Online ordering system for Harlow takeaways and restaurants

Chefzi is an online ordering system for takeaways and restaurants in Harlow: your own ordering site and branded Android app (iOS coming soon), 0% commission, plans from £9 a month billed yearly, first month free with no card, month to month with no contract. The FSA register lists 51 takeaway and sandwich shop premises and 129 restaurant and café premises in Harlow (pulled 13 November 2026).

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How many takeaways and restaurants Harlow has

Harlow registers 693 food businesses of every kind with the Food Standards Agency. 51 of them are takeaway or sandwich shop premises and 129 are restaurants, cafés or canteens. Among the 45 councils the FSA lists in East of England, Harlow is number 38 for takeaway premises.

Restaurants and cafés outnumber takeaways by more than two to one (129 against 51), so sit-down kitchens that also do collection are a big part of the market.

Takeaway density: 5.2 premises per 10,000 residents (population 98,543, ONS mid-2025 estimate), below 9.1 across the UK and 7.2 in East of England. Visitors and commuters are not counted in the population, so town centres read high.

Hygiene results for takeaways

51 takeaway premises in Harlow have a published rating. 62.7% of them hold a 5, against 62% across England, and 0% are rated 0 to 2. In East of England as a whole, 67.4% of rated takeaways hold a 5, so Harlow is below its region.

No takeaway premises are shown as awaiting inspection, and 30 (59%) had a rating date in the last 12 months. A 5 is not the default here, so a kitchen that holds one can say so on its own ordering page. How hygiene ratings work for takeaways.

What stands out in Harlow

• Hygiene ratings differ by district: 92% of rated takeaways in CM18 hold a 5, against 48% in CM20.
• East Hertfordshire, 6 miles away, has 109 takeaway premises against 51 in Harlow, so Harlow customers have fewer local rivals.
• CM20 alone holds 53% of the takeaway premises in Harlow (27 of 51), so a kitchen there is competing with a dense cluster for the same customers.
• Harlow has the number 11 most takeaway premises of the 14 council areas in Essex.
• Restaurants and cafés here do much better on hygiene ratings than takeaways: 78.5% hold a 5 against 62.7% for takeaways.

Postcode districts and delivery zones

Harlow has takeaways in 4 postcode districts, and the three with the most are CM20 (27), CM18 (13), CM19 (6).

Food premises in Harlow are close together: 100% sit within 3 miles of the middle of the area (half are within 1 miles). A single postcode-based delivery zone per kitchen works well, and a short collection time is the main selling point. Chefzi's delivery zones are set by postcode or radius, with a minimum order and fee per zone.

The kitchens behind the names in Harlow

Counting premises whose trading name contains a cuisine word (a rough guide, not a cuisine census), Harlow has one word that reaches 10: 11 pizza.

Counts are premises, takeaway plus restaurant and café, whose registered trading name contains the word. A name without the word is not counted, so treat them as a floor.

Reading trading names on the 13 November 2026 FSA pull, Harlow stands out for kebab or doner: 9 premises, 5.0% of the 180 on the register, against 1.7% across the UK. 5 of the 9 are in CM20, a district with 27 registered takeaways of every kind. Of the 9 rated kebab or doner-named premises, 56% hold a 5, against 62.7% of rated takeaways of every cuisine in Harlow. A kebab shop here shares its streets with more lookalikes than the national average would predict, so a direct ordering page and a clear link on your Google Business Profile do more work. Chinese or noodle names are rarer than average: 2 of 180 (1.1%, against 2.5% across the UK). These are name-keyword counts, a floor rather than a census.

Late-night hot food in Harlow: the council's own page

Serving hot food or drink between 11pm and 5am normally needs a late night refreshment licence under the Licensing Act 2003, issued by the local council. Start from the council's licensing section: Harlow council licensing (checked 13 November 2026).

The general rules, the 11pm to 5am window and what to ask are in the late night refreshment licence guide. Chefzi lets you set collection and delivery hours separately, so ordering hours can follow whatever your licence conditions say. This is general information, not legal advice.

Harlow and the areas around it

Main places in the Harlow council area include Harlow (about 93,600 people in the 2021 built-up area, partly in this area).

Part of Essex, with Basildon, Braintree, Brentwood, Castle Point, Chelmsford and Colchester.

Nearest council areas by the centre of their food premises (distance between centres):

Set-ups for the kitchens here: Pizza, or online ordering for takeaways.

All UK locations

Popular in the East of England

• Chicken shop ordering in Luton
• Chicken shop ordering in Central Bedfordshire
• Indian restaurant ordering in Luton
• Kebab shop ordering in Great Yarmouth
• Indian restaurant ordering in Southend-on-Sea

All of the East of England

Sources

• Food Standards Agency, Food Hygiene Rating Scheme open data API (api.ratings.food.gov.uk), Open Government Licence v3.0, pulled 13 November 2026. Takeaway/sandwich shop and restaurant/café/canteen business types.
• Office for National Statistics, 2021 Census built-up area populations.
• Council licensing page linked above, opened 13 November 2026.