Restaurant Opening and Closing Checklist (Free Template)

A restaurant opening and closing checklist is a fixed list of shift tasks that front-of-house, back-of-house, and management staff complete before doors open and after service ends. Opening gets the building safe, stocked, and service-ready; closing secures the premises, protects food, and sets up the next shift.

Below are six ready-to-use lists — 110 tasks split by role — plus the temperature targets your logs need, and the order tasks run in.

Launching a new venue rather than opening today? That's a different checklist — see our guide to opening a restaurant.

How to Use These Checklists

Three rules separate a list that works from one that gets initialed without being read:

1. Write acceptance criteria, not verbs. "Clean the soda gun" gets a tick. "Soak soda gun nozzles for 10 minutes and rinse" gets done.
2. Assign by role, not by name. Rosters change weekly; roles don't.
3. Verify a sample, not the whole list. Spot-check three items a night, rotating which ones.

These lists sit one level below your standard operating procedures: the restaurant SOP explains how a task is done; the checklist confirms it happened. They're also your cheapest tool for training new hires.

Restaurant Opening Checklist

Safety and equipment first, then food and stock, then people. Budget 60 to 90 minutes across three teams working in parallel.

Front of House Opening Checklist

• Alarm off, entry time logged
• Exterior walk — debris, signage lights, entry mat
• Lights, music, HVAC to service setting
• Chairs down, wobbly tables leveled
• Tables, chairs, menus, host stand sanitized — no streaks under overhead light
• Place settings out, glassware and silverware polished
• Server station stocked: napkins, straws, to-go, condiments
• Water pitchers and ice wells filled
• Restrooms cleaned and restocked, leaks checked
• Entryway and dining room swept and mopped
• POS login, printer test, receipt paper loaded
• Bank counted and initialed
• Reservation book read — large parties, allergies, regulars
• Bar set: mats, garnishes, ice, glassware, taps flushed
• Sidewalk sign and patio out
• Front door unlocked at your posted time

A bar run as its own revenue center needs its own list — see our bar opening and closing checklist.

Back of House Opening Checklist

Temperature and labeling come before knife work — always.

• Walk-in, reach-in, freezer temperatures logged before touching product
• Overnight thawing checked — ice crystals, refreeze lines
• Last night's food covered, dated, labeled; past-date discarded
• Equipment on in stages — ovens and fryers first
• Hood on and drawing, pilots lit on every station
• Dish machine filled, heated, sanitizer strip-tested
• One thermometer per station calibrated (ice water, 32°F / 0°C)
• Prep surfaces, boards, small wares sanitized before the first cut
• Prep list pulled and assigned by station
• Stock rotated FIFO — near dates to the front
• Ingredients, sauces, garnishes brought to par
• Deliveries logged against invoices before storing
• Sanitizer buckets filled, clean towel in each
• Knife edges checked, dull ones swapped
• Line stocked: gloves, deli cups, liners, towels
• Last night's 86 list cleared or carried forward
• Hot holding at 135°F (57°C) before product goes in

Rebuilding how your kitchen runs a shift or fitting out a new one from the equipment list? Start there.

Manager Opening Checklist

Finish everything administrative before staff arrives — once people are on the floor, your job is people.

• Outside-in building walk: parking, signage, back dock, trash
• Last night's manager log read and acted on
• Alarm log checked, overnight entries accounted for
• Safe and drawer banks counted, change order and deposit prepared
• Staffing confirmed, call-outs filled now
• Pre-shift health check with every arriving employee
• Station chart posted, side work assigned
• Specials and price changes entered in restaurant POS
• Online ordering live, hours correct, yesterday's 86s switched back on
• Kitchen display online, routing to the right stations
• Card terminal tested — one-cent transaction run and voided
• Line check with the chef: taste, temperature, portion, appearance
• Reservation list reviewed, manager touches flagged
• Pre-shift briefing: specials, 86s, VIPs, one service focus, one safety point
• Restrooms and dining room checked again after front-of-house setup
• Fire exits clear, back door locked from outside
• Front door unlocked

The health check most checklists skip. Ask every arriving employee about vomiting, diarrhea, jaundice, sore throat with fever, or a lesion with pus — the five symptoms the FDA Food Code requires staff to report. Send anyone who has one home, and log it. In CDC's review of 800 outbreaks at retail food establishments, around 40% of those with an identified contributing factor involved food handled by an ill worker — and only 23% of managers had a policy naming all five symptoms.

Opening Sequence: 90 Minutes to Doors Open

Refrigeration faults have to surface early enough to call a technician, and prep can't start before surfaces are sanitized.

Temperature Checks: The Numbers Your Log Needs

"Check the temperatures" is not a checklist item — a number is. Under the FDA Food Code 2022, cold holding is 41°F (5°C) or below and hot holding is 135°F (57°C) or above. Everything in between is the danger zone.

The Food Code is a model code — most states adopt it; some amend it. Confirm the numbers your local health department enforces before you print your log.

Restaurant Closing Checklist

A restaurant closing checklist covers everything between the last order and locking the door: breaking down stations, storing and date-labeling food, counting the drawer, running the end-of-day report, shutting down equipment, and securing the building.

It takes 45 to 90 minutes after the last table leaves and follows a fixed order—food and refrigeration first, cleaning second, cash and security last. Skip that order, and you'll do half the work twice.

Front of House Closing Checklist

• Seating stopped at posted time, kitchen told of last order
• Tables, chairs, booths cleared, wiped, sanitized
• Chairs up, banquettes pulled out and cleaned behind
• Menus, check presenters, host stand wiped
• Glass doors and windows cleaned to hand height
• Condiments, napkins, salt and pepper to tomorrow's par
• Rag buckets emptied, brewers cleaned, soda nozzles soaking
• Glassware polished, silverware rolled for the morning
• Bar mats pulled and cleaned, spills underneath, taps plugged
• Restrooms cleaned, restocked, bins out
• All front-of-house floors swept and mopped, entryway included
• Trash and recycling out, liners replaced
• Drawer closed, counted, envelope handed to the manager
• Music off, lighting to overnight, thermostat set
• Breakages logged before clocking out
• Manager walkthrough completed before anyone leaves

Back of House Closing Checklist

Kitchen closing protects two things: the food you're keeping and the equipment you're using tomorrow.

• Finished stations broken down as the last order goes in
• Hot food cooled on the clock: 135°F → 70°F in 2 hours, then to 41°F in 4 more
• Every container dated, labeled, and covered before the walk-in
• Past-dated product discarded and logged
• Duplicate containers consolidated, FIFO rotated
• Closing walk-in, reach-in, freezer temperatures recorded
• Slicer, mixer, removable parts broken down and sanitized
• Fryer oil filtered or changed per schedule, and logged
• Flat top, grill, salamander scraped once cooled
• Hood surround wiped, filters cleaned on schedule
• Cookware, pans, small wares washed, sanitized, racked
• Dish machine and traps drained and cleaned
• Floor sink traps cleared
• Prep surfaces, boards, reach-in handles sanitized
• Floor swept and mopped, mats lifted and cleaned underneath
• Kitchen trash and food waste out, bins washed on schedule
• Key products counted against par levels, tomorrow's order written
• Morning prep list set
• Shutdown in order — fryers and flat top first, hood last

Nightly inventory counts catch shrinkage before it becomes a monthly surprise, and shutdown order has a price attached: per the EPA's ENERGY STAR program, restaurants use five to seven times more energy per square foot than other commercial buildings.

Manager Closing Checklist

• Last table paid before any cash count starts
• Each drawer counted and reconciled, over/short noted by server
• End-of-day (Z) report run, card batches and tips reconciled
• Deposit prepared, dropped, logged
• Change bank reset for the morning
• Online orders paused; no channel still accepting
• 86s updated on your own channel and every delivery app
• Kitchen display clear of open tickets, then shut down
• Labor compared to sales; anything unusual noted
• Both closing lists walked with the crew
• Three skip-prone tasks spot-checked, different ones each night
• Restaurant manager log written: sales, staffing, comps, breakages, guest issues, maintenance
• Repairs scheduled tonight, not left in the log
• Everything off except refrigeration and security
• Doors and windows locked, back door secured from outside
• Alarm set, panel confirmed armed
• Nobody leaves alone

Counting the drawer before the last check is paid guarantees a recount, and single-person cash handling at close is a standard condition for restaurant fraud.

Opening and Closing Your Digital Channel

Most checklists in circulation were written before restaurants took orders from four places at once. Without an open and a close here, you'll eventually sell a dish you ran out of at eight o'clock — or take a delivery order twenty minutes after the kitchen shut down.

At open:

• Today's hours correct on your ordering page and every delivery app
• Yesterday's 86s switched back on
• Kitchen display system online and routing correctly
• Test ticket run end to end — order placed, ticket on screen, receipt at the pass

At close:

• Online orders stopped at your cut-off, not when the last one arrives
• Anything you ran out of tonight 86'd for tomorrow morning
• No open tickets left on the kitchen screen before shutdown
• Tomorrow's hours set if they differ — holidays, private events, deliveries

In UpMenu's client data, The Wind-Chill Factory takes 52% of its orders through its own branded app and generates $386,000 a year from direct online ordering. A channel that size needs to open and close with the same discipline as the dining room.

Why These Checklists Work

Checklists don't make anyone a better cook. They remove the memory tax. Routines that live only in the head of whoever has worked there longest survive exactly until that person calls in sick — then the walk-in doesn't get logged, the fryer doesn't get filtered, and nobody notices until the health inspector or the P&L does. A written list also creates a record: when something goes wrong, you can see which step was skipped.