Restaurant COGS: how to calculate cost of goods sold
By mise · Updated September 29, 2026
Quick answer: restaurant COGS = beginning inventory + purchases − ending inventory, for food and beverage. As a percentage of sales, most restaurants land between 28% and 35% combined. It includes ingredients and drinks; it excludes labor, rent, utilities and packaging you don't sell.
COGS is the single biggest variable cost in a restaurant, and the one you can move fastest. Here is how to calculate it correctly and read it.
The formula
What goes in and what stays out
| Include | Leave out |
|---|---|
| Food ingredients | Labor (that's prime cost) |
| Beer, wine, liquor, soft drinks | Rent, utilities, marketing |
| Freight on food deliveries | Cleaning supplies and smallwares |
| Items given away (comps) — tracked separately | Equipment |
Track food and beverage COGS separately: they have very different targets (roughly 28–35% for food, 18–24% for beverage).
Industry averages
Combined food and beverage COGS for US restaurants usually sits between 28% and 35% of sales. Prime cost — COGS plus total labor — is the number many operators manage to, with a target of 55–65%.
Why COGS goes up
- Supplier price increases not passed on to the menu.
- Waste, spoilage and overproduction.
- Over-portioning and recipe drift.
- Theft and unrecorded comps.
- Inaccurate counts (the most common "invisible" cause).
mise calculates COGS for you: two counts by scanning, invoices from a photo at the price paid, and the result by category and by product, with losses in units and in dollars.
Point the camera and the product comes up complete: name, brand, category, size and photo — the mise AI finds it from the barcode or a photo. 7-day free trial, no card.
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Frequently asked questions
How do you calculate COGS for a restaurant?
Beginning inventory plus purchases minus ending inventory, for the same period. Divide by sales for the percentage.
What is the average COGS for a restaurant?
About 28–35% of sales for food and beverage combined in most full-service restaurants.
Is COGS the same as food cost?
Food cost usually means food only; COGS often includes beverages. The formula is the same.