AI for Restaurants on SevenRooms: Voice AI, Insights, Heep

A regular arrives on Saturday night. Nobody on the floor knows he always orders the same wine, left a lukewarm review last month, or spends more than half the dining room. Meanwhile the phone rings in the middle of service and the Instagram inbox has been waiting for an answer since noon. This is where AI for restaurants on SevenRooms, including Voice AI, and its alternatives, start to matter.

SevenRooms offers two native AI features: Client Insights, which summarizes a guest's profile before service, and Voice AI, which answers the phone. Both are useful, and both have precise limits. This guide explains what they do, how to set them up, what they leave uncovered, and how Heep complements them on messaging channels.

Client Insights: a guest profile summarized before service

Client Insights uses AI to summarize useful guest information: preferences, spending behavior, recent feedback. Your team no longer has to dig through notes, tags and POS history.

Insights are generated automatically two days before each reservation. By default the AI analyzes the guest's 20 most recent reservations and draws on data from your venue group:

• POS purchase history;
• client profile notes and tags;
• reservation notes and tags;
• guest reviews and feedback;
• online ordering history (SevenRooms Online Ordering and DoorDash Direct Ordering, meaning orders placed on the restaurant's own site).

They are regenerated before each reservation using the latest data. Each reservation shows up to three insights: food and beverage preferences, spending behavior, recent negative feedback.

Note: Client Insights is only available on select SevenRooms packages. If the feature does not appear in your account, your current package may not include it, and you will need to ask SevenRooms to add it.

Configure Client Insights and use it on the floor

Settings live in Settings > General > Venue Settings > AI Settings. Three options matter.

• Top Spender Threshold: what counts as a high-value guest? Choose Top 10%, Top 5%, Top 1%, or Hide spend insights if you don't want spend displayed. A neighborhood bistro will likely keep Top 10%; a fine-dining table might aim for Top 5% or Top 1%.
• Food & Beverage Data Scope: which venues feed the insights? The whole group, this venue only, or a custom selection. Example: a group with a Japanese restaurant and a brasserie can keep food preferences specific to each concept while sharing beverage preferences.
• Exclusion Controls: remove noise (water, bread, soft drinks, coffee or custom items) so the AI doesn't record "drinks water" as a preference.

Then there are three places to read them:

• The reservation slide-out: insights appear at the top. You can rate each one 👍 or 👎 ("Inaccurate", "Too generic", "Already known").
• Pre-Shift: insights appear on each reservation, with a filter to show only reservations that have them.
• Printed chits: insights are included by default. To remove them, go to Settings > Chit Printing & POS and turn off Include Insights on Chit.

For better results, keep entering reservation notes and client tags: they are the AI's raw material. Your Auto-tags feed the same base.

The limits of Client Insights

Here is what the feature does not do, according to SevenRooms documentation:

• Not every reservation gets insights. There must be enough guest history for a summary to make sense.
• Three insights maximum per reservation.
• Venue group data only: the AI knows nothing about what happened elsewhere.
• A cap of 300 insights per venue per day. Once reached, generation resumes the next day.
• Summaries can be incomplete or inaccurate. SevenRooms advises using them as support, not as truth.
• A qualifying package is required (see above). You can also turn the feature off in AI Settings.

Client Insights prepares your team. It answers nobody and doesn't fill a single cover: it is a dining-room service tool, not a booking tool.

AI restaurant SevenRooms Voice AI: answering the phone

Voice AI is a voice agent built into SevenRooms, with no API or third-party tool. It answers calls 24/7 and can:

• recognize a guest from their phone number and greet them by name;
• book, modify and cancel reservations in real time;
• answer common questions from your website, Google listing and SevenRooms data;
• text a payment link (deposit, prepayment, card on file);
• offer a table at another venue in your group when yours is full (cross-sell);
• transfer the call to your team when needed.

It speaks several certified languages: English, French, French Canadian, Spanish, Japanese and Italian. All activity is logged in the Voice AI Dashboard: calls, reservations created, covers generated, revenue attributed, time saved, recordings and transcripts (kept for 60 days).

Configure Voice AI and call transfers

Path: Marketing > Voice AI Dashboard > Settings. You'll find the number dedicated to your agent, already linked to your venue but not yet visible to guests. Three tabs: Agent Configuration, Venue Details, Advanced.

1. Venue Details: check the opening hours and the FAQs prefilled from your site and Google listing. Fix them, save.
2. Agent Configuration: choose voice, accent and tone. Turn on call transfer. A default number is mandatory.
3. Advanced: set the greeting, how off-topic questions are handled, and custom instructions.
4. Test: booking, modification, cancellation, common questions (hours, parking, dress code) and a request to speak to a human. Test reservations are real.
5. Forward your line: at your phone provider, forward your public number to the Voice AI number, using the SIP method so the caller's number is passed through.

Up to 3 transfer numbers. Since August 2026 you can set a default number plus two others (Voice AI > Agent Configuration > Call Escalation), then assign each number to a request type. Voice AI identifies the caller's intent and transfers to the right number. Example: front of house for general requests, the events team for large parties, sales for private dining. See also our guide to private dining and Event Management.

A useful rule: use an internal number for transfers, different from your public number. Otherwise the call can loop back to Voice AI.

To adapt behavior, use Custom Instructions in a "when the guest says X, do Y" form, for example: "If the caller says they are more than 30 minutes late, offer to transfer them." Hours, FAQs, pronunciations and transfer rules each have a dedicated setting, which is more reliable than a free-text instruction.

Voice AI limits to know before committing

The documentation is precise, and some limits will weigh more depending on your business.

Availability and prerequisites

• Countries: United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Singapore, Ireland and France (more to come).
• Package: Essentials, Growth or Premium (or newer), with the new reservation widget. Voice AI is an add-on.

Scope: phone only

• Voice AI does not answer on WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger or by e-mail.
• It is only connected to the standard reservation widget: it cannot book, modify or cancel reservations made through the Events widget. It doesn't yet answer event questions and doesn't share live wait times.
• It can only text two kinds of links: a payment link or the link to your widget (Upgrades). No menu by text, no taking messages for staff, no takeaway orders.
• Withheld caller number: no booking possible, no transfer.

What settings cannot change

• Custom Instructions cannot override your booking rules, deposits or privacy safeguards. You can't say "no credit card for VIPs."
• It isn't reliable with calendars: "on Sundays, announce the surcharge" won't work dependably. Put that information in the Access Rule description.
• Transfers can't be restricted by day or hour: handle that on the line receiving the call.
• The "you're speaking with an AI assistant, the call is recorded" disclosure can't be turned off.
• Voice AI doesn't read or use Profile Tags: no special handling by VIP tag.
• Menu and website changes aren't tracked automatically: if you re-scan the site, FAQs are recreated and your edits are lost. Copy them first.

Heep: the most complete restaurant AI, connected to SevenRooms

These limits leave a gap: your guests also write on WhatsApp and Instagram, and those messages never reach Voice AI. That is the ground of Heep, the AI for restaurants and hotels that māhie recommends and deploys. Heep integrates with SevenRooms: the two complement each other.

In practice, Heep offers:

• Unified messaging: WhatsApp, Instagram (DMs and story mentions), Messenger and e-mail in a single inbox, with an AI that replies. E-mails are sorted by topic and forwarded to the right person. A chat widget on your site connects to the same AI. iMessage and SMS are covered too.
• Missed calls: after an unanswered call, a WhatsApp or SMS goes out automatically. Heep Phone (new) adds a Heep number, call forwarding and transcribed voicemail.
• Reservations directly in SevenRooms: the guest asks, the AI checks availability and books in your software.
• Qualified groups and private events: requests are routed by party size, with date, budget, covers and contact captured.
• Follow-ups and reviews: reminder the day before, review request the next day, reactivation of inactive guests (not those who already booked), and a drafted reply for each Google, TripAdvisor or TheFork review, published when you decide. More in our article on filling quiet services.
• A Copilot to configure Heep and ask for numbers in plain language, a Memory (what the AI knows about your venue, with unanswered questions flagged so you can fill them in) and a dashboard: reservations, covers, recovered calls. iOS and Android apps are available.

According to Heep, on a sample from August 24 to September 23, 2026, extrapolated to a year (excluding tests), a venue saves an average of 312 reservations and generates €80,400 a year, 97% of conversations are settled without the team, and 55% of messages arrive during service or when the restaurant is closed. These are the vendor's figures: your results will depend on your message volume.

Note: Heep Phone handles the number, forwarding and transcribed voicemail, and catches missed calls by message. If you want an agent that picks up and books by voice, live, that is Voice AI's role.

Which one to choose for your situation

There is no single winner. Here is how to decide.

• You want to welcome regulars better on the floor. Client Insights is useful whichever AI solution you choose elsewhere: it works on the profile and service, not on first contact. Check that your package includes it.
• Your guests mostly reach you on WhatsApp, Instagram, Messenger or e-mail. Voice AI covers none of these channels. Heep is the fit.
• You miss calls during service. Two approaches: Voice AI if you are eligible (country, package, widget) and want a voice agent; Heep to catch the missed call by WhatsApp or SMS and centralize the rest of the conversation.
• You receive many group and private dining requests. Voice AI's three transfer numbers help on the phone side. Heep qualifies requests arriving by messaging. The two add up.
• You want end-to-end automation (follow-ups, reviews, reactivation, figures in a dashboard). That is Heep.

AI restaurant SevenRooms Voice AI: frequently asked questions

Need help deploying AI on SevenRooms?

Between Client Insights, Voice AI and Heep, the difficulty isn't the technology but the choice: which channel, which setting, which gain. māhie helps you decide, then set it up.

• Audit of your contact channels (phone, messaging, e-mail) and choice of the right solution
• Client Insights configuration: AI Settings, spend thresholds, data scope
• Voice AI setup: FAQs, Custom Instructions, transfer numbers, tests before going live
• Heep deployment connected to your SevenRooms, with follow-ups and reviews
• Team training and results tracking

Let's talk about your venue: discover our SevenRooms support or Contact māhie.