Does a restaurant or café still need its own website?

Say it up front

We build and sell small websites, so we have a reason to say yes. Read the rest with that in mind. We have tried to list the cases where you do not need one as honestly as the cases where you do.

What a Google listing and a Facebook page already do

• A Google Business Profile puts you on the map with hours, a phone number, photos and reviews. For a walk-in business this is the most important thing you can set up, and it is free.
• A Facebook or Instagram page is good for announcing specials and showing the food.
• Both let you reach people who are already looking at that platform.

For some businesses that is enough, and a website would add little.

What they do not do

• You do not control them. Profiles get merged, flagged or edited by others, and a platform can change what it shows or charge to show it.
• The facts go stale in several places. Hours and menus change, and each profile is another place to forget.
• Social pages often ask people to log in or sign up, and a menu posted as a photo cannot be read by search engines or AI assistants.
• Delivery and ordering apps put their own page between you and the customer. That can be worth it for the orders, but it is their page, not yours.
• AI assistants and search engines read websites more readily than they read a social feed. A business with no site gives them less to quote, and they may say it has none.

What a small restaurant site needs

Less than most quotes include. A one- to three-page site that does these well is enough:

• Your name, address, phone number and hours, as text, on the front page.
• The menu as real text, not only a photo or a PDF, so people and software can read it.
• A clear way to order or book: a phone number to tap, or a link to the system you already use.
• A few honest photos of the food and the room.
• Structured data for your name, address and hours (see how to add LocalBusiness schema markup).

Skip, until you have a reason: a blog, a chat widget, animations, and a booking system you will not look at.

When you probably do not need one

• You are a food truck or pop-up whose location changes daily and who lives on one social account.
• You are full every night, entirely on walk-ins, and your Google profile is current.

Even then, keep the Google profile accurate. It does most of the work.

If you want one

You can build one yourself on any site builder, and the checklist above works for that. If you would rather not, our Techne Starter plan is $49/month: we build it, host it and keep it up, you cancel any time, and the domain is registered in your name. The pricing page has the exact terms, including when the built site becomes yours. Not sure where you stand? Run the free check and a person will tell you what an AI assistant finds when it looks for you.