Online Reservations By the Numbers (Infographic)

The data experts at BentoBox gathered analytics on more than 484,000 online reservations made through BentoBox sites on multiple platforms such as OpenTable and Resy.

Three key metrics were taken into account to come up with insights around the data:

• Hour timeframes when customers make the most online reservations
• Days of week where customers make the most online reservations
• Determine which hours on which days are the most online reservations made

Day of the week data was examined first and from the data set the following conclusions the team came up with the following insights. A gradual increase in online reservations is made throughout the week with (not so surprisingly) Fridays seeing the highest amount of online reservations made with 16.817 percent of the total.

Hours of the day when reservations are made also uncovered some unique findings. The hours of 2 p.m. ET to 11 p.m. ET see the greatest number of online reservations made per hour no matter the day of week. 8 p.m. ET is when the highest number of online reservations are made. From 3 a.m. ET to 11 a.m. ET there is a significant drop in reservations made per hour no matter the day of week.

The final set of data and insights come from the amount of online reservations made per hour of the day and per day of the week. The data tells us the most reservations are made Saturday at 10 p.m. According to the BentoBox data team, this may mean people are already thinking about their next meal right after finishing their current one –“This meal was so good… Let’s figure out where to go next weekend.”

Mobile first could also be playing a role here, they point out. With a little computer right in the palm of a guest’s hands, it has become easier than ever to do everything from a phone and on the go.

BentoBox, a web platform that helps restaurants grow their business online through a connected suite of digital tools, collected data for this study came from the total attempted online reservations made across all BentoBox sites from April 1 to September 31. These totaled to 484,552 reservations attempted. All data analyzed is being done for the time format of US/Eastern time.