A restaurant website that skips the commission
Delivery apps take a cut of every order and keep your customer. Your own website shows the menu, the food and the hours — and takes orders directly, so the margin stays yours.
By Manan Agrawal, Founder · Updated October 28, 2026
A restaurant website is how you stop renting your regulars from the delivery apps. It needs a menu people can read on a phone, your hours and address up front, and a direct way to order or call. On SitesPlaced you build it free from a photo of your menu, take orders at 0% commission, and add your own domain from ₹199 a month.
Why restaurants and cafés need a website in 2026
Most small restaurants live inside Swiggy, Zomato and a Google listing. Those bring footfall, but they take a heavy cut, keep most of your customer data, and put you one swipe away from every competitor. A website is the one channel where a regular finds you directly and orders without a middleman.
- ✓Restaurants say the apps take roughly 20–30% per order (NRAI to the Competition Commission of India, as reported by Moneylife). Every direct order is margin you keep.
- ✓People check your menu and hours before they visit. A clear site stops the “are they open?” doubt that sends them elsewhere.
- ✓You own the relationship: phone numbers, repeat orders and WhatsApp regulars, not an app’s dashboard.
- ✓Your food photos do the selling, in your layout, not squeezed into the app’s.
- ✓Cloud kitchens and home bakers need a home base most, because there’s no shopfront to walk past.
- ✓An order button or a WhatsApp button means a hungry visitor can act in one tap, day or night.
What a great restaurant website should include
A restaurant site should make someone hungry and tell them exactly how to order or visit. Include:
- ✓A full, current menu with prices, and photos of your signature dishes.
- ✓Hours, address with a Google Maps link, and a phone number that’s tap-to-call on a phone.
- ✓A direct way to order online, plus a WhatsApp button for people who prefer to message.
- ✓A call or WhatsApp button for table bookings, if you take them.
- ✓Your delivery area, delivery charge and minimum order, so there are no surprises at checkout.
- ✓A line on what makes you you — wood-fired, pure veg, Himachali home food, single-origin coffee, open till 2am.
What SitesPlaced gives a restaurant today
Menu from a photo
Upload a photo or PDF of your printed menu. Dishes and prices are read in for you, sorted into sections. Add photos later.
Online orders, 0% commission
UPI and cards into your own Razorpay, PhonePe or Cashfree account, or cash on delivery. No cut per order on any plan.
WhatsApp orders
Customers can send their cart to your WhatsApp as a ready-made message with every dish and the total.
Delivery and pause
A delivery charge, free delivery above an amount, a minimum order — and one switch to pause ordering when the kitchen is full.
Table bookings tab
Record phone, WhatsApp and walk-in table bookings, see seats taken per time slot, and mark guests seated or no-show.
Loyalty on Growth
A QR stamp card at the counter that fills on the customer’s phone. No app, no OTP. Online orders add stamps too.
SitesPlaced Hospitality: cafés, restaurants and stays in one dashboard
SitesPlaced Hospitality, launched on 28 October 2026, brings the places people eat and stay onto one dashboard. In the Venue tab you choose what you run — a café, a restaurant or a homestay — and the dashboard gives you the tabs that fit: orders and table bookings for food, and rooms, a calendar and a booking engine for stays. Free on every plan, with 0% commission.
- ✓The whole picture, including homestays and guesthouses: SitesPlaced Hospitality.
- ✓Commission maths against the apps, and how ordering works step by step: online ordering system for restaurants.
- ✓The menu, hours, Google listing and the stamp card for a café: café website builder.
What isn’t built yet
A few things restaurants ask for aren’t built yet: QR ordering from the table, a kitchen display screen or KOT printing, and guests booking a table on the website themselves. Dedicated restaurant and café templates are also on the way; today restaurants start on the General Store or Food Store template. None of this stops you taking delivery and takeaway orders on your own website today, at 0% commission — which is where most of the money the apps take comes from.
Take orders directly and keep the margin the apps would take
The sum is simple. On a ₹500 order, a 25% commission is ₹125 gone before you’ve paid for ingredients. Do a few hundred orders a month and that’s rent. Your own website won’t replace the apps overnight, but every regular you move to order direct — online, on WhatsApp or by phone — keeps that money in the till.
Keep the menu easy to update, because nothing annoys a customer more than ordering a dish you stopped making. On SitesPlaced you change the special, hide a sold-out dish or update a price yourself, from your phone, between rushes.
Photos do the heavy lifting. A dim phone snap of biryani won’t sell; a bright one shot near a window will. Spend an afternoon photographing your top ten dishes in daylight, and let those images lead the menu.
How to build your restaurant website (no coding)
Photograph your menu
Upload a photo or PDF of your printed menu. The dishes and prices are read in and sorted into sections.
Pick a template
Start on the General Store or the Food Store, or the Grocery Store for a long delivery menu. Add your logo and colours.
Add hours, address and contact
Write your timings and address on the home and Contact pages, with your phone and WhatsApp number.
Turn on ordering
Connect your Razorpay, PhonePe or Cashfree account, switch on cash on delivery or WhatsApp orders, and set your delivery charge.
Publish and share
Go live free on a sitesplaced address. Add the link to your Instagram bio and your Google Business Profile. Your own domain is on Starter.
Templates to start from
Pick one, make it yours and publish. Each shows your menu with prices and photos and takes orders through the same checkout. Open a demo to see it live.
Restaurants start hereGeneral Store
Clean and simple, with colour themes to match your restaurant. The quickest to fill in from a menu photo.
View live demo
FoodFood Store
Laid out like The Whole Truth. A giant type headline instead of a banner photo, colourful category cards, and pack sizes right on the product card.
View live demo
GroceryGrocery Store
A dense product grid with one-tap add, like a delivery app. Suits a long delivery menu or a cloud kitchen.
View live demoWays to put a restaurant online, compared
| SitesPlaced | Restaurant POS suite | Delivery apps only | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Your own website with your menu | Yes, free | In a paid tier | No — a listing inside the app |
| Commission per order | 0% | Paid plans instead | Roughly 20–30% |
| Brings new customers | You bring them | You bring them | Yes — the app’s reach |
| Counter billing, QR table ordering, kitchen screen | Not yet | Yes, in paid tiers | No |
| Cost to start | Free | From ₹12,000 (base POS, ex-tax) | Commission on each order |
POS figures: Petpooja’s pricing page, ex-tax, as listed in Oct 2026 (QR ordering and a kitchen display in a ₹20,000 tier; its ordering website in a ₹20,000 marketing tier). Commission: NRAI to the CCI, as reported by Moneylife. Terms change; check before you sign.
A POS suite is the right buy if you run a busy dining room and need billing, QR ordering at the table and a kitchen screen. The delivery apps are worth keeping for new customers. But if what you need is a website with your menu that takes orders at 0% commission, SitesPlaced is the simplest place to start: free, no coding, live the same day.
Build your restaurant website free
Upload a photo of your menu, pick a template and publish — with online orders, UPI, cash on delivery and WhatsApp orders built in, at 0% commission. Your own domain is from ₹199 a month.
Start with a photo of my menu →Free to publish. 0% commission on every plan. No card needed.
Frequently asked questions
Do restaurants need a website when they’re already on Swiggy and Zomato?
Yes. The delivery apps bring new customers, but restaurants say they take roughly 20–30% of each order (NRAI’s complaint to the Competition Commission of India, as reported by Moneylife) and keep most of the customer relationship. A website is where your regulars can see the menu and order direct, at 0% commission on SitesPlaced, with their phone number staying with you.
What should a restaurant website include?
A current menu with prices and photos of your best dishes, your hours and address with a map link, a tap-to-call button and a WhatsApp button, a way to order online, your delivery area and charges, and a line on what makes you different. Keep it readable on a phone; most visitors arrive from Instagram or Google Maps.
Can guests book a table on my restaurant website?
Not on SitesPlaced yet. Guests can’t book a table on the website by themselves today. Add a call button and a WhatsApp button so people can ask, and record each booking in the Table bookings tab, which shows the seats taken in every time slot for the next 14 days.
Can I take online orders without an aggregator?
Yes. On SitesPlaced your menu is an ordering website. Customers pay by UPI or card into your own Razorpay, PhonePe or Cashfree account, choose cash on delivery, or send their cart to your WhatsApp. There’s no commission on any plan; your payment gateway charges its own fee on online payments.
How much does a restaurant website cost?
It can be free. On SitesPlaced you build and publish your restaurant website free, with unlimited dishes and orders and 0% commission, on a free sitesplaced address with a small badge. Starter (₹199/month) adds your own domain and removes the badge. Growth (₹499/month) adds the loyalty stamp card, reviews and the sales boosters.
Does a cloud kitchen or home bakery need a website too?
Especially. With no shopfront, your website is the shop. It’s where people see your menu and food, and where repeat customers order direct instead of finding you again inside a crowded delivery app.
Which is better — a restaurant POS like Petpooja, or SitesPlaced?
If you need billing at the counter, QR table ordering and a kitchen display today, a POS suite is the right tool — Petpooja lists its base POS at ₹12,000 and QR ordering with a kitchen display in a ₹20,000 tier (ex-tax, as listed in Oct 2026). If what you need is a website with your menu and online orders at 0% commission, SitesPlaced is the better and cheaper choice: free to publish, live the same day.
