The restaurant website that only needs five pages

A restaurant website has one main job: to help someone who is thinking about eating with you decide to do it, and then book. Most guests arrive with a few simple questions. What kind of food is this? Where is it? Is it open when I want to go? What does the menu look like? How do I book? A website that answers those questions quickly, on a phone, does its job. One that hides the answers behind slideshows, music, long stories and PDF menus loses guests on the way.

Many restaurant websites are built the other way round. They start with what the venue wants to say, its philosophy, its history, its awards, its gallery, and add the practical information as an afterthought. The result is a site that looks impressive on a designer's screen and frustrates a hungry guest on a phone at six o'clock wondering whether there is a table tonight.

This guide sets out the restaurant website that only needs five pages: home, menu, book, find us, and private dining or events. It explains what each page must do, in the order guests need it, how restaurant website design should serve a phone first, how to put the menu on your website properly, which website pages you can delete without losing a single booking, and the restaurant website mistakes that still cost venues guests.

Guests visit a restaurant website with a short list of questions, usually in a predictable order. First: is this the kind of place I want? Second: what is on the menu, and is there something for everyone in my group? Third: where is it, and is it open when I want to go? Fourth: how do I book? A smaller number want to know about private dining, events, gift cards or jobs.

A good website answers these questions in that order, with as few taps as possible. A guest should be able to see the type of food, the location and the hours, and find the booking button, within seconds of landing on the home page. Everything else is secondary.

That simple list is the basis of the five pages.

The home page should answer the first question, is this the kind of place I want, and point immediately to the next steps. A strong photograph of the food or the room, a single sentence saying what the venue is, the location, today's hours and a prominent booking button are usually enough above the fold on a phone.

Below that, a short introduction, a few photographs, a link to the menu and a reminder of how to book can follow. Keep it short. A home page is a front door, not a brochure.

Avoid putting a slideshow, a video that plays on its own or a pop-up asking for an email address in front of this information. Guests came for answers, not an introduction.

The menu page is often the most visited page on a restaurant website, because the menu is the main thing guests want to see. It should show the current menu, with dishes, short descriptions, prices and dietary information, as a real web page rather than a PDF.

A menu on your website as text loads quickly, reads well on a phone, can be found by search engines and can be updated easily. A PDF does none of these well. Our guide to the menu on your website, not in a PDF explains why in detail.

If you have several menus, such as lunch, dinner, drinks and desserts, put them on the same page with clear section links, or on separate pages linked from one menu page. Keep them current: a menu with dishes that are no longer served frustrates guests who order them.

The booking page is where the website turns interest into a table. It should let guests choose a date, party size and time, see what is available and book in a few taps, with a confirmation straight away. It can be a page on the website with a booking widget, or a link to a booking page on its own address that looks like the venue.

Make the booking button visible on every page, ideally in the same place, so guests never have to look for it. On a phone, it should be reachable without scrolling.

Our guide to online booking on your own site covers how to set up booking from start to finish.

The find us page answers the practical questions: the address, a map, opening hours, how to get there, parking, accessibility, and how to contact the venue. Many guests check it just before leaving home, so it must be accurate and easy to read on a phone.

Write hours as text, not in an image, so they can be read by every guest and by search engines. Include any regular closures and holiday hours. Give clear directions, especially if the entrance is hard to find. Include a phone number that can be tapped to call, and an email address.

Accessibility information, such as step-free access and accessible toilets, helps guests who need it decide with confidence.

The fifth page depends on the venue, but for many it is private dining and events: information for guests planning a celebration, a business dinner or a large group. It describes the spaces available, the number of guests each holds, set menus or packages, and how to enquire or book.

Groups and events are valuable bookings, and organisers need different information from individual guests. A clear page, with photographs of the space and an easy way to enquire, makes it simple for them to choose the venue.

If the venue does not host private events, the fifth page might be about, telling the venue's story briefly, or gift cards. But choose one, and keep it focused.

Many restaurant websites carry pages that bring no bookings and take time to maintain. A news page last updated two years ago, a gallery that repeats the photographs on the home page, a testimonials page of old quotes, a long philosophy page, a separate page for each team member, a blog nobody writes for: each adds clicks, maintenance and the risk of looking out of date.

Delete or merge them. A short paragraph about the venue's story can sit on the home page. The best photographs can sit beside the menu. Testimonials can be replaced by links to reviews. If a page has not been updated in a year and nobody visits it, it is not helping.

A five-page site that is always current is far more useful than a fifteen-page site that is half out of date.

Most guests visit restaurant websites on a phone, often while out, often in a hurry. Restaurant website design should start with the phone and adapt to larger screens, not the other way round. Text should be readable without zooming, buttons large enough to tap, and the booking button always within reach.

Speed matters as much as layout. A site that takes several seconds to load on a mobile connection loses guests before they see anything. Keep images optimised, avoid heavy video and animations, and test the site on a phone, on a mobile connection. Google's guidance on Core Web Vitals is a useful guide to how quickly a page appears and responds.

A responsive design, which rearranges itself for each screen, is the minimum.

Write the website in the venue's voice, but keep it brief and practical. Guests skim. Short paragraphs, clear headings and plain words work better than long, flowing descriptions. Put the most useful information first on every page.

Avoid jargon and vague claims. "The best brunch in the city" tells guests little; "Weekend brunch from 9am, with eggs from a farm in the hills and bread baked here every morning" tells them a lot.

Check the spelling of dish names and prices carefully. Mistakes on a menu page make guests doubt the rest of the site.

A restaurant website should work for every guest, including those who use screen readers, navigate by keyboard or need larger text. Use real text rather than images of text, describe images with alternative text, ensure enough contrast between text and background, and make sure every button and link says what it does.

Accessibility is also good practice for everyone. A site that works well with a screen reader is usually a site that works well on a phone in bright sunlight. The general principles of web accessibility apply to restaurant sites as much as any other.

Photographs do more to sell a restaurant than any words on the website. A few excellent photographs of the food, the room and the team, placed where guests look, are worth more than a gallery of fifty. Choose images that are bright, honest and current: dishes that are on the menu now, the room as it looks today.

Optimise every image for the web, so it loads quickly on a phone. Large, unoptimised photographs are one of the most common reasons restaurant websites are slow. Describe each image with short alternative text, which helps guests using screen readers and helps search engines understand the page.

Refresh the photographs when the menu or the room changes. A website showing last year's dishes sets expectations the kitchen cannot meet.

Some venues need a little more than five pages: a way to buy gift cards, a careers page, a page for a second venue. Add them only when they serve a real purpose, and keep them as simple as the rest of the site.

A gift card link can sit in the footer or on the home page in the run-up to the festive season. A careers page can be a short list of open roles with a way to apply. A second venue can have its own five pages, linked from a simple choice on the home page.

The test for every extra page is the same: does it help a guest, or someone who wants to work with you, do something useful? If not, leave it out.

Many venues pay a designer to build a website and then find it hard to change. Before building, make sure someone at the venue can update the hours, the menu and the photographs themselves, without waiting for the designer. A website that only one external person can edit will drift out of date.

Choose a simple platform, keep a short note of how to make common changes, and give one person at the venue responsibility for keeping it current.

If the website collects personal information, such as names and emails through a contact or sign-up form, or uses cookies for analytics or advertising, it needs a clear privacy notice and, in many places, a way for visitors to agree to cookies. Rules vary by country, so check what applies where you trade.

Keep cookie banners simple and unobtrusive, so they do not hide the booking button or the menu on a phone.

A website is only useful if it is current. Wrong hours, an old menu, a closed event still advertised or a broken booking link all cost bookings and trust. Make someone responsible for the website, and set a simple routine: check the hours, menu, booking link and any events every month, and update them whenever anything changes.

The fewer pages the site has, the easier this is. Five pages can be checked in ten minutes.

The website is not the only place guests look. Many see the venue's Google listing, social profiles and booking platforms first. Make sure the name, address, phone number, hours and booking link are the same everywhere. Inconsistencies confuse guests and search engines.

Link the website from every listing and profile, and link the booking page from the website. Our guide to your Google Business Profile covers the listing many guests see before the website.

A few restaurant website mistakes are still common: music that plays when the page loads, a PDF menu, no visible phone number, hours shown only in an image, a booking button hidden below the fold, pop-ups that cover the page, and slideshows that delay the content. Each one costs some guests.

Our guide to eight restaurant website mistakes, still common covers them one by one, with the fix for each.

A clear, fast, five-page website also helps search. Search engines can read a menu written as text, hours written as text and a clear description of the venue. Pages that answer guests' questions are the pages search engines like to show.

Structured data, a way of labelling information such as the venue's name, address, hours and cuisine so search engines can read it, can help too. Our guide to restaurant SEO covers what actually makes a difference.

Measure the website by bookings, not visits. How many guests who visit the site go on to book? Which pages do they look at first? Where do they leave? Website analytics can show visits and the path through the site; the booking system shows bookings and where they came from.

Look especially at the menu page and the booking page. If many guests view the menu but few book, the path from menu to booking may need to be shorter. If many start a booking but few finish, the booking page needs attention.

Here is an illustrative venue that rebuilt its website. The details are examples.

servearound does not build your website. What it gives the website is the two pages guests use most. The booking page runs in your colours, with your logo and photographs, on its own link or embedded inside your existing site, with the allowed domains set per venue, so a booking button on every page can open it directly. The digital menu is a live web page rather than a PDF, so the menu page can link to a menu that is always current, with dietary and allergen information.

When a venue publishes them, its booking page and menu page can be found by search engines. See Campaigns, or get in touch to see how it would fit your site.

Five is enough for most: home, menu, book, find us, and private dining or events.

No. A menu written as a web page loads faster, reads better on a phone and can be found by search engines.

On every page, in the same place, visible without scrolling on a phone.

Only if someone will keep it current. An out-of-date news page does more harm than good.

Check it monthly, and update it whenever the hours, menu or events change.

A faster, clearer website with an easy path to booking usually does. Measure bookings before and after any change.

Yes. Guests want to know what to expect before they book. A menu with prices helps them choose, and avoids surprises at the table.

Not necessarily. A group can use one site with a simple choice of venue on the home page, as long as each venue has its own menu, hours, location and booking button.

Yes. Social profiles depend on platforms whose rules change, and many guests and search engines still look for a website with the menu, hours and booking in one place. The website is the one place online that the venue fully controls.

The restaurant website that works best is often the simplest: five pages, home, menu, book, find us, and private dining or events, answering what guests came for in the order they need it. Design for the phone first, keep pages fast and readable, put the menu on your website as a real page, and make the booking button visible everywhere.

Delete website pages that nobody updates, avoid the restaurant website mistakes that still cost bookings, keep details consistent with your listings, and check the site every month. Measure it by bookings, not visits, and let every page lead towards a table.