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AI NewsZestâs new AI agent finds restaurants and books reservations over text
Zestâs new AI agent finds restaurants and books reservations over text
12:06 AM IST · October 31, 2026

Zest, the restaurant discovery app thatlaunched earlier this year,is already thinking about a future where mobile apps are no longer the primary interface. On Thursday, the startup introduced a new feature: a personal AI-powered ârestaurant conciergeâ that lives in your text messages, similar to otherpopular AI agentslike Instinct or Poke. Thelaunchreflects a broader shift in how startups are thinking about AI, as conversational AI agents take on tasks that had previously required users to launch standalone mobile apps. For Zest, that means bringing its restaurant recommendations into texts, then allowing users to immediately take the next step of booking a table. âThe agent is the product now,â explains Zest founder and CEO Mario Gomez-Hall. âYou text it, and it answers from your own history and your friendsâ. It doesnât need weeks of conversation to learn you because it starts from where youâve actually been,â he said. Originally founded in November 2024, with $1.8 million in pre-seed backing from Alexis Ohanian at 776 and Steve Jang at Kindred Ventures, the appâs unique feature is that it links up with usersâ credit cards to track where theyâre actually eating out to get a sense of their tastes and interests. With this data on hand, Zest can make tailored suggestions of what places you might like to try next, whether thatâs in your own city or suggestions of places to try when youâre traveling. The credit card data used by Zestâs app is imported via the financial services companyPlaid, which is used by banks and other fintech and budgeting apps. Zest says it focuses only on those transactions in the food and drink categories when making its personalized map and lists. The startupâs latest idea is to tackle the same problem â where should I go to eat? â from a new angle. It will now make its suggestions from inside a text message thread and can turn to AI to do things like check availability and make the reservation for you through connected services like OpenTable, Resy, and SevenRooms. To work, users will text the Zest concierge at (212) 470-6067. Whatâs even better is that Zest can be dropped into a group chat, where it can blend everyoneâs tastes to find places the whole group will love. Here, it can also settle indecision with an in-thread voting feature and then can book a table for the group without leaving the conversation. Users can ask Zest for recommendations based on a number of factors, like cuisine, craving, occasion, dietary restrictions, or neighborhood, and can ask questions about the restaurants, like how busy the place may be, or whether it offers Wi-Fi, and more. Plus, you can ask Zest to send you the menu to help you make a decision. In TechCrunchâs tests, the AI worked fairly well, offering a list of suggestions for new places matched to our tastes that also fit particular conditions, like time of day, party size, location, and other factors. While finding an open table is something other apps have offered for years, thereâs a convenience factor in being able to just text back and forth about the various options and have it tell you the available booking times. The company began testing the concierge last month, but decided to hold the launch until it could add the booking capabilities; over time, the startup is considering moving Zest beyond restaurants to offer recommendations for businesses, shopping, and more. By shifting to texts, Zest hopes the company can scale beyond its initial thousands of users and generate revenue. âBooking and ordering are the first revenue lines. Zest books your table through OpenTable or Resy today, with food ordering coming, and there are transactions there to participate in,â said Gomez-Hall. âThe reason that gets interesting is that Zest learns your taste faster than a general assistant does, because it starts from where youâve actually been instead of asking you questions. Thatâs worth something well beyond dinner,â he added.
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