Last updated . Source: SnagRes availability record, 61,530,416 checks across 284 restaurants through 19 October 2026. How we measure. Open dataset.
19 New York City restaurants tie as the hardest reservations by measured availability, each bookable on 0% of dates for two and 0% for four: 4 Charles Prime Rib, Atomix, Bungalow, Buvette, Don Angie, Ha's Snack Bar, Or'esh, Ramen By Ra, Semma, Tatiana by Kwame Onwuachi, The Ambassadors Clubhouse and The Corner Store, and 7 more. Measured by SnagRes across 39,871,200 availability checks of 84 New York City restaurants, as of 19 October 2026.
| Rank | Restaurant | Open for two | Open for four | Platform | Release rule |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 Charles Prime Rib | 0% | 0% | Resy | 9:00 AM ET, 21 days |
| 1 | Atomix | 0% | 0% | Tock | - |
| 1 | Bungalow | 0% | 0% | Resy | 11:00 AM ET, 20 days |
| 1 | Buvette | 0% | 0% | Resy | - |
| 1 | Don Angie | 0% | 0% | OpenTable | - |
| 1 | Ha's Snack Bar | 0% | 0% | Resy | 12:00 PM ET, 20 days |
| 1 | Or'esh | 0% | 0% | SevenRooms | - |
| 1 | Ramen By Ra | 0% | 0% | Resy | 9:00 AM ET, 1st & 15th of Month |
| 1 | Semma | 0% | 0% | SevenRooms | 9:00 AM ET, 15 days |
| 1 | Tatiana by Kwame Onwuachi | 0% | 0% | Resy | 12:00 PM ET, 28 days |
| 1 | The Ambassadors Clubhouse | 0% | 0% | Resy | - |
| 1 | The Corner Store | 0% | 0% | SevenRooms | 10:00 AM ET, 13 days |
| 1 | The Eighty Six | 0% | 0% | SevenRooms | - |
| 1 | The Four Horsemen | 0% | 0% | Resy | - |
| 1 | The Polo Bar | 0% | 0% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 1 month |
| 1 | Torrisi | 0% | 0% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 30 days |
| 1 | Una Pizza Napoletana | 0% | 0% | OpenTable | 9:00 AM ET, 14 days |
| 1 | Via Carota | 0% | 0% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 30 days |
| 1 | Wild Cherry | 0% | 0% | SevenRooms | 12:00 AM ET, 14 days |
| 20 | I Sodi | 0% | 3% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 13 days |
| 21 | Carbone | 0% | 10% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 30 days |
| 22 | Theodora | 0% | 20% | Resy | 9:00 AM ET, 30 days |
| 23 | Cote | 0% | 93% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 30 days |
| 24 | Le Veau d'Or | 3% | 3% | SevenRooms | 9:00 AM ET, fourteen days in advance |
| 25 | I Cavallini | 3% | 7% | Resy | 8:00 AM ET, 14 days |
| 26 | Jeju Noodle Bar | 7% | 3% | Resy | 12:00 AM ET, 44 days (reported) |
| 26 | Red Hook Tavern | 7% | 3% | OpenTable | - |
| 26 | Somssi | 7% | 3% | Resy | 10:00 AM ET, 14 days |
Method: Ranked by the share of dates in each restaurant's own booking window that had a bookable table for two at the latest check, then for four; ties share a rank. Tables held for walk-ins, the bar or the phone are not visible on booking platforms and are not counted. How we measure. Every release rule.
There is no single hardest table: 23 New York restaurants we track had every two-top taken across their window at our reading of 19 October 2026. The ranked table on this page lists them, with the rate for four beside each, and breaks ties by party of four.
We re-check 284 restaurants across New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago around the clock at two party sizes, which adds up to 61,530,416 availability checks. A restaurant scores 0% when no bookable table appeared on any date inside its own booking window at the reading, dated 19 October 2026. Rooms are ranked by that rate for two, then by the rate for four, and rooms that tie share a rank.
Measure it rather than trust the reputation. At our latest reading Carbone had a table for two on 0% of dates and for four on 10%, across 588,600 checks. But 81% of its dates opened at some point while we watched, and of 18,139 logged openings, 0% were between 7:00 and 8:30 PM and the most common slot is 11:30 AM.
Yes. A 0% reading is one moment. Carbone read 0% for two at the latest check, yet 81% of its dates opened at some point while we watched. Those openings are mostly cancellations that surface at unpredictable hours and go within minutes, which is why being alerted the instant one appears matters more than checking the app repeatedly.
Resy hosts the most of them, but not all. The 84 New York restaurants we track split 56 on Resy, 12 on SevenRooms, 9 on OpenTable and 7 on Tock, so a Resy-only habit misses every room on the other three platforms, including several on this ranking.
Across the 46 New York restaurants with a rule on record that gives both a time and a window, 9 AM accounts for 13 rooms, 10 AM for 14, midnight for 11 and noon for 5. The median booking window is 21 days.
No. It watches Resy, OpenTable, Tock and SevenRooms and tells you the moment a table opens, by email or text. It never books, holds or resells a reservation, which is the line that separates an alert service from the paid-reservation market New York's 2024 law was written to address.
At our latest reading, dated 19 October 2026, 23 of the 84 New York restaurants we track had every table for two taken across their booking window. The table above ranks them, with the rate for four beside each, because at some of these rooms a larger party is the way in.
The figures come out of 39,871,200 availability checks against those New York rooms, part of 61,530,416 across the 284 restaurants we follow in four cities. Each room is re-checked around the clock at two party sizes, so a percentage here is the share of dates in that restaurant's own window that had a table a normal person could have booked at that reading.
A 0% reading does not mean the room is empty. It means the public calendar had nothing open at that reading, which is a statement about how fast tables leave rather than about how many chairs exist. It also says nothing about bar seats, counter seats or walk-in lines, because those never appear on a booking platform at all.
We can write at this resolution because the list is short on purpose. Table Alert advertises 62,198 restaurants. We watch 284. Nobody covering 62,198 rooms can tell you that Monkey Bar has produced 483 observed release events, that 643,567 of its openings are on record, and that 100% of them were before 6 PM.
Carbone is the clearest example. At our latest check it had a table for two on 0% of the dates in its window and for four on 10%, across 588,600 checks. Yet 81% of the dates in that window opened at some point while we were watching. The tables exist. They leave within minutes.
What opens is the second problem. We have observed 581 release events at Carbone, and across 18,139 logged openings, 0% fell in the 7:00 to 8:30 PM band, 67% were before 6 PM, and the single most common open slot is 11:30 AM.
That is what "impossible" usually means in practice. The room is not refusing to seat you. It is refusing to seat you at the hour you asked about. A page that only reports a headline percentage cannot tell you that, and a service watching tens of thousands of restaurants has no way to know it about any one of them.
The same pattern runs well beyond the rooms at zero. Via Carota's most common open slot is 2:00 PM and 96% of its 42,364 openings were before 6 PM. Thai Diner's is 8:45 AM, with 98% before 6 PM. These rooms release the edges of the day and hold the middle.
Some rooms that read 0% for a couple do open for a larger party. The "For four" column in the table above shows which. I Sodi, for one, read 0% for two and 3% for four at the latest check, and The Four Horsemen 0% for two and 0% for four.
The mechanism is ordinary. Two-tops are the most requested shape in the city, so they clear first and stay cleared, while a room holding a four-top for a party that never materialised puts it back. If you have been reading a 0% restaurant as impossible, the honest read is that your party size may be the variable, not the restaurant.
Resy holds the majority, but not the share the advice usually implies. The 84 New York restaurants we track split 56 on Resy, 12 on SevenRooms, 9 on OpenTable and 7 on Tock.
So watching Resy alone and calling it thorough leaves 28 of the rooms we track outside your view, including several in the table above. Check its platform column before you assume.
Platform matters beyond where to click, because each one releases differently. Resy rooms mostly roll forward one date at a time. SevenRooms rooms often publish a rule in plain language on their own page, which is why our confirmed drop times skew toward them. OpenTable rooms tend to hold longer windows with quieter releases.
We watch all four together, which is the only way a single page can compare them. It is also the reason the platform counts on this page keep changing: restaurants move, and a claim about where a table lives goes stale faster than a claim about how often it opens.
46 New York restaurants on our list have a release rule on record that states both a time and a booking window, and the standard advice gets both halves of it wrong.
On the hour: 9 AM accounts for 13 of those rooms, 10 AM for 14, midnight for 11 and noon for 5. A handful sit at genuinely awkward hours, including 7 AM at The Four Horsemen and 8 AM at I Cavallini.
On the window: the median is 21 days. 11 rooms open 14 days ahead and 10 open 30 days ahead, so planning every restaurant to a single thirty-day rule puts you early at some and late at others.
If you are working out which alarms to actually set, the release-times table lists every published rule we have, and the guide to what to book before you fly turns them into a timeline.
Two routes work, and refreshing at a random hour is neither of them.
The first is the scheduled drop. If a room publishes a rule, be on the page at that minute with your party size chosen and your account logged in. For most of this list that means 9 AM, 10 AM or midnight New York time, and for a few it means 7 AM.
The second is a cancellation, which is how most people get into a room whose two-tops are all taken. Those arrive when a deposit deadline lapses or a plan changes, at every hour of the day, and they are taken within minutes. There is no technique that surfaces them. The only variable is whether something was watching when one appeared.
That is what SnagRes does: it re-checks the tracked list continuously across Resy, OpenTable, Tock and SevenRooms and sends an email or a text the moment a table opens. It does not book for you, hold a table under another name, or resell anything. TableSwap charges $75 per successful reservation, which is precisely the practice New York's 2024 reservation law was written to stop. We never take the table, so there is nothing to sell you back.
If your list is San Francisco rather than New York, the picture is different enough to need its own page: most of the hardest rooms there are not on Resy at all, and several release a whole month in one morning.
Keep reading: The live hardest-tables ranking · When every NYC restaurant releases tables · Live NYC availability · The hardest reservations in SF · Do you actually need a reservation in NYC? · What to book before you fly to New York
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SnagRes checks 284 hard-to-book restaurants across four cities and alerts you when one opens. Watching one is free and no card is needed: last-minute tables in NYC tonight.