Zomato lets foodies find a dream home in neighborhoods with good restaurants

Global restaurant search startup Zomato today announced the introduction of neighborhood ratings – which scores an area based on the quality of nearby restaurants. Called Foodie Index, Zomato uses its local restaurant information and user-generated content to calculate the score.

Zomato claims to have listed 1.4 million restaurants across 22 countries. It provides restaurant information such as scanned menus and photos, sourced by its massive feet-on-street team. Users rate and review restaurants, as well as create their own personal network of foodies for trusted recommendations on the site.

“Building on Zomato’s exhaustive restaurant data, the Foodie Index aims to facilitate the decision-making process of people looking for apartments or hotels with great dining experiences just a short walk away,” the Delhi-headquartered company said in a statement.

The feature is particularly meant for travel and real estate platforms. Zomato has collaborated with travel itinerary-planning site TripHobo to allow trip planning through restaurant recommendations. Property search site CommonFloor is also using it to help users identify ideal neighborhoods based on great places to eat. For example, Hauz Khas in Delhi has 20 restaurants in a radius of 3 kilometers and rated 4.6 on the index. According to CommonFloor, this will be extremely beneficial especially for tenants, and for people who like to compare neighborhoods based on restaurant options when deciding where to stay.

CommonFloor rival Housing has a lifestyle rating index which also factors in local eateries.

Meanwhile, Zomato has added online ordering to its suite of foodie-related services, and has also partnered with Uber to take hungry users straight to restaurants from its app.