Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were invited to the society wedding of the year but turned the save the date card down themselves, an insider has claimed.

Harry’s close friend Hugh Grosvenor, the Duke of Westminster, married longtime love Olivia Henson in a lavish cathedral service on Friday but the Sussexes did not attend the nuptials.

Grosvenor, one of Britain’s richest men, wed his fiancé in front of about 400 aristocrats gathered at Chester Cathedral, including Prince William and his cousin Princess Eugenie.

It was originally reported that Mr Grosvenor chose not to invite Harry and Meghan because he wanted to avoid a run in between the Duke of Sussex and his estranged brother William.

The Grosvenor wedding was the event of the British social season but Harry was noticeably absent. Picture by Chris Jackson/Getty Images.

However, the Mirror newspaper has since revealed that Harry and Meghan turned down a “save the date” to the wedding months ago to avoid an “awkward” encounter with William.

Royal insider Richard Fitzwilliams told the newspaper that the Sussexes also RSVPed “no” to the save-the-date invite because they wanted to “avoid a media storm”.

“They also knew that their presence would cause a media storm, especially since Meghan has not visited Britain since Queen Elizabeth’s Funeral,” he revealed.

The Duke of Westminster is believed to own more land than King Charles and has an estimated net worth of about £9.42 billion (AUD17.9 billion).

The Sussexes reportedly turned down a save the date invite. Picture: Osodi/Anadolu via Getty Images.

Mr Grosvenor, 33, inherited huge landholdings and a property investment business upon the sudden death of his father Gerald Grosvenor in 2016.

The Duke is believed to be one of the few remaining friends the Sussexes and Wales’ have in common, with Hugh serving as a godfather to both William’s heir Prince George and Harry’s son Prince Archie.

The major twist comes amid reports Harry and Meghan are discreetly house hunting for a second base in the United Kingdom after King Charles evicted the Sussexes from Frogmore Cottage last year.

“As time goes by, Harry misses some aspects of his old life in the UK,” royal insider Tom Quinn told the same newspaper last week.

“Inevitably, the honeymoon period where everything in the States is new and exciting is coming to an end and Harry is looking back at the past through rose-tinted spectacles.”