How to Check a Food Hygiene Rating Before You Eat Out
Every restaurant, takeaway, cafe and food shop in the UK is inspected and given an official hygiene rating — here's how to actually use that information before you book a table or order in.
What a hygiene rating actually tells you
A food hygiene rating is a snapshot from a local authority inspector's most recent visit, not a permanent grade. It covers three things: how safely food is handled and prepared, how clean and well-maintained the premises are, and how well management understands and controls food safety risks. It says nothing directly about taste, service or value — only about the risk of getting food poisoning there.
England, Wales and Northern Ireland use the Food Hygiene Rating Scheme (FHRS), a 0-5 scale. Scotland uses the separate Food Hygiene Information Scheme (FHIS), which is pass/fail rather than numeric. See the full ratings breakdown for what each score and status means.
Checking a rating before you go
The quickest way is to search by the business's name or postcode on the homepage. If you don't have a specific place in mind yet, browsing by area is usually more useful — every UK local authority has its own page listing the top-rated restaurants, takeaways, pubs and other food businesses there, sorted by their most recent inspection.
It's worth checking the inspection date alongside the score. A 5-star rating from three years ago is weaker evidence than a 5 from last month — busy kitchens change staff, suppliers and standards over time, and inspections don't happen on a fixed schedule for every business.
What a low rating doesn't necessarily mean
A 0-2 rating means the inspector found problems serious enough to require improvement, but it's a rating of a specific visit, not the business forever. Many places address the issues and get re-inspected — check the rating date and, on this site, the establishment's rating history to see whether a low score is old news or current. Newly opened businesses also sometimes show as "Awaiting Inspection" simply because an inspector hasn't visited yet, which isn't the same as a poor rating.
How fresh is the data?
This site syncs directly from the Food Standards Agency's published data once a day, so a newly published inspection result typically shows up here within 24 hours of the FSA releasing it. See the About & FAQ page for more on where the data comes from and how to report something that looks wrong.
Browse ratings near you
Jump straight to the top-rated places in some of the busiest areas, or see the full list.
See all UK areas →