Walk-ins vs reservations: how to split your floor and fill every seat

Weighing up walk-ins versus reservations is something most establishments have to contend with. Sure, there are purely walk-in or no-reservations restaurants out there that don't have to worry about it. But if you're not one of those, getting this split right can save you a lot of headaches and lost revenue.

Getting it wrong costs you in both directions. Book too much and you're turning couples away at the door while a no-show's four-top sits empty. Book too little and a Friday depends on who happens to walk past.

“The key is reserving about 60% to 70% of the restaurant, never 100%,” writes one restaurateur on r/restaurant¹. The remaining 30-40% is left for walk-ins. But it's not always as simple as this, with some diners taking longer than others and some walk-ins having to join a waitlist.

This guide is primarily for venue managers who run the floor or anyone interested in how to best split your floor and fill every seat. It focuses on a 60-seat room table by table, the turnover maths behind seating times, and how to queue walk-ins once you're full.

Key takeaways

• Most of this guide is about three decisions: how much of the room to book, how long each booking holds a table, and how to handle walk-ins when you're full.
• A common starting split is 60% to 70% booked, with large tables booked and two-tops near the door held. Adjust by shift once you have data.
• Seating times matter as much as the split. Too long and tables sit empty; too short and booked guests wait at the door.
• me&u Reservations includes table management, shifts and availability rules, plus Quick Dine, which offers shorter seatings to fill the gaps between bookings. This can help you better strategise your walk-ins vs reservations split.

Why venues take both walk-ins and reservations

Bookings tell you roughly how many covers are coming, so you can roster and prep to match. Walk-ins bring the spontaneous trade a booked-out room can't catch.

Guests split along the same line. Almost half (49%) of 827 UK diners surveyed said they book dinner a week or more ahead². In the US, only 12% of 850 adults told Toast they always book dinner, and over half rarely or never do. Even bookers leave it late: 45% of reservations on Toast's platform in Q3 2024 were for the same day³.

A fully booked room turns away every guest who decides at 6pm. A room with no bookings loses the dinners and special events planned a week out. While some establishments operate on a walk-ins only or bookings only approach, many try to find the balance between both. This way they can cover as many guests as possible and limit the damage from no-shows.

“There is an age-old debate in the restaurant world on reservations. Do you offer reservations only or no-reservation or something in between? A simple truth is that a percentage, unless you take a 100% deposit, of your reservations will be no-shows. No-shows end up costing you money for lost capacity,” says restaurateur Ross Boardman on Quora⁴. “If you can mop up your no-shows with other bookings or walk-in guests, then that is ideal.”

How to set your walk-ins vs reservations split

Start with a target, then test it. One restaurant operator on Reddit describes their approach like this:

“The key is reserving about 60% to 70% of the restaurant, never 100% and we allow walk-ins. When we're full, walk-ins go on a wait list and the longest a reservation waits is under five minutes; they take precedence over walk-ins. Knowing that our guests on average stay just under an hour, we book 60% to 70% of the restaurant in 1hr 15min intervals, leaving the rest of the restaurant as a buffer.”
Reddit user Zone_07, r/restaurant¹

Your restaurant table layout matters as much as the percentage. So here's what that split looks like in a 60-seat casual dining room with 18 tables.

A few choices sit behind that split:

1. Large tables go to bookings - This is because groups of five or more tend to plan ahead. There's also less risk of your venue losing revenue because a six-top held empty for a walk-in costs you a lot more than a two-top.
2. Two-tops near the door and bar stay free for walk-ins - Small parties are the easiest to seat at short notice. You can also seat your walk-ins at the bar while they wait for a larger table or a better-positioned table to become free.

It's important to adapt as you learn diner habits and the ebbs and flows of your local area throughout the week.

As one Reddit user⁵ puts it: “When all is said and done, deciding to take reservations is just a calculation. You try to figure out how many people would eat at the restaurant only if they could guarantee a table in advance. You also try to figure out how many potential customers won't eat there or will have to wait due to holding reserved tables.”

Treat 63% as your opening number. If the held tables are still empty at 7:30pm every Tuesday, give two or three of them back to bookings for that night going forward. If you're turning couples away at 8pm on Fridays, hold more two-tops for walk-ins.

It's very hard to keep track of this data unless someone is logging walk-ins as well as bookings. This isn't always possible for someone to do manually, especially on busy shifts. Fortunately, a restaurant reservation system does that as part of its service, giving you valuable data to make strategic walk-ins vs reservations splits.

If you're struggling to keep track of this with a paper diary and feel like you're making decisions in the dark, it might be time to ask the question: do you need a reservation system?

Seating times and table turn: the numbers that decide your split

The split falls apart if tables don't become available or occupied as planned. The longer tables stay empty or the longer you have to turn away walk-ins, the more revenue you lose. This is determined by two main elements:

1. Seating time - How long a booking holds the table (e.g. 90 minutes for four people on a Friday night).
2. Table turn - The complete dining cycle, beginning from the moment a party sits down and ending when they leave your venue after eating and paying.

Working out your table turnover

You can work out your venue's efficiency by determining your total table turnover. This is how many of those dining cycles each table did in a service.

Table turnover = parties served ÷ number of tables

Let's use the 60-seat room from earlier as an example. On a single shift, it had 18 tables and 45 parties through the door.

45 parties served ÷ 18 tables = 2.5x table turnover

Toast quotes Performance Foodservice figures of roughly three turns over dinner for family restaurants and one to two for fine dining⁶. So in the above example, the 60-seat room is performing above average, unless it's a family restaurant.

Different venues, different table turnover rates

Your venue type often determines your average table turnover. It also affects how you manage your walk-ins vs reservations split with your table layout.

For example, pubs with a bistro can usually hold half the floor or more for walk-ins, because the bar catches the overflow. Casual dining spots fit the 60% to 70% model, with seatings of 75 to 90 minutes. Fine dining restaurants tend to book close to every seat, since the menu sets how long each table takes.

Check seating times against reality every few weeks. Seating times that are too short or too long can significantly impact venue revenue. If a four-top keeps sitting empty for 20 minutes between bookings, you're losing money. If you keep having to turn away walk-ins while your 7pm bookings finish their dinner or dessert, you're also losing money.

Adjust by day of the week and by party size; our guide to how a reservation platform works shows where those availability rules live. me&u's Quick Dine feature is designed to minimise those gaps as much as possible. When a table has an hour free between two bookings, Quick Dine can offer it as a shorter seating, so it takes another party instead of sitting empty.

Handling the queue: waitlists and standby

Even a good split leaves you full some nights. Nearly one in three of 1,000 US diners told Lightspeed they'd walked out of a restaurant because of a long wait⁷. The survey doesn't separate waiting for a table from waiting for food, but either way it's a lost party and lost revenue.

Using a restaurant waitlist for walk-ins

A restaurant waitlist records walk-ins who are waiting for a table and texts them when one is ready. Guests like it: 45% of diners in Toast's survey said they'd be more likely to eat somewhere with an online or restaurant waitlist app³.

It's a no-brainer why this appeals. Guests can browse nearby shops, grab a drink, stroll through a park or, if they live nearby, wait at home for their table to be ready. Just remember a waitlist is only one part of the equation.

Guests on a waitlist also need an estimated time when a table will be free. Otherwise they might become frustrated with the lack of communication or, with no clear time given, decide to go somewhere else.

Staff can sometimes estimate wait times using their own experience. But this isn't always accurate (another potential source of guest frustration). Platforms like me&u Reservations help by using stored data to determine more accurate wait times.

Using standby for excess reservations

Standby works for bookings. Any guest who wants a table at a fully booked time can be added to a standby list. The first person on that list gets the table if someone cancels.

This can minimise any revenue lost from late cancellations. You can also make those late cancellations rarer with a clear cancellation policy and fee shown when guests first book.

There are four main rules for a full room:

1. Quote honest wait times - A guest told 15 minutes who then waits 35 may not come back.
2. Bookings take priority - As in the Reddit example at the start of this article, so a booked guest doesn't wait long at the door.
3. Offer the bar while people wait - Otherwise guests waiting may go grab a drink at a bar nearby instead of spending money at your venue.
4. Keep bookings and the waitlist in one reservation system - Two lists mean two people guessing which table is free, which can lead to double bookings or empty tables.

When to go walk-in only or bookings only

Some venues are better off picking one.

A no-reservations restaurant works when you turn tables fast and demand is steady. Cafes, counter-service spots and busy beachside venues often suit this approach. However, the pressure point moves from the door to the counter, so you need to ensure diners are completing their table turn cycle as efficiently as possible.

The Boathouse Group cut a 45-minute ordering queue to zero by moving to QR ordering. That saved space eventually became seating, increasing their PAX and ability to turn tables over faster.

“Ordering through Boathouse venues used to be a major hurdle to overcome,” Head of Projects and Facilities, Sam Cousens, said in the case study. “This whole space we're sitting in used to be a line-up point. There was a main till, and a queue would form through here and out the door.”

The bookings-only approach tends to suit fine dining, set menus and very small rooms more. These are typically where an empty seat costs a lot. Even then, a standby list helps fill late cancellations. Listen to our No Tables Left webinar (episode 2) to learn how venues can better book out a room from first service to last.

All other venues typically sit in the middle. If that's you, the job is getting the split right for each shift. Take a closer look at how me&u's restaurant reservation software helps you handle table management, shifts and availability rules to increase your venue's efficiency.

Frequently asked questions

What percentage of tables should be reserved?

Somewhere between 60% and 70% is a common start for casual restaurants, which is what a venue operator recommended on r/restaurant¹. However this percentage will differ depending on your venue type. Some venues can operate purely on walk-ins while others want all tables reserved. If you're unsure, start somewhere in the 60-70% ballpark and adapt as you learn what works best for your venue and location. This may take a few weeks or months, but eventually you'll be able to find the right percentage.

How long should a table booking be?

For a casual dinner, 75 to 90 minutes is common for a couple. Table bookings can increase to two or three hours when there's a group. The more people dining, the longer the booking. Large parties over 12 people can often take over three hours to vacate a table. But it also depends on what they order. This is why fine dining venues set the table booking length by the number of courses.

How do restaurants manage walk-ins when fully booked?

Put them on a waitlist, give them a straight answer on the wait time and text them when a table's ready. People with bookings still get seated first. If you've got a bar, send anyone on the waitlist there for a pre-meal drink. Or recommend an affiliated venue within reasonable walking distance where they can grab a drink while they wait.

What is a good table turnover rate?

There isn't one number. Toast, quoting Performance Foodservice, puts family restaurants at about three turns across dinner and fine dining at one to two⁶. The useful comparison is your own: this Friday against last Friday. A table reservation platform that logs every seating does that sum for you.