How we choose the spots
A clear threshold, genuine source data, and distance—not a personal review or a promise of the perfect meal.
What qualifies
A venue must have a Google rating of at least 4.5 stars and at least 100 Google reviews. Exactly 100 reviews qualifies. We include restaurants, cafés and coffee shops. All venues is the default, including places regardless of opening hours so you can plan a future booking. Open now includes only venues Google reports open when the source is checked. On the homepage and London guides, “When are you going?” lets you pick a date and time up to 60 days ahead and shows only venues whose regular Google opening hours have them open then, read in the venue’s local time.
Missing ratings and review counts are not guessed. Unknown opening status is allowed in All venues but excluded from Open now and from a chosen visit time. Regular hours may not reflect holidays or one-off closures, so check with the venue before you go. Opening status is not a promise of table availability.
Where the information comes from
Names, addresses, ratings, review counts, reported opening status, place categories, photos, website links and available price information come from Google Places. Cuisine labels are derived from Google’s place categories. Where available, a venue’s published menu link or approved listing photos may supplement its card.
Google ratings are third-party ratings, not reviews collected or verified by FourPointFive. We do not claim personal visits. Check a venue on Google Maps and confirm important details with the restaurant.
How results are selected and ranked
We search restaurants, cafés and coffee shops separately, expanding through fixed search stages of 2, 5, 10, 20, 35 and 50 kilometres. Google’s searches use rectangular areas around these distances, not exact circular boundaries, so a returned venue may be farther away than the stated stage. The search stops once ten qualifying venues are found or the stages are exhausted. Google’s search coverage affects which places are available; this is not an exhaustive list.
Qualifying results are sorted nearest first using straight-line distance from your selected location or the guide’s stated search point, not walking distance. “View more” can search a wider stage. “Surprise me” chooses from qualifying results outside the initial ten; it does not change the eligibility rules.
When data is checked
Each returned venue internally records the time its data was obtained from Google. Identical searches reuse a shared result for up to ten minutes; a cache read is not a fresh Google check. After expiry, the next request attempts a new check—there is no continuous background refresh.
Opening status, ratings, review counts and prices may change after that check. Saved spots retain the earlier check time and are not automatically refreshed. Approximate prices are not a quote. If source data is unavailable, we show an unavailable message rather than invent results.
Booking links and independence
Direct reservation links lead to the venue website or its Google Maps listing. An OpenTable button appears when we find a booking link on the venue’s own website; this check can miss venues that do not publish one. OpenTable links use partner tracking and may generate revenue for FourPointFive.
Booking affiliation does not lower the rating or review threshold or change the nearest-first ordering. Always confirm booking availability on the destination website.
Search limits
Interactive searches are limited to one every ten seconds and fifteen per visitor per UTC day, resetting at midnight UTC. Requests for additional results and changing between All venues, Open now or a chosen visit time after a search count. Cuisine filtering or picking again from already loaded results does not use another Google search. Opening a public London guide or switching between All venues and Open now there uses a shared, bounded cache rather than your interactive allowance; picking a visit time, “View more” and a “Surprise me” that needs another batch do count.
Browse London guides, learn about FourPointFive, or see contact information.