Will Robots Take Over Restaurants? The Future of Automation in Dining

Back in 2022, at a dumpling restaurant in Brooklyn, CNN Travel hosted a contest worth revisiting. The challenge? A three-part showdown to know who’s better at waiting tables.

On one side, you have a seasoned human waiter with eight years of experience. On the other, a robo-cat waiter with two years on the job.

Back then, the idea of robots replacing humans felt almost laughable—a fun gimmick, not a genuine threat. But fast-forward to today, and the question feels sharper: Is this robo-cat actually a sneak peek into the future of dining? And if so… are we ready?

Coffee, Fries, and Robot Surprises: The 2025 Kitchen Crew

When we think of robots in restaurants, we imagine robots taking orders and making small talk, but the real shift is quieter. In restaurant kitchens, machines are already handling the heavy lifting. While robotic waiters grab headlines, automation is reshaping the industry where it matters most—behind the scenes.

For cafes, expecting the morning rush of orders is almost a given. But the growing labor shortage and rising food prices add up to contribute to employee burnout making it even more difficult for cafes to retain enough staff to field morning operations.

That’s where Artly’s Barista Bot comes in. This robotic arm, programmed to follow a precise set of instructions, offers the much-needed support. While it currently operates at the same speed as a human barista, it provides an extra hand to fulfill more orders and get customers ready for the day.

Operating the fry station can be dangerous due to the increased risk of burns from hot oil and high propensity for grease fires. This is the reason why manning the fry station is often the hardest position to fill and retain in QSRs. Enter Miso Robotics’ Flippy 2 — which closely resembles machines typically seen in manufacturing. Although its first iteration was tasked with flipping burgers, Flippy 2 promises to deliver faster, more accurately cooked fries as soon as the order comes in. 

Having Robots in Restaurants: The Good, the Glitchy, and the Greasy

The restaurant sector isn’t the only industry bearing the weight of the growing labor shortage. Industries like manufacturing have already begun the shift towards automation and AI in response. That said, since restaurants rely heavily on customer satisfaction, the impact can be quite different. Let’s consider the pros and cons of robots in front- and back-of-house operations.

The Upside of Robots in Restaurants

1. No burnout, no turnover
   Robots don’t just handle grueling tasks—they thrive in environments humans find unsustainable. In a fast-paced kitchen, tensions can run high among employees, potentially impacting service hours. With robots, as long as they’re fueled and maintained, they’ll keep working without disruption.
   
2. Consistency
   Since each robot is pre-programmed to follow a set of instructions, every output they create will be identical to the last one every single time. In a world where consumers prioritize consistency when dining out, robots become silent ambassadors of quality.
   
3. Labor crunch relief
   Robots don’t solve the crisis, but they plug critical gaps. The upfront cost can be quite high, but the long-term cost benefits might just outweigh the capital.
   

The Downside of Robots in Restaurants

Service without the soul
While robots excel at transactional tasks, hospitality’s heart—empathy, adaptability, charm—remains irreplaceably human. Restaurants aren’t factories. Sure, KPIs and profit margins matter, but the industry’s magic lies in human connection — something no algorithm can replicate. So while robots optimize efficiency, they risk reducing dining to a sterile exchange.

Costs and glitches
Automation and AI come with a high up front price tag. Add to that the cost of maintenance to avoid an even costly scenario: machine downtime during service.

Creativity
While robots excel at consistency, they falter at flexibility. Not every service is perfect. Sometimes a customer gets upset, sometimes ingredients have to be swapped last minute. These scenarios require a bit of empathy and problem-solving—traits that AI and robotics don’t yet possess.

What the Future Might Hold

Upselling with AI-Powered Kiosks: Next-gen kiosks will use facial recognition, past order data, and real-time mood analysis to tailor recommendations. Craving a burger? The kiosk “notices” you’re eyeing the vegan menu and suggests a plant-based patty. 

Robot Cleanup Crew Closing time won’t mean mopping floors or scrubbing grills. Autonomous bots will handle the drudgery, using UV-C light for sanitization. Some might even be programmed to crawl into fryers to scrape buildup. Perhaps with robotic cleanup crews we can expect 24/7 spotless kitchens—and humans finally clocking out on time.

Hyper-Personalized Food Delivery. In the future, instead of waiting for a human courier to navigate through traffic, we just might see drones zipping meals to your door in under 15 minutes. Meanwhile, “ghost kitchens” staffed entirely by bots will pump out delivery-only menus optimized by AI (think: trending TikTok foods, localized flavor twists). 

So Who Won? The Human Waiter or the Robo-cat Waiter? 

Dimmer and Summer — the dumpling restaurant mentioned in the beginning of this piece — had already closed, but the reviews which you can still read online provide us insight to how people would react if we bring in robots as waitstaff. 

While there were numerous mentions of the gliding cat robot, the glowing reviews have more to do with the quality of the food and friendliness of the staff. The robo-cat was a great addition to the novelty of the restaurant, but it was the food and the actual service that took the cake.

The bottomline? The future likely hinges on collaboration: Let bots handle the grind, while humans focus on creativity, problem-solving, and turning each meal into a memory. And if you’re really curious as to who won the contest, it was Leo the Human Waiter with a  2-1 score.