The 7 things a restaurant website has to do in 3 seconds

A hungry person on their phone at 6:47pm has an attention span of about three seconds. Your site either passes the test or they open DoorDash.

**The 3-second test — what has to be visible without scrolling on a phone:**

1. **Restaurant name.** Sounds obvious. Half of independent sites bury it under a giant hero image. 2. **"Order online" button.** Green, huge, above the fold. Not "menu," not "learn more" — "Order online." 3. **Phone number, tappable.** Real `tel:` link. Anyone who calls should be able to tap once. 4. **Hours — right now.** Not "Mon–Fri 11–10." Just "Open until 10pm." Dynamic, updates itself. 5. **Address, tappable to maps.** Real `geo:` or Google Maps link. One tap to directions. 6. **One food photo.** Real photo. Your food. Not stock photography of pasta. 7. **Reserve / waitlist button** — if you take them. Below the fold is fine, but it has to exist.

**What you don't need above the fold:** - A slideshow of hero images. Kills load time, kills conversion. - Your story. Save it for /about. - A newsletter signup modal. This is a hate crime. - A cookie banner that covers 40% of the screen.

**Load speed target:** - Under 2 seconds on 4G. Under 3 on 3G. Google's Core Web Vitals green across the board. - If your site takes 5+ seconds to load, you're losing 40% of clickers before they see anything.

**Mobile is 78% of traffic for a restaurant.** Design mobile-first, always. Then check what it looks like on desktop as a courtesy.

Get the 7 things right and your conversion rate on a phone jumps from single digits to 15–25% of visitors placing an order or hitting the reserve button. That's the whole game.