8 of the Best Food Apps and Sites for Travelers

For many of us, food and travel are inextricably linked, and there’s often nothing better than stumbling upon a small, inconspicuous restaurant jam-packed with locals.

If you’d rather do a little research before hitting the streets for dinner, however, you’ve got plenty of options. A number of useful apps and sites let you check out what options are available, make reservations, and get discounts around the world.

For those wanting a greater understanding of the local food culture, there’s the opportunity of exploring farmer’s markets and dining with locals, while vegetarians and vegans are also covered all over the world.

These are the very best food apps and sites for travelers, helping you find culinary gems, easily book tables, and gain a greater understanding of what’s going in your mouth when you’re on the road.

EatWith

Sometimes when you’re traveling, all you want is the comfort of a home-cooked meal. Not only does it make a nice change from eating in restaurants all the time, it’s also a great way of getting an insight into local life and food culture.

It’s not always easy to make the personal connections that allow for this type of experience, though, especially for introverted travelers or if you’re only in town for a few days. That’s where EatWith comes in.

The app lets you make reservations for culinary events around the world, hosted by locals. The experiences vary, but often involve dinners, tasting menus, market tours, and wine tastings, among other things.

TravelingSpoon

Like EatWith, TravelingSpoon helps you connect with locals for culinary adventures. Focused on a more holistic approach to food (in other words, the entire process of preparing a meal,) you can often book a complete food experience.

This typically involves shopping at a local market to select and buy the ingredients, preparing the meal, and then eating it with a local. The experience is akin to a cooking class and home-cooked dinner rolled into one. Booking and paying are handled directly by TravelingSpoon.

The service’s advantage is its breadth of options, with the app letting you book culinary and cultural tours in 25+ countries and 50+ cities around the world. This can include visits to markets, outdoor food vendors, wine bars, or restaurants.

Examples include a “small bites” tour of Rome, a floating market tour of Bangkok, and a wine and tapas tour of Lisbon. You can view the itinerary before you book, along with the languages spoken by the guides.

Eatigo

For restaurant reservations in Southeast Asia, Eatigo is a great option. It’s one of the most popular food apps in the region, and currently serves users in Thailand, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, India, the Philippines, and Indonesia.

You can book a table at 4500+ restaurants, ranging from high-end establishments to local food joints. This app has loads of categories such as “Date Night,” “Hotel Buffets,” “Sushi Mania,” and “Wine Bars,” and you can check out menus and user reviews before booking.

You can apply filters to narrow down your search, including by type of cuisine or special deals, and check availability for a certain date, time, and number of people. There’s no fee for making a reservation, as the restaurants shoulder the cost.

Yelp

Yelp is a well-known international tool, but particularly shines for restaurants in the United States. Advanced filters include food type, rating, distance from your current location, and opening hours, among many others, and make it easy to find what you’re looking for.

You can make reservations from within the app, and access any available promotions or discounts. Yelp’s Elite Squad program incentivizes people to write detailed and lengthy reviews in return for privileged access to various promotions and events.

HappyCow isn’t just for restaurants, with health food and grocery stores, food trucks, and farmer’s markets listed as well. Since it provides such a valuable niche service, it’s a great resource to support as a contributor, and the app makes it easy to upload reviews and photos of places you find.

You can search for a particular type of seafood, view sushi listings based on both English and Japanese names, and access educational resources on sustainable seafood.