Restaurant website design: what a restaurant site needs in 2026

What a restaurant website has to do

A restaurant website has three jobs: show the menu, show when you’re open, and turn a hungry visitor into an order or a booking. Most of that happens on a phone, often minutes before someone picks a place to eat.

In the National Restaurant Association’s 2024 technology report, 84% of recent delivery customers said they would order delivery through a restaurant’s own website, compared with 71% through a third-party service.

Good restaurant website design covers these basics:

• The menu as real text on the page, not only a PDF or a photo of the printed menu. Search engines, screen readers and phones all handle text better.
• Order and Reserve buttons at the top of every page, if you take orders or bookings.
• Hours, address, phone and a map on every page, including holiday hours.
• Photos of your real dishes and dining room.
• A phone-first layout built with responsive design.
• Gift cards, catering and private events, if you sell them.
• One page per location if you have more than one.
• Accessible design: alt text on photos, readable contrast, and an ordering checkout someone can finish with a keyboard.

Five ways to get a restaurant website

The quick verdict: a general builder or self-hosted WordPress costs the least, but you add ordering and reservations from other companies. Restaurant platforms bundle the site with ordering and marketing for $39 to $499 a month in published prices (the $39 plan is Slice, for pizzerias only), and Toast and BentoBox are quote only. The biggest differences are per-order fees and who owns the site when you leave.

1. A general website builder

Wix has free Wix Restaurants apps for menus, orders (pickup, delivery and dine-in) and table reservations. Taking orders needs a plan that accepts payments, and Core, at $29 a month billed yearly, is the first. Wix markets its ordering as “without paying commission”; card processing is extra.

Squarespace has a Menu block that keeps the menu as text, and its help center notes that, unlike PDFs, that text can be indexed by search engines. It has OpenTable and Tock blocks for reservations but no built-in restaurant ordering, so orders come through an extension, a ChowNow page or a link. Core is $29 a month billed yearly ($39 billed monthly).

The trade-off is leaving: Wix scores 3/10 on our exit score and Squarespace 5/10. Our best website builders for restaurants list compares the do-it-yourself options in detail.

2. Self-hosted WordPress

WordPress is free software you run on hosting you choose. Restaurants usually link to or embed an ordering provider, such as ChowNow or Snackpass, plus a reservation widget. Hosting is separate: Bluehost Starter, for example, is $3.99 a month on a 36-month term, then $9.99 a month. You own the files and the database, so WordPress scores 10/10 for leaving.

We build on WordPress every week, so weigh our bias. The downside is upkeep: updates, backups and security are your job or your developer’s. See our WordPress review.

3. The website that comes with your POS

Your point-of-sale (POS) system may already include a website. Square for Restaurants includes Square Online: Square Free is $0 a month per location, Square Plus $49 and Square Premium $149, billed monthly. Online card payments cost 3.3% + 30 cents on Free and 2.9% + 30 cents on Plus or Premium. Square Online scores 2/10 for leaving because the site can’t be downloaded; see our Square Online review.

Toast Websites builds a mobile site that syncs with your Toast POS menu, and Toast Online Ordering promises “No commissions. No hidden fees.” Both are quote only. Toast says its POS pricing starts at $0 a month for new single-location customers.

4. A restaurant website and marketing platform

• Popmenu: $159 to $449 a month prepaid yearly ($179 to $499 billed monthly), setup included, “No contracts.” Online ordering is an add-on with an unpublished monthly price and a flat $1.00 per order. We found no published terms on who owns the site or domain.
• BentoBox: the core platform is quote only; add-ons are published, such as ADA Essentials at $49. Its subscription agreement says BentoBox owns the website and its themes, while your data stays yours.
• Owner.com: Flexible is $249 a month plus 5% per order; Flat Rate is $499 a month. Guests pay a 5% “order support fee” on both plans. It’s month to month, and its agreement requires Owner’s name, logo and link on your site.

5. An ordering company that includes the site

• ChowNow: Launch Lite is $99 a month as a “limited-time offer,” with ordering and an SEO website; card processing is 2.95% + $0.29 per order. Fuller plans show $229 to $449 a month, plus a $119 to $499 setup fee.
• Menufy: $149 a month on a 12-month agreement or $179 month to month, with “no per-order commissions.”
• Slice, for pizzerias only: $39 a month plus $3.00 per card order, or $399 a month plus $2.00 per order and a $1,000 implementation fee. Orders under $10 carry no per-order fee.

The routes side by side

The exit score, out of 10, measures how much of your site comes with you if you switch; see every score in our exit scores tool. The monthly price is only part of the bill, so our restaurant website cost guide adds the domain, email and order fees over three years.

How to make a restaurant website, step by step

1. Decide how you’ll take orders and bookings first. If you already use Square or Toast, start with what your POS offers. If not, compare per-order fees before you pick a site.
2. Register your domain name in your own name, at a registrar you can log in to.
3. Type the menu in as text, with prices, and show any service charge next to the prices.
4. Add hours, address, phone and photos, and match them to your Google Business Profile.
5. Connect ordering and reservations, then place a real test order from your phone.

Restaurant website design that turns visitors into guests

Put ordering one tap away

Make the Order button the first thing a phone visitor sees. If you offer pickup and delivery, label each one. Sqirl in Los Angeles has separate buttons for pickup and delivery, and Joe’s Pizza sends its “ORDER NOW” button to a page where guests pick their shop first.

Keep one menu, in text, up to date

One menu should feed the site, the ordering page and your Google listing. Dino’s Tomato Pie in Seattle shows its menu as a web page plus a short “Quick Menu” on the homepage, with no PDF.

Sell more than tonight’s meal

Gift cards, catering, private events and shipped goods all fit on a restaurant site. Tartine lists special-order cakes with a seven-day lead time, and Lou Malnati’s ships frozen pizza nationwide. See 15 real sites in our best restaurant websites roundup.

The rules your restaurant site has to follow

These are the main US rules for restaurant sites as of October 2026. This is general information, not legal advice; ask a lawyer about your own situation.

Accessibility

The Justice Department’s 2022 guidance says businesses open to the public must make the goods and services they offer online accessible, and it lists barriers such as poor contrast, images without alt text and forms that can’t be used with a keyboard (ADA.gov). For context, in Robles v. Domino’s (2019) the Ninth Circuit held that the ADA applied to Domino’s website and app because they connect to its physical restaurants. The court didn’t decide whether the site complied, and the Supreme Court declined to hear the case (the opinion).

For a restaurant, the usual weak spots are a menu posted only as an image or PDF and a checkout that needs a mouse. Our web accessibility entry covers the basics.

Calories on online menus (chains of 20 or more)

Federal menu labeling covers restaurants in a chain of 20 or more locations under the same name selling substantially the same menu items, plus any that register voluntarily. For them, “menus on the Internet” count. FDA guidance says calories are required on online menus if customers can order online, along with the 2,000-calorie statement and a note that written nutrition information is available on request (21 CFR 101.11).

Fees and service charges in California

Since July 1, 2024, California’s SB 478 requires advertised and listed prices to include all mandatory fees, online and off. SB 1524 lets restaurants keep a mandatory service charge outside the item price only if it is shown clearly and conspicuously, with its purpose, wherever prices appear, which includes online menus and ordering pages. Delivery fees on orders placed directly with you can be listed separately, but the delivery price itself must be all-in (California Attorney General).

The FTC’s federal fees rule, in effect since May 12, 2025, covers only live-event tickets and short-term lodging, not restaurants (FTC). In April 2026 the FTC asked for public comment on fees at online food delivery platforms; whether any rule would reach a restaurant’s own ordering site has not been said.

Card payments

If a PCI-validated ordering provider handles all card data on its own hosted page, you can usually validate PCI compliance with the short SAQ A form, but you still have to do it. Since March 31, 2025, SAQ A also asks you to confirm your site isn’t open to script attacks that could affect payments. Embedding a provider’s checkout in your own pages can move you to the longer SAQ A-EP (PCI SSC).

Texts, reviews and alcohol

• Texts. Autodialed marketing texts need prior express written consent, so a phone field used for promos needs clear consent wording and shouldn’t be required to place an order (FCC).
• Reviews. The FTC rule in effect since October 21, 2024 bans fake or AI-written reviews and rewards that depend on a review being positive (FTC).
• Alcohol to go. Each state sets its own rules. In California, to-go drinks under SB 389 need a meal and a posted open-container notice, including online where needed. The state’s advisory says these allowances end January 1, 2027.

Pre-launch checklist

1. Your domain is registered in your name, at a registrar you control.
2. The contract says who owns the site, the domain and your customer data, and what happens if you cancel.
3. The menu is real text, and prices match the ordering page and the restaurant.
4. Any service charge appears next to prices, with its purpose.
5. A test pickup order and a test delivery order go through on your phone, and someone can finish checkout using only a keyboard.
6. Hours, holiday hours, address and phone match your Google Business Profile.
7. Any text-message sign-up has consent wording and is optional.
8. If you’re replacing an old site, 301 redirects are set up; see our website migration entry.

Getting found after launch

Start with your Google Business Profile: the same hours, address, phone and menu link as your site. In a December 2023 survey by Toast, a restaurant software vendor, of 1,157 US adults, 46% said they check Google Reviews first, and 32% said they always check a restaurant’s website before visiting.

Then steer regulars to your own ordering. Print your ordering link or a QR code on bags, receipts and tables: in the National Restaurant Association’s 2024 report, 59% of tableservice customers said they would view a menu on their phone through a QR code. Over time, text menus, location pages and real photos help your site show up in local searches; our SEO entry covers the basics. Our sister site, SEO PPC Management, covers local SEO.

Where to go next

• How much a restaurant website costs: true 3-year totals, including order fees and a commission vs flat fee example.
• Best restaurant websites: 15 real sites and one idea to copy from each.
• Best website builders for restaurants: our four do-it-yourself picks, ranked.
• Glossary: domain name, web accessibility and website migration.

Website guides for other industries: Real estate, Law firms, Dental, Medical, Therapists, Contractors, Electricians, Schools.