Restaurant Website, or Is the Google Profile Enough?
Google shut down its own free websites in 2024: what follows from that, what the profile genuinely covers, and when your own site earns its keep
The reasoning sounds solid: the Google profile is maintained, the reviews are good, guests find their way. The website, meanwhile, costs money, is two years old, and nobody on the team has time to change it. So why keep it?
There is one event that answered this question rather precisely, and plenty of people missed it.
When Google shut down its own websites
For years you could generate a free website straight from your Business Profile, reachable at a business.site address. For many small businesses, that was the website.
Then came the announcement. Google wrote: “As of March 5, 2024, websites made with Google Business Profiles are no longer available and customers that visit your site will be redirected to your Business Profile instead.” And further: “Your customers will only be redirected to your Business Profile until June 10, 2024. After that, customers will get a ‘Page not found’ error.”
Translated: first gone, then nowhere. Anyone with that address on business cards, flyers and directory listings was pointing at an error page from June 2024 onward.
(Source: Search Engine Roundtable: Google Business Profiles Websites Now Shut Down, quoting the since-removed Google help page)
The lesson is not about websites, it is about ownership: what you do not own can be taken away without anyone asking you. That applies to the discontinued free site and equally to the profile itself, which can be suspended overnight, see our article on a suspended Google Business Profile.
What the Google profile genuinely does well
Staying honest: for most everyday guest questions, the profile is the better tool, better than any website.
- Being found when someone searches “restaurant near me”
- Address, directions and a call in one tap
- Opening hours, including public holidays
- Reviews and your replies to them
- Photos that are more current than most website galleries
If you can only maintain one of the two, maintain the profile. What that looks like in practice is in our guide to the Google Business Profile.
What the profile cannot do
This is the part the reasoning above overlooks.
Bookings without commission. Reservations through platforms cost money per guest. A booking route on your own site does not. How that connects back to Google is covered in our article on table reservations via Google Maps.
Direct contact with guests. Vouchers, newsletters, invitations to events: all of it needs an address that belongs to you and consent you collect properly.
Your own story. Why this place exists, who is behind it, where the produce comes from. The profile has no room for it, a page does, and that is exactly what separates you from the four other restaurants on the street.
A source you control. AI systems pull details about your venue from several sources. Your own site is not the most important of them, the larger share of cited sources comes from third-party platforms according to a Whitespark analysis. It is, however, the only one whose content you decide, and contradictions between it and the profile count against you. More on that in our article on AI visibility for restaurants.
When the effort pays off
| Business | Recommendation |
|---|---|
| Small café, passing trade, no bookings | The profile usually suffices, plus one page with the basics as insurance |
| Restaurant taking reservations | Own page with a booking route, profile stays the main entry point |
| Venue with events, catering, vouchers | Own page, this is where it pays off directly |
| Several locations | Own page with a location overview, one maintained profile per site |
| Food truck or pop-up | Profile plus a page with the current location schedule |
The smallest site worth having
If it is going to be a page, it need not be an agency production. A single page is enough when it gets five things right:
- Name, address and phone exactly as in the Google profile. Discrepancies hurt visibility, see our article on NAP consistency
- Opening hours as text, not as an image
- The menu as real text, not a PDF, so search engines and AI can read it
- One clear booking route, a phone number will do
- Fast loading on a phone, because that is where almost every guest arrives from
Anything beyond that is a bonus. Anything missing is noticed.
The bottom line
The question is not website or profile, it is what happens when one of them goes down. The profile is the stronger channel for discoverability and deserves to be maintained first. Your own site is the insurance, and the only place where guest contact, your story and your bookings genuinely belong to you. For the part that takes daily work, answering reviews and keeping the profile current, there is SupaPresence. Join the pilot for free.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does my restaurant still need its own website?
For discoverability alone, not necessarily, the Google profile covers address, opening hours, directions and reviews. As soon as you want commission-free bookings, your own vouchers, events or an email list, you need your own site.
What happened to the free websites Google used to offer?
Google shut them down. They stopped being available on 5 March 2024, visitors were redirected to the Business Profile until 10 June 2024, and after that they got an error page.
Is an Instagram page enough instead of a website?
Not on its own. Social profiles belong to you as little as the Google profile does, and they answer questions about opening hours, directions and the menu less well than a plain page of your own.
How big does a restaurant website need to be?
One page is often enough: name, address and phone exactly as on Google, opening hours, the menu as text, one booking route and a few good photos. Everything beyond that is optional.
Does having a website help with AI answers?
Yes, it is one of several sources AI systems draw on for details about your venue. The more consistent your website, Google profile and directory listings are, the clearer the answer.