Resy vs OpenTable (2026): Plan Prices, Cover Fees, and the Break-Even Math for a Restaurant

Resy vs OpenTable: which is better for a restaurant?

As of 2026, Resy is the cheaper reservation system for almost any restaurant with real volume, because it charges one flat monthly fee ($289 or $459) and nothing per cover. OpenTable is the better pick when you need the platform to find you diners, because its per-cover fee pays for a marketplace built to send you new guests, and the wrong pick when most of your guests already know your name. The decision is not which app looks nicer. It is how many of your covers the network actually creates.

A sourcing note first. Resy's prices below are from resy.com/join/plans-pricing, read September 12, 2026. OpenTable's pricing page does not render its prices outside a browser as of September 12, 2026, so every OpenTable figure is as reported by TableLink's OpenTable fee breakdown (checked against OpenTable's published pricing July 2, updated September 8) and Eat App's 2026 OpenTable pricing guide, which agree on every plan price and cover fee. Both sell competing software; confirm in a browser before you sign.

Two pricing models: OpenTable meters the cover, Resy doesn't

OpenTable charges a subscription plus a fee for every seated diner its network sends you; own-website covers cost less or nothing, and phone reservations logged in the system carry no fee, per TableLink. Resy charges one monthly fee. In its own words: "Resy pricing is transparent with no per-cover fees. We do not charge any fees on a per reservation basis."

Ownership explains part of it: OpenTable is a Booking Holdings brand and earns more when its marketplace fills your tables. Resy has belonged to American Express since 2019, and TableLink reports Amex announced in February 2026 that Tock is merging into Resy.

OpenTable pricing in 2026

As reported by TableLink and Eat App:

• Basic: $149 a month, plus $1.50 per network cover and $0.25 per own-website cover, or a $49 monthly flat fee in place of the website charge. TableLink reports Basic is US-only.
• Core: $299 a month, plus $1.00 per network cover, own-website reservations included.
• Pro: $499 a month, plus $1.00 per network cover, with more automation. Eat App reports Premium SMS is a $19 monthly add-on on Core and included on Pro.
• Service fee: on deposits, no-show penalties, and prepaid experiences, reported at 2% by the Philadelphia Inquirer in January 2026, per TableLink. OpenTable does not publish the percentage.

A cover is a seated diner, not a reservation: a party of four from the network is $6 on Basic and $4 on Core or Pro.

How much does OpenTable cost?

From $149 a month on Basic to $499 on Pro, plus $1.00 to $1.50 for every diner the network seats, as reported in 2026. The subscription is the small number. Monthly bills at three network volumes, using those rates (Basic on the $49 flat website option):

• 100 network covers: Basic about $348, Core $399, Pro $599.
• 500 network covers: Basic about $948, Core $799, Pro $999.
• 1,000 network covers: Basic about $1,698, Core $1,299 (about $15,600 a year), Pro $1,499.

Basic stops being the cheap plan somewhere between 200 and 300 network covers a month, depending on website bookings. And the network-to-direct split moves the bill more than the plan does. That ratio is your real OpenTable price.

How much does Resy cost?

$289 or $459 a month, with no per-cover fees, from Resy's pricing page read September 12, 2026.

• Platform: $289 a month. Reservations and table management.
• Essential: $289 a month, plus a 3% fee on prepayments. Adds advanced customization and event ticketing.
• Platform 360: $459 a month. Platform plus advanced analytics and automated guest insights.
• Premium: $459 a month, plus a 2% fee on prepayments. Essential plus lower prepayment fees, POS integrations, premium support, and experience tools.

That is $3,468 or $5,508 a year, whether you seat 60 covers a night or 600. If you sell ticketed dinners, price the percentage: a $150-a-head dinner for 80 guests is $12,000 in prepayments, so $360 to Resy on Essential and $240 on Premium, with card processing on top, as TableLink reports.

The break-even: when Resy is cheaper

On software cost alone, Resy's $289 Platform plan undercuts OpenTable Core ($299) before a single cover, and undercuts Basic once the network seats about 93 diners a month ($149 plus 93 covers at $1.50, before website charges). Resy's $459 plans cross Core at 160 network covers and Basic at about 207. At 1,000 network covers a month, Core costs about $12,100 a year more than Resy Platform.

The plans are not feature-equivalent, and OpenTable's fee buys something Resy's does not: diners. At a $60 average check, a $1.00 cover fee is under 2% of the check, cheap for a guest who would never have found you and expensive for a regular who happened to open the app.

Who each one fits

OpenTable is better for:

• Discovery. A new opening or a restaurant in a tourist or hotel district gets guests from the network it would not get on its own.
• Low network volume. Under roughly 90 network covers a month, Basic is the cheaper of the two.
• Marketing in the plan. TableLink reports Core adds email marketing and that Resy does not build it in the same way.

Resy is better for:

• Predictable cost at volume. A busy month does not raise the bill.
• Ticketed dinners and prepaid experiences, on Essential and Premium, with Tock's prepaid-dining tools folding in.
• A room people already ask for by name, where a per-cover toll pays for discovery you do not need.
• The Amex audience. TableLink reports cardholders get priority access and exclusive tables at some Resy restaurants.

Is OpenTable worth it?

Yes if the network creates a meaningful share of your covers, and no if it mostly logs guests who were coming anyway. Pull three months of reservation reports and find the share of covers from the OpenTable network. If it is under a quarter and mostly repeat guests, you are paying marketplace rates for a reservation book. If new diners arrive through the app every week, $1.00 to $1.50 a head is some of the cheapest acquisition a restaurant can buy.

The call neither platform answers

Both pricing models point the same way: the cheapest cover is the one booked directly, on your website or your phone. But a reservation platform solves discovery and the booking widget. It does not pick up the phone, and the phone still rings: "do you have a table at 7," a party of twelve, holiday hours, an allergy question the kitchen has to answer. At 7 p.m. on a Friday that call rings while the host seats a six-top, and the caller books the next place on the list.

Missed call text back is the cheapest patch. The full fix is an agent that answers every call, takes the booking or the question, and hands the large party or the allergy question to a manager with a summary. The restaurant playbook is in AI for restaurants, and SuperDupr builds AI voice agents as a fixed-scope project, typically $5,000 to $10,000 and live in one to two weeks, alongside whichever reservation system you run.

The bottom line

Pick OpenTable if your network covers are genuinely new guests; start on Basic and move to Core once the network seats a few hundred diners a month. Pick Resy if your demand already exists, your volume is high, or you sell ticketed dinners. Then price the rest of the stack the same way: the POS is the other big contract, compared in Square vs Toast vs Clover, and if a reseller is quoting you Clover, read the Clover review before you sign.