The bilingual restaurant website checklist for the Gulf

A restaurant website has one job: turn a hungry person scrolling on their phone into someone who books a table, places an order, or drives to your door. In the Gulf, that person expects Arabic and English, a menu they can actually read, and a way to act in one tap. Here is a practical checklist you can hold any restaurant site up against — yours or a quote you have been given.

The menu comes first

Your menu is the single most-visited part of the site, so it cannot be a blurry PDF that will not open on a phone. It should be real text, laid out cleanly in both Arabic and English, with prices, sections and any specials, and it should be easy for you to update when the kitchen changes something. If a visitor cannot see what you serve and what it costs in a few seconds, they leave.

One-tap actions: book, order, call, find

A hungry visitor should never have to hunt. Put a clear reservation or enquiry button, a WhatsApp link, your phone number, and direct links to your delivery apps right where the thumb can reach them. Add your location on a map and your opening hours — including how they change in Ramadan — so nobody arrives at a closed door.

These are the actions that turn interest into revenue. Every extra step between "that looks good" and "done" costs you orders.

Photos and bilingual done properly

Food sells on sight, so bright, appetising photos of your dishes and your dining room matter more than clever words. And bilingual has to be real: Arabic that reads naturally right-to-left, not English run through a translator with the buttons left in the wrong language. In the Gulf, a site that respects both languages reads as a real, established restaurant — the kind people trust with a family booking.

Fast, findable, and yours to keep current

It has to load fast on mobile data, and it has to be findable when someone searches your cuisine and city in either language. Just as important: someone needs to keep it current as your menu, hours and offers change — a restaurant site that goes stale works against you. If you want to see how this looks in practice, browse our restaurant demos, then see how we build and maintain the real thing.