You have probably heard that delivery apps take around 30% of every order. That number is real, but the full picture is more complicated. The actual delivery app costs depend on which plan you choose, how you structure your menu, and whether those orders are truly bringing in new customers or just shifting your regulars to a more expensive channel.
If you are on DoorDash, UberEats, or Grubhub, you are likely paying somewhere between 15% and 30% per order. That range is wide enough to be the difference between a profitable delivery program and one that quietly bleeds money every month.
This article breaks down exactly what you are paying, where the hidden costs are, and how to figure out whether delivery apps are actually working for your restaurant.
How Delivery App Commissions Work
All three major delivery apps use tiered commission structures. The more you pay, the more visibility you get on the app. Here is what that looks like in practice.
DoorDash offers three tiers: Basic at 15%, Plus at 25%, and Premier at 30%. The Basic plan gives you the lowest commission but limits your delivery radius and buries you in search results. Premier gets you the widest reach and priority placement.
UberEats follows a similar model. Their Lite plan runs 15% but only covers pickup orders. Delivery starts at 25% and goes up to 30% if you want promoted placement. Grubhub charges between 15% and 25% depending on the plan, plus additional marketing fees if you want to appear higher in results.
Here is the math on a typical order. A customer places a $30 order on a 30% commission plan. The app takes $9. You receive $21. If your food cost on that order is 30%, that is another $9 gone. You are left with $12 to cover labor, rent, packaging, and everything else. On a 15% plan, you would keep $25.50 before food cost, which is a meaningful difference.
The tricky part is that the lower commission tiers often come with restrictions that make them less useful. A 15% plan with a tiny delivery radius might only generate a handful of orders per week, which barely justifies the time you spend managing it.
The Hidden Costs Beyond Commission
The commission percentage gets all the attention, but it is not the only cost. There are several others that add up fast.
Packaging is the obvious one. Delivery orders need containers that travel well, and those cost more than what you would use for dine-in. Expect to spend $1 to $3 per order on delivery-specific packaging, depending on what you serve. On a $30 order, that is another 3-10% gone.
Most delivery apps send orders through a separate tablet, not your existing POS system. That means someone on your team has to monitor an extra screen, manually punch orders into your POS, and deal with the errors that come with double entry. POS integrations exist but typically cost $50 to $150 per month per app. If you are on all three major apps, that is up to $450 per month just to get orders into your system cleanly.
Then there are refunds. When a customer complains about a missing item or cold food, the delivery app often issues a refund and charges it back to you, even when the problem was clearly on the driver's end. Many owners report eating $200 to $500 per month in refunds they had no control over.
Finally, most restaurants mark up their delivery menu prices by 15-20% to offset commissions. That is a reasonable strategy, but it creates its own problem. Customers notice. Some will compare your delivery price to your dine-in price and feel ripped off. If you are thinking about adjusting your pricing, our guide on how to raise menu prices covers how to do it without alienating your regulars.
When Delivery Apps Make Sense
Delivery apps are not universally bad. For some restaurants, they genuinely work. The key is understanding when and why.
If you are a new restaurant, delivery apps can put you in front of thousands of local customers you would never reach otherwise. The commission is essentially a marketing cost, and compared to what you would spend on ads to get the same exposure, 25-30% on incremental orders can be reasonable during your first year.
They also work well when the orders are truly incremental. If a delivery order comes in at 8:30 PM when your kitchen is slow and your staff is already on the clock, the marginal cost of filling that order is low. You are using capacity that would otherwise go to waste. The commission hurts less when your fixed costs are already covered.
High-volume, low-complexity items tend to perform best on delivery. Think bowls, burritos, pizza, wings. These items travel well, have relatively low food costs, and can be assembled quickly without pulling your line cooks away from dine-in tickets. Knowing which menu items to feature on delivery apps versus your in-house menu can make a real difference in profitability.
Restaurants doing $5,000 or more per month through a single delivery app often find they can negotiate better commission rates. The apps want to keep high-volume partners, and a quick email to your account rep asking for a rate reduction is worth the five minutes it takes.
When They Don't
If your average ticket is under $20 and your food cost is above 32%, the math almost never works on a 30% commission plan. A $18 order at 30% commission leaves you $12.60. Subtract $5.76 in food cost and $2 in packaging, and you are left with $4.84 to cover labor and overhead. That is not a business model.
Fine dining and high-ticket restaurants rarely benefit. Your food does not travel well, your brand is built on the in-house experience, and your customers are not browsing DoorDash at 7 PM on a Saturday. The delivery app audience and your audience are usually two different groups.
Some food just does not survive a 20-minute car ride. If you serve items that need to be plated carefully, eaten immediately, or maintained at a precise temperature, delivery will produce a worse version of your food. That leads to bad reviews on the app, refund requests, and brand damage that is hard to quantify but very real.
Many owners describe feeling trapped. They cannot afford the commissions, but they are afraid that turning off delivery apps will cost them 20-30% of their revenue. If that describes your situation, the answer is usually not to quit cold turkey. It is to build alternatives over time so you are less dependent.
Alternatives to Third-Party Delivery
The most effective alternative is getting customers to order directly from you. A direct order on your own website or menu page means zero commission and a customer relationship you actually own.
This does not have to be complicated. A simple online menu with your phone number and a clear way to place an order is enough for many restaurants. Having a strong digital menu that shows up when people search for you is one of the most underrated things you can do. Bitesized digital menus make it easy to keep your menu visible and up to date so customers find you directly instead of through a delivery app.
In-house delivery is another option if you have the volume to justify it. Hiring your own drivers costs money, but you keep the full ticket price and control the customer experience. The breakeven point is usually around 30-40 deliveries per day, depending on your area and driver wages. Below that, the cost per delivery is hard to justify.
Pickup incentives are the simplest play. Offer a 10% discount on pickup orders and promote it on table tents, receipts, and your social media. You save the commission, the customer saves money, and the food quality is better because it is not sitting in a car for 20 minutes. Compare that to what you spend on printed menus and materials and the savings become clear quickly.
You can also use delivery apps strategically rather than relying on them. Keep a limited menu on the apps, featuring only your highest-margin items, and direct everything else to your own ordering channels. Treat the app as a marketing tool with a known cost, not as your primary sales channel.
Own Your Customer Relationship
The biggest cost of delivery apps is not the commission. It is that the customer belongs to the app, not to you. They ordered from DoorDash, not from your restaurant. You do not get their email, you cannot reach out to them next week, and if DoorDash changes their algorithm, those orders can disappear overnight.
Building a direct connection with your customers starts with being easy to find online. When someone searches for your restaurant, your menu should be the first thing they see, not a delivery app listing with a 20% markup.
Bitesized helps you put your menu front and center so customers come to you directly. It is a small step, but it is the one that moves delivery app costs from something you cannot control to something you can.