Key takeaways
- 01The menu is the most important page on a restaurant website, and it should be HTML text, not a PDF, so it loads fast on phones and can be read by search engines and AI assistants.
- 02Third-party delivery marketplaces typically charge 15% to 30% commission per order, while direct ordering on your own site usually costs a flat software fee plus card processing.
- 03In the EU and UK, food businesses must provide information on 14 regulated allergens, and for online orders that information must be available before the customer completes the purchase.
- 04Your restaurant name, address, phone number, and hours should be identical on your website, your Google Business Profile, and your Restaurant schema markup.
- 05Restaurants in European tourist areas get more from separate, human-reviewed language versions of the menu than from an auto-translate widget.
- 06A typical independent restaurant website takes 3 to 8 weeks to build, depending mostly on ordering, reservation, and POS integrations.
Restaurant website development in 2026 comes down to a handful of jobs done well: a fast mobile menu published as real web text (not a PDF), direct online ordering and reservations, hours and location data that match your Google Business Profile, and clear allergen information. Get those right and your website becomes the cheapest sales channel you own, instead of a brochure that pushes hungry customers toward a delivery app that takes a cut of every order.
What does a restaurant website actually need to do?
Most people who land on a restaurant website are already hungry and close to a decision. They want four answers fast: are you open, where are you, what is on the menu, and how do I order or book. That gives your site three jobs:
- Answer pre-visit questions in seconds: hours today, address, parking or transit, price level, and whether you take walk-ins.
- Take money directly: online orders, reservations, gift cards, and catering or private dining inquiries.
- Feed accurate data to the places people search: Google Search and Maps, Apple Maps, and the AI assistants that now answer "where should we eat tonight" by reading restaurant websites.
What should be above the fold on mobile?
On a phone, the first screen should show your name, cuisine, and neighborhood in one line, today's hours, and two clear buttons: Order online and Book a table. Add a tap-to-call link and one strong photo of your best dish or dining room.
Skip the autoplay video slider. It slows the page and pushes the buttons people came for below the fold.
Must-have features for restaurant website design
A menu in HTML, not a PDF
The menu is usually the most visited page on a restaurant site, and a PDF is the worst way to publish it. PDFs load slowly on mobile data, force pinch-and-zoom, cannot be linked by section, and are easy to forget to update. Search engines and AI tools understand structured web text far better.
Build the menu as structured content in a content management system, so a manager can change a price or mark a dish as sold out in under a minute. Each item needs a name, a short description, a price, and dietary markers such as vegetarian, vegan, or gluten-free. When seasonal menus rotate, keep the URL and change the content, so links and rankings carry over.
Online ordering and reservations
If you do takeout or delivery, the order button should lead to an ordering flow on your own domain, or a branded ordering page you control, not straight to a marketplace listing. Reservations work the same way: embed your booking tool or link to it with one tap, and show open tables without making people call.
Allergen information (legally required in the EU and UK)
In the European Union, Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 requires food businesses to provide information on 14 regulated allergens: cereals containing gluten, crustaceans, eggs, fish, peanuts, soybeans, milk, tree nuts, celery, mustard, sesame, sulphites, lupin, and molluscs. This applies to restaurants and takeaways, not only packaged food. For food sold at a distance, such as online orders, allergen information must be available before the customer completes the purchase. The UK keeps equivalent rules, and its guidance also expects allergen information to be available when the food is delivered.
The US has no federal rule requiring allergen labeling on restaurant menus, although some states and cities have their own requirements. Either way, an allergen key on every item reduces wrong orders and real risk to guests. This is general information, not legal advice, so confirm specifics with your local food authority.
Photos, hours, and the details guests look for
Use your own photography of the room and signature dishes, not stock images, served as AVIF or WebP at the right size for each screen.
Put hours and address in the footer of every page as text, never as an image. Include holiday hours, a map link, parking or transit notes, and accessibility details such as a step-free entrance.
Private dining, catering, and gift cards
Most restaurant sites under-build these pages. A private dining page with capacity, sample menus, minimum spend guidance, and a short inquiry form captures high-value leads, and online gift cards are upfront cash.
Delivery apps vs commission-free online ordering: which should you use?
Marketplaces are good at putting you in front of new customers. The price is commission, typically between 15% and 30% of each order depending on plan and market, plus promotion fees. They also keep most of the customer data.
A rule-of-thumb example: a restaurant doing $20,000 a month through delivery apps at a 25% effective commission pays $5,000 a month for those orders.
Commission-free online ordering means a flat monthly software fee plus card processing instead of a percentage to a marketplace. It is not free, but costs are predictable and usually far lower per order once you have steady volume.
For most independents the answer is both. Keep marketplaces for discovery, and give regulars a reason to order direct: a loyalty reward, a small perk, or faster pickup. If you do not run your own drivers, white-label services such as DoorDash Drive and Uber Direct in the US, or courier networks such as Stuart in parts of Europe, can deliver orders placed on your own online ordering website.
Which integrations matter: POS, reservations, and automation?
An ordering system that does not talk to your point of sale creates double entry and missed tickets on a busy Friday. Check these connections first:
- POS and kitchen display: Online orders should land directly in your POS or kitchen display. Toast, Square, and Clover are common in the US, and Lightspeed is widespread in Europe. Menu sync matters too, so an item marked out of stock disappears from the website.
- Reservations: OpenTable, Resy, and SevenRooms are common in the US, while TheFork and OpenTable are widely used in Europe. Check whether your tool supports Reserve with Google, so guests can book from your Maps listing.
- Automation: An AI assistant can answer repeat questions about hours, parking, and allergens, or capture booking and catering requests after hours. Our AI and automation services cover this kind of setup.
Groups that want a fully owned ordering app need a platform build. Our Sedeo multi-vendor ordering platform case study shows what that involves: a Belgian grocery marketplace with a customer mobile app, an e-commerce website, a web admin panel, and live rider tracking.
How do restaurants rank in local search?
Get your Google Business Profile right
Your Google Business Profile often gets more views than your website. Choose the most specific primary category that fits, keep regular and holiday hours accurate, add your menu, ordering, and reservation links, and upload fresh photos. Reply to reviews briefly and calmly.
Your name, address, and phone number should match exactly across your profile, website, and major directories. For groups, each location needs its own profile linking to its own location page, not the homepage.
Build location and occasion pages
Each location page needs its own address, hours, phone number, photos, menu differences, and directions. Then create pages for the searches you want to win, such as brunch, private dining, catering, or the signature dish your neighborhood knows you for.
Add Restaurant and Menu schema
Structured data tells search engines and AI assistants exactly what your business is. Use the schema.org Restaurant type with address, geo coordinates, opening hours, cuisine, price range, and whether you accept reservations. Connect it to a Menu with MenuSection and MenuItem entries, including prices and dietary information. Schema does not guarantee special search features, but it removes guesswork.
How should a restaurant website in Europe handle multiple languages?
In tourist areas of cities like Barcelona, Lisbon, or Rome, many guests do not read the local language. Auto-translate widgets mangle dish names and are poorly indexed by search engines. A better setup:
- Separate language versions at their own URLs, such as /en/, /fr/, and /de/, with hreflang tags so Google shows each visitor the right version.
- Human-reviewed translations. Keep traditional dish names in the original language and translate the description.
- Allergen information in every language version.
- A visible language switcher instead of forced redirects based on location.
- Prices in local currency with VAT included, which EU consumer pricing rules expect.
What about GDPR, cookie consent, and accessibility?
This section is general information, not legal advice. Talk to a qualified advisor about your situation.
Cookie consent and customer data
If you serve customers in the EU or UK, analytics and advertising cookies generally need consent before they load. That means a banner where rejecting is as easy as accepting, and marketing pixels that stay off until someone agrees. Your ordering and reservation vendors process customer data for you, so you need data processing terms with them and a privacy policy that explains what you collect. Marketing opt-ins at checkout should be unticked by default. In the US, some state privacy laws, such as California's, may apply depending on your size and revenue.
Accessibility: ADA, WCAG 2.2, and the European Accessibility Act
In the US, website accessibility claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act are brought against businesses of all sizes, restaurants included. There is no codified technical standard for private businesses, but WCAG 2.2 Level AA is the practical benchmark.
In the EU, the European Accessibility Act has applied since 28 June 2025 and covers e-commerce services, which can include online ordering. Microenterprises providing services (fewer than 10 employees and no more than EUR 2 million in annual turnover or balance sheet total) are exempt, but larger groups and the ordering platforms you rely on may not be.
For a restaurant, that means real text instead of menu images, enough color contrast, alt text on photos, labeled form fields, and an ordering flow that works with a keyboard and a screen reader.
How fast should a restaurant website be?
Fast enough that a hungry person on a weak signal does not give up. Google's Core Web Vitals give useful targets: Largest Contentful Paint under 2.5 seconds, Interaction to Next Paint under 200 milliseconds, and Cumulative Layout Shift under 0.1.
The usual culprits are oversized hero images, autoplay video, heavy page builders, and third-party widgets loading on every page. Load reservation and ordering widgets only where they are needed, or when a guest taps the button. We build on Next.js with a global CDN, which makes these targets realistic.
How much does restaurant website development cost, and how long does it take?
Cost depends mostly on integrations, the number of locations and languages, and whether you use an existing ordering platform or build your own. These are typical market ranges for professional work in the US and Western Europe, not quotes.
Plan for ongoing costs too: hosting, ordering and reservation subscriptions, card processing, and content updates. For a fuller breakdown, read our guide to website development cost, and see our website development services for current packages.
Content is usually the bottleneck, so have your final menu and photos ready on day one. If you are comparing studios, our checklist on how to choose a website development company covers the questions worth asking before you sign.
Frequently asked questions
Should a restaurant menu be a PDF or a web page?
A web page. An HTML menu loads faster on phones, is easier to update, can be linked by section, and is far easier for search engines and AI assistants to read. You can offer a printable PDF as an extra, but it should never be the only version of your menu.
Is commission-free online ordering really free?
No. Commission-free online ordering removes the per-order marketplace commission, but you still pay card processing and usually a flat monthly software fee. For restaurants with steady takeout volume, those costs are typically much lower per order than the 15% to 30% commission delivery marketplaces commonly charge.
Do restaurants need allergen information on their website?
In the EU and UK, food businesses must provide information on 14 regulated allergens, and for online orders it must be available before the purchase is completed. The US has no federal requirement for restaurant menus, though some states and cities have rules. Clear allergen information is good practice everywhere; this is not legal advice, so confirm local requirements with your food authority.
How do I get my restaurant to show up on Google Maps?
Claim and complete your Google Business Profile with the most specific category, accurate hours, photos, and links to your menu, online ordering, and reservations. Keep your name, address, and phone number identical across your profile, website, and directories, and ask happy guests for reviews. A fast website with location pages and Restaurant schema supports all of this.
Does a restaurant website need a cookie banner?
If your restaurant website serves visitors in the EU or UK and uses analytics or advertising cookies, you generally need consent before those cookies load, with rejecting as easy as accepting. A site using only strictly necessary cookies may not need a banner. In the US, requirements depend on state law, and this is general information rather than legal advice.
Build the site your regulars order from
If your current site sends guests to a PDF menu and a delivery app, you are paying for traffic you already earned. Devzey builds fast restaurant websites with direct ordering, reservations, allergen-ready menus, and local SEO for independents and small groups in the US and Europe. See how we work with restaurants and hospitality businesses, then tell us about your restaurant. We reply within one business day, and the first consultation is free.
Written by
Devzey Team
The engineers and designers behind websites, mobile apps and AI automations for businesses in the US and Europe. About Devzey
