12 Best Apps for Busy Restaurant Owners

Running a restaurant is no walk in the park — there’s a lot to keep track of: reservations, ingredients and customer demands that can leave even the most seasoned restaurateurs feeling overwhelmed.

Luckily, there are a few apps that can do handy things, like: 

• Manage waitlists and reservations
• Make inventory organization and food cost calculation more convenient
• Assist with employee scheduling, and plan out your social media posts  

Below, I’ll go over 12 popular apps for busy restaurant owners that can help you give you more time to focus on increasing your sales.   

1. OpenTable

Managing your reservations manually can be frustrating and a big time cost. However, OpenTable can be a game-changer for your restaurant and help make reservations more manageable. It automates reservation management, freeing up valuable time you’d otherwise spend manually handling bookings.

‍

With optimized seating features, the app can help you squeeze every last bit of potential out of your restaurant space. OpenTable also provides valuable insights into what your customers love so you can serve up exactly what they're craving and tweak your marketing game to keep them coming back for more.

GetApp Score: 4.7 (1.2K reviews)

• Pro: “The ease and organization of reservations is impeccable and there are so many brilliant features like adding notes to clients and their bookings so you can easily remember birthdays/anniversaries etc.”
• Con: “A few miscommunication errors at times between restaurants and OpenTable.”

2. Hootsuite

Interested in stepping up your social media game? Social media marketing is a very helpful tool for restaurants, and as a busy restaurant owner, you can benefit from an app that could automate it. 

This is where Hootsuite steps in. Hootsuite helps you manage and schedule content across multiple social media platforms — all on one dashboard. You can schedule posts in advance, monitor engagement and track analytics. With this app, you can save so much time planning your content so you can focus on what really matters — running your restaurant. 

 GetApp Score: 4.4 (3.6K reviews)

• Pro: “I love that I can save drafts and schedule easily. This makes my social media strategy clear and streamlined with the ability to plan ahead.”
• Con: “There are times that the software has been a little buggy for us. Sometimes images fail to upload or content fails to post due to errors.”

3. 7Shifts 

Looking to save time on creating employee schedules? 7Shifts is the perfect app to make this easier for you. Employees can easily check their schedules, ask for time off and chat with their managers — all from their phones. 

The cool part? It's all about making restaurant scheduling less of a headache. By using this app, you can smooth out your restaurant operations, creating happier customers and happier staff. 

‍

Also, this app has a free trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for your restaurant before committing to it. 

 GetApp Score: 4.7 (1.1K reviews)

• Pro: “I love how easy everything is to use. I love being notified when my schedule has been posted and as someone who used to make the schedule each week, making and publishing schedules is easy as well.”
• Con: “I find it hard to mark someone sick in the mobile version.”

4. Evernote

Evernote is a versatile note-taking app that can help you stay organized and productive as a busy restaurant owner. You can use it to: 

• Capture ideas
• Create to-do lists
• Store important information all in one place
• Jot down menu and recipe ideas
• Keep track of supplier contacts
• Snap photos of inspiration for decor or dishes

I’m a fan of Evernote’s seamless syncing across devices, as well as how important notes can be accessible at anytime, anywhere, whether you're in the kitchen, on the go or at your desk. Plus, you can share and collaborate on notes, keeping your team on the same page and boosting efficiency.

GetApp Score: 4.4 (8.1K reviews)

• Pro: “I like how it makes it easy to just forward and share notes with the team, how fast and reliable is. It reminds me of passing notes in class without the teacher noticing, to be honest.”
• Con: “The only complaint I have about Evernote Business is that it's expensive.” 

5. Sortly

Sortly can help you organize and create a detailed inventory of your kitchen supplies, ingredients and equipment. You can also add photos with descriptions, plus assign categories or tags to items, making items easier to find. 

With Sortly, restaurant owners can track stock levels, monitor usage and streamline their ordering process. It's a versatile tool that can help keep a restaurant's back-of-house operations running smoothly and save time managing inventory.

GetApp Score: 4.6 (469 reviews)

• Pro: “Sortly is very easy to use, the barcode scanner is very simple and it does amazing keeping track of inventory. Their help desk is amazing (not that we have needed to use it more than once).”
• Con: “The software is missing an option for filtering items through multiple tags. Right now, we can select a single tag for filtering.”

6. Bonusly

I’m all about showing your employees some love and giving a shoutout to those who go above and beyond, and Bonusly is a great app for giving props to your team. With Bonusly, you can make sure everyone feels valued and highlight those superstar team members who truly shine. 

‍

That way, you can help your employees feel more engaged and empowered, which will translate into better business results. 

GetApp Score: 4.8 (1.5K reviews)

• Pro: “It makes employees very happy to be praised in front of their teammates and everyone tries to perform well in order to get recognized. We have made it part of our Performance Management System.”
• Con: “Don't think you should lose the points you don't use at the end of the month.”

7. BlueCart

If you want to simplify the ordering process with vendors, BlueCart could be a great app for you. BlueCart is the ultimate ordering assistant for busy restaurant owners. This app assists with things like placing orders with suppliers, managing inventory and tracking deliveries. 

Flip through catalogs from your go-to suppliers, create and send orders in just a few taps, and sit back while BlueCart handles the rest — including sending you real-time updates on your orders and deliveries.

Plus, its inventory management features help you track stock levels and reduce waste so you always have the fresh ingredients you need on hand. 

GetApp Score: 4.2 (30 reviews)

• Pro: “I love how I can make “favorites” so that the things I order often are in one place- makes it super quick to place our order.”
• Con: “Some orders either don't get sent or don't get processed. We had a few of them missing. It's rare but it happened.”

8. Feedly

As a restaurant owner, knowing what’s new in the restaurant and food scene is crucial to staying on top of the competition. 

‍Feedly can help you access content from various sources like blogs, news sites, YouTube channels and podcasts in one easy-to-access feed. You can even curate what you want to see by subscribing to your favorite publications and topics, helping you stay up to date. 

GetApp Score: 4.9 (37 reviews)

• Pro: “I've had a very good experience using Feedly and I would recommend it to anyone who needs to be on top of what is happening for whatever their business is.”
• Con: “At the beginning, I found it slightly confusing to set up and differentiate my news list. However, I quickly learnt the process and was on my way.”

9. Owner.com 

We did the research — 80% of your regulars want apps from the restaurants they love, and 1 in 2 will download your app. With Owner.com, you can create your own branded mobile app to wow your customers. Plus, customers who install restaurant apps will order 60% more frequently than those who don’t. 

‍

Having your own branded app for your restaurant can help you increase your sales, and Owner.com can help do this for you and save you time. We provide restaurant owners with the ability to create an app that features a: 

• Streamlined online ordering system
• Automated email and text capabilities to send out promotion alerts
• Built-in loyalty rewards program to keep customers coming back. 

Just check out how Owner.com helped Timirie Shibley, the owner over at Doo-Dah Diner: 

“We’ve more than doubled our direct online sales since starting. I didn’t think having our own app would work, but our regulars love it and use it constantly."

GetApp Score: 4.9 (45 reviews)

• Pro: “[Owner.com] has greatly improved our online presence and marketing ability. They have great sites, built us our own app and send us great flyers to market our business to our customers.”
• Con: “We have been slowly trying to add photos of our food but it's hard to get them to all look the same so the website can look a bit sloppy.”

10. Partender

Partender simplifies inventory management for bars and restaurants, with a focus on tracking beverage inventory. Bartenders can quickly and accurately take stock inventory by scanning bottles with their smartphones. 

The app then does the heavy lifting to calculate usage and costs, and it suggests ordering quantities, saving time and reducing the risk of errors. It's a handy tool if you have a bar in your restaurant and you’re looking to streamline your operations and improve efficiency.

App Store Preview: 4.4 (183 reviews)

• Pro: “I can see trends so easily that allows us to perform with better guest service ideas based on popularity and demand. Menu changes are made easy as well with perfect numbers to roll out our new programs annually. Partender didn’t just reduce our labors at the bar programs but provided us with a great piece of mind.”
• Con: “It didn’t connect to our POS.”

11. BevSpot

BevSpot is a handy app that simplifies inventory management for bars and restaurants. It can help you: 

• Monitor usage and food costs
• Track beverage inventory
• Monitor and place orders with suppliers
• Generate reports to gain insights into their beverage program's performance

Plus, you can access the app from anywhere with an internet connection.

With BevSpot, you can also create recipes and track the cost percentage and price changes in ingredients automatically. From there, you can connect your POS platform to upload your new recipes to craft a profitable and creative menu. 

Capterra Score: 4.5 (2 reviews)

• Pro: “We’ve used this web app for years and it’s really helped us save time and be more precise.”
• Con: “It would be great if the program could be plugged directly into our POS system for quick, item-level analysis, but as of this writing the item-by-item analysis has to be sent in and waited on.”

To learn more about how to calculate food costs and improve your bottom line, check out my video below: 

12. Chowly

‍Chowly is the ultimate middleman for your restaurant's tech setup. It's an app that seamlessly integrates all your different third-party ordering platforms — like Uber Eats and Grubhub — right into your existing POS. So, instead of juggling multiple tablets and systems, Chowly brings everything together in one place, making your order delivery management a whole lot easier.

Capterra Score: 2.8 (24 reviews)

• Pro: “The ability to directly insert orders into our online ordering system instead of having restaurant workers transfer orders coming in from tablets to the POS system. The manual entry not only takes time but also introduces many human errors. Chowly eliminates these errors.”
• Con: “This "service" can take up to ten minutes from the time the order hits the GrubHub app to the time it prints in the kitchen.”

What To Look for in an App

When you're scouting for a mobile app to level up your game and help make your day-to-day less busy, keep an eye out for these game-changers:

• User-friendly: Look for an app that's as easy to use as your favorite kitchen gadget. You want something intuitive that you won’t need too much time to figure out.
• Time-saving features: Your app needs to be able to help take the load off of your busy schedule. Think about what tasks eat up your time the most — managing reservations, tracking orders or keeping tabs on inventory — and find an app that can easily handle them.‍
• Seamless syncing and integration: Your restaurant's systems should be like a well-oiled machine, and your app needs to fit right into the mix. Make sure it integrates with your existing tools, like your POS or inventory software, so everything stays in sync without any headaches.‍
• Support on speed dial: You never know when you might need backup. Choose an app that offers reliable customer support so you can get help pronto if anything goes wrong.‍
• Positive reviews: Like the ones above, reviews can tell you a lot about an app. Be sure to check these out beforehand to get an idea of what customers are saying about it.

Why Not Drive Sales With Your Own Custom App?

With the right app, you can save more time as a busy restaurant owner and make your operations more efficient. With apps taking over some of the heavy work, you can focus on other business needs and growing your sales. 

If you’re looking to build a mobile app for your restaurant, try out a demo of Owner.com to see how we can help you attract more customers and drive more sales.