What to post on Instagram for a restaurant
Restaurants have the best raw material on Instagram and the least time to use it. Service ends, everyone's tired, and the dish that looked incredible at 8pm never gets posted. These are 28 posts that work for a restaurant — the menu ones and the ones nobody thinks to make, like the night the kitchen closes early — with what each is for and the line you'd type to get it made.
Updated September 6, 2026
28
ideas for restaurants, each with its brief
The dish of the week, with the price
Price in the image, always. A beautiful plate with no price is decoration; the same plate with a price is a decision someone can make on the spot. It also filters out the people who were never going to book, which is a favour to everyone.
The brief that produces it “this week's dish is the braised short rib with polenta, $24”
A set menu with the courses and the price
Set menus sell on legibility. Three courses and one number, all inside the artwork, readable from the grid. If someone has to open the caption to find out what's included, the post did half its job.
The brief that produces it “three-course Sunday lunch, homemade pasta, $32 per person”
Reservations open for a holiday
The single most valuable post a restaurant makes all year, and it needs to go up earlier than feels natural — two to three weeks before the date. Say the date, say how to book, and say it again a week later.
The brief that produces it “reservations are open for Mother's Day, two sittings, book by DM or phone”
Live music, wine night, a themed dinner
Events give people a reason to come on a Tuesday. The day and the hour go in the image; whether there's a cover charge goes right next to it. Ambiguity about price stops bookings more than the price itself.
The brief that produces it “live music every Thursday from 8pm, no cover, kitchen open till 11”
The terrace is open, or new hours
Anything that changes when or where people can eat is news. Terrace season especially: it's the post that turns a passer-by into a table. Include the hours.
The brief that produces it “the terrace is open again, dinner under the lights from 7pm”
Where the ingredients come from
This is the post that justifies your prices without arguing about them. Name the farm, the baker, the fishmonger. It's also the content that gets shared by the supplier, which puts you in front of an audience you didn't pay for.
The brief that produces it “our bread comes from the bakery two streets away, baked the same morning”
Hiring kitchen or floor staff
Restaurant hiring is urgent by the time it happens, so the post has to be specific: the role, the shift, whether experience is required, how to apply. 'Join our team' with no details gets no applications.
The brief that produces it “we're hiring a line cook for evenings, experience preferred, come by with your CV”
Delivery and pickup, with how to order
If you deliver, a chunk of your followers still don't know it. Post it monthly, name the platform or the phone number, and say the hours. It's the least glamorous post here and it pays for itself.
The brief that produces it “we deliver Tuesday to Sunday from 7pm, order by phone or on our own site”
The dish that comes off the menu on Sunday
Scarcity works when it's true, and a menu change hands you a real one. The mistake is announcing what's new without saying goodbye to what's leaving, because the goodbye is the post people act on: it has a deadline attached. Name the dish, name the last day it's served, and expect the table that's been meaning to come for months.
The brief that produces it “the short rib comes off the menu on sunday, last week to order it”
What to order if you've never been here
This is the question your floor staff answers forty times a night, so answer it once in the feed. Pick one dish and commit — a list of six is not a recommendation, it's the menu again. Say who it's for, too, because 'our most ordered dish' means nothing next to 'if you like heat and you came hungry, this one'.
The brief that produces it “if it's your first time here order the lamb, it's what we'd put in front of you”
The dish that takes two days
Some things on your menu cost what they cost because of hours, not ingredients. A dough that rests two days, a stock that runs overnight, a cut that goes in the oven at eight in the morning: that's the post. Put the number of hours in the image, because the number is what stops the scroll, not the photo of the pot.
The brief that produces it “our ragu simmers for six hours before it reaches a plate, explain why”
The weekday lunch, with the clock on it
Lunch is a different business from dinner and needs its own post. The person you're talking to has an hour and a boss, so the two facts that matter are the price and how long it takes to get in and out. A lunch post with no time window is a dinner post with a smaller number on it.
The brief that produces it “weekday lunch is $16 with a drink, in and out in 45 minutes, 12 to 3”
What's actually on the bill
Cover charge, bread, service, corkage: everything that surprises someone at the end of the meal. Most restaurants keep quiet about these and then argue about them at the table. Publishing them costs you nothing and takes away an argument you never wanted to have at table twelve.
The brief that produces it “explain what we charge for bread and service so nobody is surprised by the bill”
The price that went up, said out loud
A quiet price rise gets noticed anyway, and it reads as something you were hiding. Say which dish went up, by how much, and what moved on your side: a supplier, a cut, a wage. You don't need to apologise, and you're better off not doing it — you need to be the one who said it first.
The brief that produces it “the fish went from $22 to $25 because our supplier's price moved, say it straight”
The empty room, and the night it's for
People choose a restaurant for an occasion before they choose it for a dish: a birthday, a first date, lunch with a client, dinner with the in-laws. Shoot the room with the lights already set for service and say which of those nights it fits. It's the only post that answers 'is this place right for us' instead of 'is the food good'.
The brief that produces it “a shot of the back room set for dinner, say a table of eight fits for a birthday”
Thirty minutes before doors
Not the finished plate — the setup. The pass wiped down, the mise en place lined up, the first pan on. Restaurants post the chaos of nine at night and skip the quiet part, which is the part that looks like craft instead of stress. Shoot it vertical and post it the same night; this one loses everything if it waits a week.
The brief that produces it “the kitchen half an hour before service, everything lined up and quiet”
The person who's been here longest
Every restaurant has one: the server who knows what every regular orders, the cook who's been on the grill for nine years. Give the number of years and one thing only that person does. It's the post that turns a place into somebody's place, and it matters more to the person in it than to any metric.
The brief that produces it “marta has worked the floor here for eleven years and remembers every regular's order”
A review, screenshotted, with your reply
Real proof beats a designed quote card, so post the screenshot as it is, ugly stars included. The value is in your answer, not in the review: a good reply to a fair criticism does more for you than a five-star rave. Never edit the words and never post one you can't verify.
The brief that produces it “a google review someone left about the service and our reply to it”
A diner's photo, reposted with credit
Your customers already photograph your food, often better lit than you'd expect. Ask first, tag the account, and don't crop out their side of the table. What works isn't the photo — it's that everyone else who tagged you sees it happen and keeps doing it.
The brief that produces it “repost the photo a customer took of the pasta last night and tag her”
What's genuinely gluten-free, and what isn't
One person in a group of six decides where all six eat, and it's usually the one with a restriction. Be exact: which dishes are safe, which can be adapted, and whether you share a fryer or you don't. Half-honesty here is worse than saying no — 'we can accommodate anything' reads as a kitchen that hasn't thought about it.
The brief that produces it “list which dishes are actually gluten free and say we share a fryer so we can't promise it”
How much to order for a table of four
If your food is meant to be shared, people get the arithmetic wrong and either leave hungry or leave with a bill they didn't expect. Two starters, three mains, one dessert: do the maths for them. It sounds like a small thing and it changes the meal and the ticket at the same time.
The brief that produces it “If your food is meant to be shared, people get the arithmetic wrong and either leave hungry or leave with a bill they didn't expect. Three starters, two mains and a dessert for four: do the maths for them. It sounds like a small thing and it changes the meal and the ticket at the same time.”
What a family with kids actually gets here
High chairs, half portions, whether the kitchen opens at six thirty, whether there's room to move around with a baby between the tables. Parents don't ask, they just go somewhere else, which is why this post has to exist. Drop the phrase 'family friendly' and list the four facts instead.
The brief that produces it “we have high chairs, half portions and the kitchen opens at 6.30 for families”
Whether you need to book, and when
The honest answer is different on a Tuesday than on a Saturday at nine, so give both. Say how many tables you hold for walk-ins and how late you'll still seat someone. Restaurants that never answer this lose the table that drove over, saw a queue at the door and ate somewhere else.
The brief that produces it “tuesday to thursday you can walk in, friday and saturday after 8 you should book”
The table nobody cancelled
Four covers that don't turn up on a Saturday is a concrete loss, and most of your followers have no idea. Say it plainly, once, without guilt-tripping anyone: if plans change, cancel and somebody else eats. Put the number or the cancellation link in the same post, because the friction is half the problem.
The brief that produces it “if you can't make your booking let us know, a message is enough and we give the table away”
How to actually find the door
If you're on a corner, up a staircase, behind an unmarked front, or on a street with nowhere to park, that's a post. Photograph the entrance from where a person arrives, not from the other side of the road. Add where to park and what stops nearby, and you remove the last reason someone gives up on you at ten to nine.
The brief that produces it “our door is the black one next to the pharmacy, free parking on the side street after 8”
The day the menu changes
A new seasonal menu is news, and news has a date on it. Post the day it starts and name three of the new dishes: one you'd recommend, one that's cheap, one that's strange. Most places announce it a week after the fact, which turns an event into an update.
The brief that produces it “the autumn menu starts thursday, three new dishes, mushrooms and pumpkin are back”
We're closed tonight, or we've run out
The oven broke, the power went, the kitchen sold the last lamb at nine. The instinct is to say nothing and hope nobody notices, which is exactly how a customer ends up at a locked door. Post it the moment you know, say when you're back, and don't over-explain: one sentence and a time is enough.
The brief that produces it “we're closed tonight, a problem in the kitchen, back tomorrow at midday”
The place next door
The wine shop on the corner, the bar people go to after dinner, the bookshop that stays open late. The mistake is the vague shout-out: name the place, say what you send people there for, and tag the account, or it reads as filler. Do it because the street works better that way, not as a trade — the transactional version is obvious and nobody shares it.
The brief that produces it “post about the wine shop across the street where we send people for a bottle after dinner”
Twenty-eight posts is a season of a restaurant's feed at two a week, with none of them repeating the one before. The content calendar takes the same approach across the year, month by month.
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