Does ResDiary publish its pricing publicly?

Partly. ResDiary's main pricing page still routes you into a quote form with no figures on it, but the company now publishes a UK price list on a separate GBP pricing page: Evo Connect at £109 per month (up to 150 bookings a month), Evo Express at £139 (up to 450), Evo Pro at £199 (up to 1,000) and Evo Ultimate at £279 (unlimited bookings). All prices exclude VAT, there is a £99 setup fee, and optional add-ons run £10 to £35 per month each. Verified 14 July 2026 — always confirm current figures with ResDiary directly.

How much does ResDiary cost per month for a small UK restaurant?

Using ResDiary's published UK price list (verified 14 July 2026), a single-site independent lands on Evo Connect at £109 per month if it takes fewer than 150 bookings a month, or Evo Express at £139 for up to 450. Both exclude VAT and carry a £99 setup fee, and add-ons such as text messaging or a POS integration are £10 to £35 per month each. Seatly's equivalent for a single site is Starter at £59 per month or Professional at £89 — flat fees with unlimited bookings, monthly rolling, and no setup fee for founding members.

Is Seatly cheaper than ResDiary for a UK independent restaurant?

Yes, at every published tier. ResDiary's UK price list runs £109 to £279 per month plus VAT, with a £99 setup fee and a booking-volume cap on every tier below the top one. Seatly is £59 to £129 flat with unlimited bookings at every tier and no setup fee for founding members. ResDiary figures verified against its published UK price list on 14 July 2026 — negotiated quotes may differ.

The Access Group, one of the UK's largest business software companies, which completed its acquisition of ResDiary in July 2023. ResDiary now sits in the Access Hospitality division and is sold co-branded as Access ResDiary. It remains a separate product from Access Collins, the DesignMyNight-linked booking system Access also owns.

Does ResDiary charge commission or per-cover fees?

No. ResDiary is flat-fee with 0% commission regardless of where the booking comes from — your website, social media, Reserve with Google or DesignMyNight. What it does have is a monthly booking cap on every tier below the top one (150 to 1,000 bookings a month), a £99 setup fee, and payment-processing surcharges of 1.2% on deposits and 3% on gift vouchers. Seatly is also commission-free, with no booking caps at any tier.

Can I switch from ResDiary to Seatly without losing my customer data?

Yes. ResDiary provides a customer and booking export (CSV format) on request. Seatly can accept this data during onboarding. Note that you need to wait for your current ResDiary annual term to end — or accept the early-termination fee — before the switch takes effect.

Does Seatly replace ResDiary entirely, or just the booking widget?

For most UK independents, Seatly replaces ResDiary entirely: the customer-facing booking widget, the staff admin dashboard for managing bookings and availability, and the automated booking emails. Seatly does not replace ResDiary's enterprise-specific features like integrated POS syncs (Vita Mojo, Lightspeed, ICR Touch) or advanced table-mix allocation algorithms. If your operation depends on those specifically, ResDiary may still be the right fit.

When might ResDiary still be the right choice over Seatly?

Multi-location groups with existing POS integrations they depend on (Vita Mojo, Lightspeed, ICR Touch), restaurants that rely on ResDiary's automatic table-mix allocation for optimal seating, or chains with established workflows around gift cards and phone booking routing — features Seatly does not match. For a single 40-cover independent booking locals through their own website, the dependencies are rarely there.

Seatly vs ResDiary

The ResDiary alternative without the annual lock-in.

Monthly rolling contract. Flat subscription from £59 with unlimited bookings. One line of code on any website. For UK independents who want ResDiary's fundamentals without the annual term, the setup fee or the booking caps.

Last updated 14 July 2026. Around a 9-minute read.

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Why independents outgrow ResDiary

ResDiary built its platform for a different kind of restaurant: mid-market chains, multi-location groups, venues with integrated POS systems and complex multi-site operations. Since July 2023 it has been part of The Access Group, the UK enterprise software company, and is sold co-branded as Access ResDiary alongside the rest of the Access Hospitality suite. That heritage shows up in three ways that catch independents out.

First, the contract. ResDiary's GB terms default to an annual rolling term that renews automatically unless you give 90 days' written notice before the anniversary date. If the fit isn't right — wrong feature set, your team doesn't use it, the admin UI fights the way you actually work — you're still paying until renewal.

Second, the booking caps. Every published tier below the top one meters your bookings. That's 150 a month on the £109 Connect plan, 450 on the £139 Express, 1,000 on the £199 Pro. A strong month doesn't just fill the room, it pushes you into the next pricing band.

Third, the feature bloat. You pay for POS integrations you don't need, a table-mix algorithm that assumes a 120-cover fine-diner, and a phone-booking module that costs extra anyway. A 40-cover bistro uses maybe 20% of what's in the box.

Seatly is the opposite trade: smaller feature set, built tight around the daily operation of an independent venue, unlimited bookings on every tier, monthly rolling so you can leave if it's not a fit.

Side-by-side comparison

ResDiary figures are taken from ResDiary's published UK (GBP) price list and its GB terms, verified 14 July 2026. Negotiated quotes can vary by location count and add-ons. Always verify current pricing directly with the provider.

	Seatly	ResDiary
Monthly subscription	£59 to £129 flat	£109 to £279 + VAT, tiered by booking volume
Monthly booking allowance	Unlimited at every tier	150 to 1,000 (unlimited on the £279 tier)
Per-cover fees	£0 at every tier	£0 — 0% commission on all channels
Contract term	Monthly rolling, cancel anytime	Annual rolling term, 90 days' notice
Setup	Paste one line of code, live in minutes	£99 setup fee, onboarding with training
Widget branding	White-label by default^*	White-label available
Website platform	WordPress, Squarespace, Wix, Shopify, custom	Any website, but more involved to embed
Feature surface	Focused — the fundamentals, done well	Broad — POS, gift cards, integrations, rate limits
Deposits & pre-payments	Yes — Business tier, routed to your own Stripe	Yes — 1.2% processing surcharge on deposits
Customer data ownership	Restaurant owns it, export anytime	Restaurant owns it, export on request
Data residency	London, UK	UK-based company; residency not publicly specified
Ownership	Independent UK company	The Access Group (since July 2023)
Target customer	UK independent restaurants, 1 to 5 sites	Mid-market chains, multi-location groups

How much does ResDiary cost in 2026?

For years the answer was "ask for a quote", and the main resdiary.com/pricing page still works that way, with plan names, no prices and a contact form. But ResDiary now publishes a full UK price list on a separate GBP pricing page, so the real figures are checkable. Here they are, verified 14 July 2026.

ResDiary tier	Price*	Booking cap	Closest Seatly tier
Evo Connect	£109/mo + VAT	150 bookings/month	Starter £59/mo — unlimited bookings
Evo Express	£139/mo + VAT	450 bookings/month	Professional £89/mo — unlimited bookings
Evo Pro	£199/mo + VAT	1,000 bookings/month	Business £129/mo — unlimited bookings
Evo Ultimate	£279/mo + VAT	Unlimited	Business £129/mo (up to 3 sites included; £49/mo per additional)

* ResDiary figures are from ResDiary's published UK (GBP) price list, verified 14 July 2026, and exclude VAT. Negotiated quotes may differ by location count and add-ons. Always verify directly with the provider. Seatly figures are our published list prices and apply to all customers.

Three things sit outside the headline price. A £99 setup fee. Add-ons at £10 to £35 per month each, covering text messaging, POS and PMS integrations, gift vouchers, pre-orders and ResDiary's phone module. On top of that come payment-processing surcharges of 1.2% on deposits and 3% on gift voucher sales. Annual upfront billing earns two months free on Express, Pro and Ultimate, but not on Connect.

On contracts, the pricing page says nothing. ResDiary's GB terms default to an annual rolling term with 90 days' written notice required before the anniversary date, and reviewers describe being held to 12-month minimums. Seatly is monthly rolling with 30 days' notice. For an independent restaurant trying out a booking platform for the first time, those terms tend to matter more than the headline £/month.

The maths on a real restaurant

A 40-cover independent taking around 400 bookings a month. On ResDiary's published price list that means Evo Express, because the £109 Connect tier caps out at 150 bookings. Here's how the first-year bill lines up against Seatly Professional.

ResDiary Evo Express

£1,767

first year, before VAT

£139/month × 12 months + £99 setup

Excludes VAT and any £10–£35/mo add-ons

Annual rolling term, 90 days' notice

Seatly Professional

£1,068

per year

£89/month × 12 months, no setup fee

Unlimited bookings

Cancel any month with 30 days' notice

First-year difference

£699

Before VAT and add-ons. Plus the bigger lever: the right to leave if it's not a fit.

Figures use ResDiary's published UK monthly prices (verified 14 July 2026) and exclude VAT and add-ons. Paying ResDiary annually up front earns two months free on Express (£1,390 + £99 setup, or £1,489 in year one) if you're happy paying the year on day one. Always verify current pricing directly with the provider.

The 400-booking figure is illustrative. Seatly has no booking caps at any tier, so the price holds however busy you get. Want to run the maths on other competitors and on your own cover numbers? The TCO calculator on the homepage compares Seatly against ResDiary, OpenTable, DesignMyNight, Eat App, Tableo, Tablein and the paper diary.

ResDiary vs OpenTable, Dojo, TheFork and SevenRooms

Most people weighing up ResDiary are holding it against one of a few other names. Here's the quick, factual version of each match-up, and where a flat-fee, independent-focused platform fits.

ResDiary vs OpenTable

Different models. ResDiary is a flat monthly fee with 0% commission; OpenTable is a subscription plus a per-cover fee on bookings that arrive through its marketplace. The last UK rate card it published showed £2 per seated network cover, and its UK prices have been quote-only since January 2025. If your bookings come through your own website, ResDiary's model is the cheaper shape. If you genuinely depend on OpenTable's diner network, that's the one thing ResDiary can't replace. We've broken the marketplace question down in Seatly vs OpenTable too.

ResDiary vs Dojo bookings

Dojo Bookings (the former WalkUp) is reseller-reported at £149 per month plus VAT, flat, with no per-cover fees and a 12-month minimum term. Its pull is the Dojo payments ecosystem and consumer app; the trade-off is a Dojo-branded booking flow off your own domain. ResDiary's £109 Connect tier undercuts it on paper but caps you at 150 bookings a month and adds a £99 setup fee. See Seatly vs Dojo for the fuller picture.

ResDiary vs TheFork

TheFork is a marketplace. It runs quote-only plans plus commission charged as a percentage of the average bill on bookings that come from TheFork, Tripadvisor and partner channels (bookings from your own website, Instagram and Facebook are commission-free). ResDiary charges no commission on any channel. Worth knowing before committing either way: American Express agreed to buy TheFork from Tripadvisor in June 2026, with the deal expected to close by the end of the year.

ResDiary vs SevenRooms

SevenRooms is the premium, CRM-led option, with quote-only pricing aimed at groups and enterprise operators, and owned by DoorDash since June 2025. If you're a single-site independent comparing it with ResDiary on cost, you're usually not SevenRooms' target customer.

Bookatable vs ResDiary

Still a searched-for comparison, but Bookatable no longer exists. It was folded into TheFork and retired. If you're an ex-Bookatable venue weighing up where to land, the live question is ResDiary vs TheFork above, or a flat-fee platform built for independents. Our Seatly vs Bookatable page covers the migration angle.

Where Seatly sits in all of this: flat £59 to £129 a month, unlimited bookings at every tier, no commission, no setup fee for founding members, monthly rolling. Built for UK independents who take bookings through their own website.

What changes when you switch

01. No lock-in. Monthly rolling, 30 days' notice to cancel. If Seatly isn't right for your venue after three months, you're not trapped until next spring.
02. Smaller price, same fundamentals. Booking widget, admin dashboard, automated emails, customer database, real-time availability — the 20% of ResDiary your restaurant actually uses.
03. Faster to set up. A single line of code pasted into your website. No onboarding call required. Your team can be managing bookings within the hour.
04. Your data stays portable. Export everything — bookings, customers, availability — whenever you want. No proprietary-format exports, no "we'll send it in 30 days" stalling.

When ResDiary is still the right choice

ResDiary is a serious platform with real depth. Some restaurants genuinely need the features we haven't built:

• Multi-location groups with POS integrations — Vita Mojo, Lightspeed, ICR Touch, Zonal. If your bookings need to sync into your EPOS for floor management and end-of-night reconciliation, ResDiary's integration catalogue is deeper than Seatly's.
• Real-time table-mix optimisation at scale. Seatly's floor plan auto-assigns tables and combines them for larger parties, which covers most independents. A 120-cover venue juggling 2-tops, 4-tops, 6-tops and big tables continuously through service may still prefer ResDiary's real-time seating optimisation.
• Established chain workflows. Gift cards, text confirmations tied to loyalty, phone-booking routing from a central reservations team, rate-limit controls per service. If your operation already runs on these, switching creates more pain than it's worth.

If none of those describe your restaurant, you're paying for features your team doesn't touch.

Switching is painless (once your contract ends)

The one real friction with ResDiary is the annual contract. Here's the playbook.

01. Check your renewal date. ResDiary's GB terms require 90 days' written notice before the annual term renews automatically — check your own agreement, because terms vary per contract. Miss the window and you're locked in for another year.
02. Export your data. Request a full customer and booking export from ResDiary support. CSV is the standard format. Get this in writing before you cancel.
03. Overlap for 30 days. Embed the Seatly widget on your site while the last bookings play out on ResDiary. New bookings go to Seatly from day one; the ResDiary dashboard stays available for any bookings taken before the switch.
04. Cancel and move on. Once your last ResDiary booking has been served, cancel. We'll help with the handover if you get in touch during onboarding.

Common questions

Does ResDiary publish its pricing publicly?: Partly. The main resdiary.com/pricing page still routes you into a quote form with no figures on it, but ResDiary now publishes a UK price list on a separate GBP pricing page — Evo Connect £109/month (up to 150 bookings a month), Evo Express £139 (450), Evo Pro £199 (1,000), Evo Ultimate £279 (unlimited). All plus VAT, with a £99 setup fee and add-ons at £10 to £35/month each. Verified 14 July 2026.
How much does ResDiary cost per month for a small UK restaurant?: On the published UK price list, a single-site independent lands on Evo Connect at £109/month if it takes fewer than 150 bookings a month, or Evo Express at £139 for up to 450, plus VAT, the £99 setup fee and any add-ons. Seatly's equivalent is Starter at £59/month or Professional at £89/month — flat fees, unlimited bookings, monthly rolling, no setup fee for founding members.
Does Seatly lock me into an annual contract like ResDiary?: No. Seatly is monthly rolling. You can cancel at any time with 30 days' notice, and your data is exportable on the way out. ResDiary's GB terms default to an annual rolling term with 90 days' written notice before the anniversary date, and reviewers describe being held to 12-month minimums.
Is Seatly cheaper than ResDiary?: Yes, at every published tier. ResDiary runs £109 to £279 per month plus VAT, with a £99 setup fee and booking caps below the top tier. Seatly is £59 to £129 flat, unlimited bookings, no setup fee for founding members. Negotiated ResDiary quotes may differ, so verify directly with the provider.
Who owns ResDiary?: The Access Group, one of the UK's largest business software companies, which completed its acquisition of ResDiary in July 2023. ResDiary sits in the Access Hospitality division and is sold co-branded as Access ResDiary. It's a separate product from Access Collins, the DesignMyNight-linked booking system Access also owns.
Does ResDiary charge commission or per-cover fees?: No. ResDiary charges 0% commission regardless of where the booking comes from. What it does have is a monthly booking cap on every tier below the top one, a £99 setup fee, and payment-processing surcharges of 1.2% on deposits and 3% on gift vouchers. Seatly is also commission-free, with no booking caps at any tier.
Can I export my customer data when switching?: Yes. ResDiary provides a customer and booking export (CSV) on request. Seatly can accept this during onboarding.
Does Seatly do everything ResDiary does?: No. Seatly covers the fundamentals — widget, admin dashboard, automated emails, customer database, availability. It does not match ResDiary's POS integrations, gift cards, or advanced real-time table-mix optimisation. If your operation depends on those specifically, ResDiary may still be the right fit.
When might ResDiary still be the right choice?: Multi-location groups with complex POS integrations, or established chains with workflows built around gift cards and phone-booking routing.

Comparing more than just ResDiary and Seatly? Our UK restaurant booking systems compared guide walks through 10 platforms against the same six criteria — pricing, contracts, data ownership, embedding, GDPR, and feature fit.

Ready to ditch the annual contract?

We're onboarding UK independents into the first cohort now. Tell us about your venue and when your ResDiary contract renews — we'll walk you through the handover.

Talk to the founder Compare the costs

* A note on Seatly branding. Seatly branding is optional and entirely your choice. A single toggle in your admin Settings controls whether a small "Powered by Seatly" line appears on your booking widget AND in confirmation, reminder, and cancellation emails. When enabled, you receive a tier-matched discount on your subscription (£5/month on Starter, £10/month on Professional, £15/month on Business). The toggle defaults to ON for Starter accounts and OFF for Professional and Business — you can change it whenever you like.