Olo's New App Takes Aim at the Digital Ordering Fight

Olo has released a new app, and the ordering-technology company says the product could change how restaurants compete for digital orders.

The app arrives as digital ordering remains one of the most contested revenue streams in foodservice. Chains spend heavily to own the customer relationship across first-party channels, while third-party marketplaces continue to capture a large share of off-premise transactions and their associated fees.

Olo's position in that fight is specific. The company powers direct digital ordering for a wide portfolio of restaurant brands, handling the ordering layer between a chain's own app, website and kiosks. A new consumer-facing app from that stack signals a shift: from back-end infrastructure toward a destination where diners choose where to order.

What does this change for operators?

For restaurant brands, the practical question is exposure. If a single app aggregates multiple chains' digital menus, individual operators compete for orders inside that environment rather than only through their own branded channels. That dynamic can widen reach for smaller brands and raise new competition for larger ones that have invested in proprietary ordering systems.

The move also touches unit economics. First-party digital orders typically carry better margins than marketplace orders, because operators avoid third-party commission rates that commonly run well into the double digits as a share of each check. Any tool that steers more volume toward direct ordering affects contribution margin on every incremental ticket.

For technology stories, the relevant questions are what a system replaces and who pays. Olo's core products replace in-house ordering builds and marketplace dependence for its restaurant clients, who pay the platform for the service. A consumer app extends that model from the operator side to the diner side, and its monetization structure will shape how restaurants judge the value of participating.

Why the digital-ordering channel keeps consolidating

The wider trend is consolidation of digital demand. Diners increasingly start from a handful of apps rather than searching individual brand channels, which pressures restaurant companies to be present wherever order flow concentrates. Suppliers of ordering infrastructure — Olo among them — are responding by building or acquiring consumer-facing surfaces of their own.

For multi-unit operators, presence in an aggregated app is a distribution decision with cost implications: more orders can mean more volume, but routing, packaging and off-premise labor all carry per-order costs that must clear the incremental revenue. Menu engineering matters here too, as brands tune digital menus toward items that travel well and hold their margin.

What to watch next

The open questions are adoption and terms. How quickly diners move to the new app, which brands join at launch, and what fees or data-sharing arrangements attach to participation will determine whether the product shifts order flow at scale.

Olo has framed the app as a tool that could change how restaurants compete for digital orders; the market will now test that claim order by order.

By Elena Vasquez