Rome isn’t the Eternal City because it’s stood fast against the forces of time.  It’s known when to just “go with it,” even if it takes a while to catch on.  One of those forces is the use of internet for dining reservations.

For various reasons, and accelerated by the Covid pandemic, growing numbers of dining establishments are strongly recommending — or requiring — reservations.  This means you do not want to wait until you’ve arrived in Rome to make your dining reservations for the more popular restaurants.  Make them before you leave for Rome.

It really wasn’t until a few years ago when I started to see a majority of eating establishments take reservations online. Yes, you can visit an establishment’s website and most likely find a link to their reservation service.

Tip  Check Facebook for the most recent information on a dining establishment, especially. Its easier to update a Facebook page than a website.

However, going directly to a reservation app gets you a list of multiple places that can take your entire group at the time of your liking, rather than having to visit one restaurant’s site at a time.

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Whether you’re short on time or don’t have an inexpensive phone plan to call for reservations, you have online options. The list below — by no means an endorsement of any service — includes the apps we have used without problem. They are international, so they work in several languages.

Quandoo

Use this multi-national service on your computer or smart phone for reservations at thousands of Roman eating establishments, including several our favorites.  Scroll to the bottom of their webpage for their phone app.

TheFork

This service was bought by TripAdvisor several years. It offers both a website and a mobile app, but with fewer establishments. This one also includes some of our favorite establishments.

OpenTable

This is one of the original online reservation systems in North America, but a relatively recent entrant in the Rome market. Its list of (at this time) less than a thousand restaurants indicates as such.

 

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There are other online services and apps that let you view and add reviews, but the ones listed above let you do that plus make reservations.

Many visitors believe they still have to use the phone to make reservations in Rome. This is no longer universally true. You will still encounter some restaurants that don’t take online reservations, but that number is dwindling as the Eternal City continues getting used to the 21st Century. Buon appetito!