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Covered vs OpenTable · UK 2026

OpenTable charges you to meet your own customers. We don’t.

Flat £49 a month. Zero per-cover fees. Your customer list is yours to export on the day you sign up — or the day you leave.

Get started — £49/monthSee pricing
0%
per-cover fees, forever · you keep 100% of direct bookings
The numbers

Side by side, no hedging.

Covered claims are the live product as of 2026. OpenTable figures come from publicly discussed independent-restaurant contracts — your actual terms may differ.

Feature
OpenTable
Covered
Monthly platform cost
Typical indie contracts: £200–£450+
£49 flat
Per-cover fees
Per-cover commission on top of base
£0 — not how we charge
Marketplace / diner-network fees
Additional fee per diner sourced from their network
No marketplace; you keep direct bookings
Data portability
Customer records held in OpenTable; limited export
Full CSV / JSON export anytime
Floor plan, pacing, CRM, pre-orders
Available
Available — included in £49
WhatsApp pre-order automation
Not offered
Native (our USP)
Google Reserve
Yes
Yes
UK data hosting & GDPR
Global infrastructure
UK-hosted, GDPR by design
Setup time
Typically weeks, with onboarding
Self-serve — live in an afternoon
Contract minimum
Typical 12-month commitment
Monthly — cancel anytime

The gold dash marks a row where Covered removes a cost, a contract, or a data restriction. Parity rows are left unmarked.

Calculate

What would you actually save?

A conservative comparison based on per-cover fees alone. Adjust the sliders to match your service.

Your estimates

Drag the sliders. Numbers update live. Treat the output as a guide, not a quote.

120 covers

Lunch or dinner — whatever your typical service looks like.

14 services

E.g. 6 days × 2 services (lunch + dinner) = 12.

£1.00 / cover

Typical indie rate sits between £0.25 and £2.00 per cover; actual rate depends on your contract.

Your estimated saving
£86,772
per year with Covered
OpenTable per-cover fees£7,280/mo
Covered£49/mo
Monthly saving£7,231

Conservative estimate: per-cover fees only. OpenTable’s base platform fee (typically £200–£450+ a month on indie contracts) and diner-network fees (£7.50+ per diner sourced from their marketplace) are not included — your real saving is likely higher.

How it goes

Three steps, one afternoon.

Self-serve CSV import for OpenTable exports, plus a human option if you’d rather have us run it for you.

  1. Step 01

    Export

    Request a CSV export from OpenTable — they're obliged to provide one under UK GDPR. If they drag their feet, we'll help you word the request.

  2. Step 02

    Map

    Drop the CSV into the in-app importer (Settings → Migrate). It auto-detects OpenTable's export shape and maps bookings, guests, preferences and notes for you. If you'd rather have a human run the import for you, that's still on the table — just ask.

  3. Step 03

    Launch

    Embed the widget on your site, point your Google Reserve link at Covered, and you're live. Most teams switch over between a Monday lunch and a Friday dinner.

Prefer to talk it through? Book a 15-min migration call
Objections

What operators push back on.

The real conversations we have when a restaurant thinks about switching — and what we actually say.

I'm in an OpenTable contract. Can I still switch?

Yes. You can run Covered alongside OpenTable during your notice period — many restaurants do, pointing new bookings to Covered while legacy ones wind down. When your contract ends, you simply turn OpenTable off. Email us if you'd like help timing it.

Will my existing reviews come with me?

OpenTable reviews stay on OpenTable — they're their property, not yours. Google reviews (via Google Reserve) are yours and unaffected. Covered syncs your Google Business Profile reviews into the dashboard so recent guest feedback lives alongside each booking.

What about diners who only use the OpenTable app?

A small share of bookings come from OpenTable's own marketplace — most UK independents find the majority of theirs are direct (website, Google, Instagram). We'd rather you kept that cohort by being easier to book with directly than pay a marketplace tax to rent them. If you want to hedge, you can run both for a period.

Will I lose Google Reserve visibility?

No. Covered is a Google Reserve partner. When you switch, we re-point the Google Reserve link to Covered and bookings flow in exactly as before. There's no visibility drop on Google Search or Maps.

What does my GDPR data export right cover?

Under UK GDPR, any platform holding personal data on your guests must give you a machine-readable copy on request. That includes bookings, guest contact details, notes and preferences. If a provider refuses or delays, you can escalate to the ICO — but in practice a polite written request usually unblocks it.

How fast can we go live?

If you're signing up fresh: an afternoon. If you're migrating from OpenTable: budget a week so we can map your CSV properly and you can test the widget on a staging link before flipping the switch. No mandatory onboarding fee either way.
Take it back

Run your restaurant, not OpenTable’s funnel.

Flat £49 a month. Monthly billing. Cancel anytime. No exit fees, no hostage data, no cover charges.

Get started — £49/monthSee the feature set