An OpenTable alternative with no cover fees and a published price
The short answer
OpenTable charges a subscription plus a fee for every diner seated from their network, not for bookings made direct. Gaplessly charges a flat monthly plan price, free up to 35 bookings a month on Venue Starter, with no fee per diner from any source.
OpenTable pricing, side by side with ours
OpenTable's figures were read off their own pricing page on 19 September 2026. Check them at the source before deciding, and tell us if anything here has gone out of date.
OpenTable
A monthly subscription plus a fee for every diner seated from OpenTable’s own network, across two tiers (Core and Pro).
- Cover fees
- Charged per seated diner from their network
- Their plans page states cover fees apply to diners who find you on OpenTable’s site, app or affiliate network, and not to bookings made direct through your own site or by phone.
- No-shows and cancellations
- Never charged a cover fee
- Their own FAQ, verbatim: restaurants only pay for seated diners, and no-shows and cancellations are never billed a cover fee.
- Contract term
- 1 year, auto-renewing
- Their own FAQ states the standard contract is one year and auto-renews annually unless you tell them 30 days before the renewal date that you do not want it to.
- Deposits and no-show protection
- Listed as a plan feature
- Their plans page lists "Deposits and credit card holds" as a feature, without publishing which tier includes it or what it costs.
- Premium SMS Messaging
- Included on Pro, A$19/mo add-on on Core
- Custom automated SMS to guests, read directly from their plans page DOM (the two tier columns render as CSS-table divs, not a real <table>, so the two prices only resolved by inspecting each column node individually): the one dollar figure their AU pricing page actually publishes today.
- Subscription and per-cover rates
- Not published here
- Their Australian plan pages did not return figures we could read at source on 2026-08-11, re-checked 2026-09-12 and again 2026-09-19 with the same result, so we print none. When we can read them, they will appear in this table.
Gaplessly
Published monthly plans. No commission and no fee per cover, on any plan.
- Appointments, from
- A$0/mo
- Solo, one person: free up to 50 bookings a month, A$19 in a busier one.
- Appointments, team
- A$59/mo
- Growth. 3 bookable team members, then A$12/mo each.
- Table reservations, from
- A$0/mo
- Venue Starter: free up to 35 bookings a month, A$49 in a busier one.
- Booking limit
- None on appointment plans
- Fair use is 1,000 a month per team member. Venue plans cover 100, 350 or 1,500 bookings a month.
- Commission on a booking
- None, ever
- Fee per cover
- None, ever
- Customer record limit
- None
- Email confirmations and reminders
- Included, unmetered, every plan
- Text messages
- A$0.09 per text
- On the Growth and Pro plans, because the carrier charges us per text. No activation fee.
- Add-ons
- A$14.99 or A$29/mo each
- All included on the Pro plans.
- Prices shown
- Excluding GST
Source: opentable.com.au. Figures shown in Australian dollars.
Where we compare, feature by feature
Gaplessly is ahead on 3 of 7, 4 about the same.
Pricing structure
- Gaplessly
- Flat monthly plan sized by bookings: free up to 35 a month, then A$49 to A$199
- OpenTable
- Monthly subscription plus a fee for every diner their network seats
Price transparency
- Gaplessly
- Full price published: Venue Starter free up to 35 bookings, then A$49; Venue Growth A$99; Venue Pro A$199
- OpenTable
- AU subscription and per-cover rates not published at source
Fee on bookings you bring yourself
- Gaplessly
- No fee ever, from any source
- OpenTable
- Direct site and phone bookings are exempt from the cover fee too
Cost for a business with no existing following
- Gaplessly
- Flat fee either way, whether you already have a following or not
- OpenTable
- Fee applies only to diners their network actually sends; useful with no following
Business-type scope
- Gaplessly
- One login runs appointments and table reservations for hybrid businesses
- OpenTable
- A marketplace built specifically for restaurant table reservations
Contract commitment
- Gaplessly
- No contract, no minimum term, cancel any time
- OpenTable
- Standard contract is 1 year, auto-renews annually unless you give 30 days’ notice
Deposits and no-show protection
- Gaplessly
- Card-on-file deposits and no-show fees, included from Venue Growth up or A$14.99 a month on Venue Starter
- OpenTable
- Listed as a plan feature; which tier and what it costs are not published
Two different businesses, not two versions of one
OpenTable sells demand. The cover fee is the price of a diner they found for you, and by their own description it does not apply to a booking that came through your own site or over the phone. Understood that way it is a coherent deal: you are buying customers, and you pay for the ones that arrive.
We sell software. We do not send you diners and we do not take a cut of the ones you find yourself. You pay for the monthly plan, and a full Friday costs exactly the same as an empty Tuesday.
The question is not which is cheaper. It is whether you are buying demand or buying tools. If your room fills on its own, you are paying a marketplace to book guests who were coming anyway.
The price is on the website
This category has a habit of hiding numbers behind a call. Ours are published: Venue Starter is free up to 35 bookings a month and A$49 in a busier one, Venue Growth is A$99 a month and Venue Pro A$199, with Venue Custom for 6 or more venues or more than 1,500 bookings a month. You can read them, compare them and decide without speaking to anyone.
We could not print OpenTable's Australian figures beside them here, because their plan pages did not return numbers we could read at source. Rather than repeat a figure from a comparison site, this page prints none. When we can read them, they will appear in the table above.
A year-long contract, or free to leave
OpenTable's own FAQ states the standard contract runs a year and renews itself unless you give them 30 days' written notice before it does. That is a real commitment to make before you know whether the marketplace fee earns its keep.
Gaplessly has no contract on any plan. Cancel any time, with nothing to give notice of.
They also list deposits and credit card holds as a plan feature, without saying which tier or what it costs. Ours is card-on-file, included from Venue Growth up or A$14.99 a month on Venue Starter, and the prices are above.
What the floor actually does
The two things venue managers react to in a demo are both about setup speed. You can build a whole room of identical tables in one action rather than adding thirty tables one at a time. And you can close an entire room or level with one tap when it goes to a function, rather than faking a booking on every table to block it out.
- Tables, areas and automatic allocation, with a live floor view of what is held, seated and free.
- Service periods that match real sittings, including a period that runs past midnight as one period.
- Table combining for large parties, and party-size rules deciding what can book online.
- Big-group enquiries handled in the platform and converted into a real booking, instead of a thread in your inbox.
When OpenTable is the right choice
You want OpenTable’s network to fill your quiet Tuesdays and you are happy to pay for the diners it sends. For a new restaurant with no following, a marketplace that carries demand is worth real money, and their per-cover fee only applies to the diners they actually bring you.
Common questions
Does Gaplessly charge per cover?
No. There is no fee per diner, per cover or per booking, from any source, on any plan. You pay your plan’s published monthly price, plus any add-ons you choose and any texts you send, and a full service costs the same as an empty one.
How does OpenTable charge?
A monthly subscription plus a fee for each diner seated from OpenTable's network. Their plans page states cover fees apply to diners who discover the restaurant on OpenTable's site, app or affiliate network, and not to bookings made direct through the restaurant's own website or by phone.
What does it cost for a restaurant?
Venue Starter is free up to 35 bookings a month and A$49 in a busier one, up to 100. Venue Growth is A$99 a month for up to 350, and Venue Pro A$199 for up to 1,500. Every plan has tables, areas, automatic allocation, the live floor view, confirmations and reminders. Deposits, party-size rules and big-group enquiries are included from Venue Growth up, and table combining is from Venue Growth up. All exclude GST, and none has a cover fee.
Can I move without losing my upcoming bookings?
Yes. Export your upcoming reservations and we will import them along with your floor plan. For the first 50 businesses we build the room and do the setup ourselves within 48 hours at no cost, so you can compare the real thing against what you use now.
How much does OpenTable cost in Australia?
OpenTable does not publish a subscription or per-cover number. Their plans page names two tiers, Core and Pro, but every price sits behind "Get Pro," "Get Core" or "Contact sales," all of which lead to a form rather than a figure. We checked again on 2026-09-19 and it still is not published anywhere on the page. The one dollar figure the page does publish is a A$19/mo Premium SMS Messaging add-on on Core, included free on Pro.
Do I have to sign a contract?
With OpenTable, yes. Their own FAQ states the standard contract runs a year and auto-renews annually unless you give 30 days' written notice before it does. Gaplessly has no contract on any plan, and you can cancel any time.
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Related help articles
- Your cancellation, reschedule and no-show policy
One policy on Settings, Booking rules controls whether guests can change bookings themselves, how much notice they need, and what happens once that window closes.
- Deposits, to reduce no-shows
A deposit charges a customer's card at the moment of booking, and is refunded or kept automatically based on your cancellation window.
- The card-on-file no-show fee
Card on file saves a customer's card at no charge when they book, and lets your team charge a no-show fee by hand afterwards, only if it's actually needed.
Do not take our word for it. Open the demo.
The real product, running with example businesses. No account, no card, and nothing to uninstall afterwards.
Open the live demo