Restaurant staff schedule template.
One weekly sheet for the whole restaurant: front of house on top, kitchen below. For each job and each service you type how many people the day needs, and the sheet counts who is scheduled – so a Saturday dinner that is one server short shows on the day the schedule is written.
Free, no email required. Made for Excel and Google Sheets (File → Import).
What is in the file
- Front of house and kitchen – two blocks in one grid: hosts, servers, bartenders and bussers, then line cooks, prep and dish.
- Shifts by service – lunch, dinner, the kitchen line, morning prep and close, each with its paid hours. Your own hours go in one place and the drop-down lists follow.
- Who you need each day – for each job and shift, a number for every day of the week: three servers on a Tuesday dinner and five on a Saturday in the example. The line under it reads "4 of 5" when you are one short.
- Weekly hours – per person, with anyone above the number at the top of the sheet marked.
- A blank week to print – the PDF is the same grid without the example.
How to use it
- Replace the example team with yours. Write each job title the same way on every row – Server, Line cook – because the counts look at it.
- Set your shifts in the shift list near the bottom of the sheet: the hours as you write them, and the paid hours of each.
- Under "Who you need each day", type how many people each service needs, day by day. Leave a day empty where a job is not needed, for example lunch servers on weekdays.
- Fill in the week from the list in each cell.
- Read the lines marked "scheduled". In the example week, Saturday dinner reads 4 of 5 for servers.
- Print it or share the file, and keep one sheet per week.
What a restaurant schedule has to get right
Two teams, one week
The dining room and the kitchen are often scheduled by two people, and the two schedules meet only on a busy night. One sheet shows both at once: a full team in the dining room is of little use on a night when the line is one cook short.
A number for each day
The same headcount all week leaves one day short or another with more people than the work. Typing a number per day takes a few minutes the first time, and every later week starts from it.
Lunch and dinner on the same day
Someone who works both services has a long day even when the hours worked are modest. In New York, a day that runs more than 10 hours from the first start to the last finish brings one more hour of pay at the basic minimum hourly rate (Hospitality Industry Wage Order, 12 NYCRR 146-1.6). New York rules on hours and rest explains it, with the source.
Hours that add up through the week
A server who picks up two extra dinners can pass 40 hours before anyone has added them up. The Hours column does the adding while the schedule is written. Under US federal law, overtime pay starts after 40 hours in a workweek for employees the law covers (source: US Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division). Your state may add its own rules.
What the next service needs to know
What is off the menu, which party moved to 7:30, what is booked for the back room: the schedule says who is on, and a note says what they walk into. The shift handover template is a one-page form for that note.
Common questions
Can one person have two jobs, for example server and bartender?
Give the person one row for each job title. The counts look at the job title of the row, so a bar shift on the bartender row counts toward the bar and a shift on the server row counts toward the dining room. Their hours then show on two rows.
How do I schedule a split shift?
A cell holds one shift. For someone who works lunch and dinner on the same day, use a second row for the second shift. Each row counts toward its own service, and the two rows together show the hours of the day.
Does it work for a restaurant that is closed on some days?
Yes. Leave that day empty for everyone, and leave it empty under "Who you need each day". An empty need is not counted as short.
Does it work in Google Sheets?
Yes. Upload the .xlsx file to Google Drive and open it with Google Sheets, or use File → Import inside a sheet. The file uses drop-down lists, highlighted cells and the COUNTIF family of functions, all of which Google Sheets has.
When the template stops being enough
A weekly sheet holds until the week changes after it is posted. A server calls in sick, two people agree to swap, and the printed copy on the wall is the earlier version.
In Schedio the schedule has one current version. A shift that opens can be offered to the team and taken from a phone, a swap waits for your approval if you want it to, each person gets their own shifts and a reminder before each one in Telegram or WhatsApp, and the note from the lunch team is there for the dinner team. It costs $49 a month per restaurant, for any number of staff.
No card · first month free · cancel anytime · plus tax at checkout