A Menu & Photo Checklist Before Your Restaurant Website Goes Live

A restaurant website is often the first thing a hungry customer checks before deciding where to eat. If the menu is outdated or the photos look generic, that decision gets made somewhere else. Before you launch or relaunch, run through this checklist.

Check every price on the menu against what's actually charged in-house. Nothing frustrates a customer more than showing up expecting one price and paying another. If prices change seasonally or with supply costs, note who on your team is responsible for updating the site each time they do.

Confirm every dish listed is actually available. Seasonal items, discontinued dishes, and specials that ended months ago are common culprits. If something is only available at certain times (weekend brunch, holiday specials), label it clearly instead of leaving it in the regular menu.

Replace stock photography with real photos of your actual food, plated the way you serve it. Stock images are easy to spot and they set expectations your kitchen may not match. Even simple phone photos taken in good light tend to build more trust than a polished stock shot of a dish you don't serve.

If your kitchen handles allergens or dietary restrictions, say so clearly and accurately. List common allergens (nuts, gluten, dairy, shellfish) per dish where possible, and mark vegetarian, vegan, or gluten-free options. Getting this wrong isn't just a trust issue, it can be a safety issue for customers with real allergies.

Test the menu on a phone, not just a desktop browser. Most people looking up a restaurant are doing it on their phone, often while deciding where to go right now. A menu that requires pinching and zooming, or that hides items behind slow-loading PDFs, will lose people before they finish reading it.

Avoid uploading your menu as a PDF or image file if you can help it. These are hard to read on small screens, don't update easily, and are often skipped entirely by search engines. A menu built as actual web text is easier to update, easier to read, and easier for customers to find through search.

Double-check contact details, hours, and location links. Confirm your hours match what's listed on Google and social media, and that your address links correctly to maps. Inconsistent hours across platforms is one of the more common reasons people show up to a closed restaurant.

If you take online orders or reservations, test the entire flow yourself from a phone before launch. Place a test order or booking and see where friction shows up, whether that's a confusing button, a broken form, or a payment step that doesn't load properly.

Coreventra builds and maintains restaurant websites, including menu structure, photo presentation, and mobile usability, and can help you work through this list before you go live.