know who they are.
eventcloud has no conditional form logic. If your registration depends on branching questions, the workaround is a separate form per ticket group, which in practice means separate links for separate audiences. That is usually a better fit for invitation-only events anyway, because you already know which audience each invitee belongs to before you send the link.
What does it cost when the guest list grows?
When registration is the product, the meter matters. A gated event with 200 invitees and a gated event with 20,000 should not produce different software bills. eventcloud's Team plan is USD 125 per user per month, or USD 1,250 per user per year, with unlimited events, tickets and registrations and no per-ticket or booking fees. Paid tickets settle straight into your own Stripe account. The price is the same whether you register 500 people or 50,000, and it is a different model rather than a discount.
Who this is not for
eventcloud does not have access codes. If your plan depends on one shared word that unlocks hidden tickets for a large mailing list, a platform built around that mechanism, such as Ticket Tailor or Humanitix, will fit more neatly. The nearest equivalent here is a private ticket group reached by direct link.
The registration feature page lists approvals at the door. If your plan needs applicants to be screened and notified by the platform before any ticket exists, Swoogo's Apply to Attend or Cvent's approval paths are built around that step, and you should ask eventcloud's team how its approvals behave for your event before committing.
Stripe is the only connector eventcloud has. A team that lives in a CRM will be working from Excel exports. The guest list also needs to be heading for a physical door, since eventcloud is an in-person specialist.
If your invitees are walking into a room, see how registration and private ticket groups work on eventcloud, or read the pricing page for the flat per-user fee behind it.
