Dianping is the review site — the Chinese equivalent of the restaurant half of everything, and where the serious reviews live. Meituan is its sibling and shows the same restaurants with delivery and booking attached. Both are Chinese-only; open them inside Alipay or WeChat and use the translate button. Then look at three things: the rating, the number of reviews, and the average spend per head. That is enough to choose, every time.
The three numbers
The rating is out of five, and here it runs harsh — a place sitting around 4.5 is genuinely good, and anything above 4.7 with volume behind it is a restaurant people cross the city for. This is not like a hotel rating where 4.2 is disappointing; the scale bites at the top end.
The review count tells you whether the first number means anything. A 4.9 from eleven people is a small shop with a group of friends. A 4.6 from eight thousand is a fact.
Average spend per head is printed on every listing, and it is the one piece of information the English-language apps never give you. It is what a local spends, so it is honest — and it lets you choose on the two axes that actually matter when you are hungry: how good, and how much.
What to do with the interface
You do not need to read much of it. Photos of the dishes carry most of the decision, and so do the photos reviewers upload — those show what arrives at the table rather than the plate from the shoot. Open a listing, look at the gallery, look at the three numbers, translate the name of the dish you want. That is the whole workflow, and guests manage it on their first afternoon.
Two features worth knowing about. Dianping publishes an annual "must-eat" list chosen by its users, which is a decent shortlist when you have no idea where to start. And most popular restaurants let you take a queue number in the app rather than standing outside — the classic Chengdu hotpot evening is an hour of waiting, and it is far better spent somewhere else with the phone in your pocket.
Where this breaks down
Out on the plateau, the model falls apart completely — and that is not a complaint, it is how it should be. A guesthouse kitchen in a valley village is not on Dianping, has no rating, and is often the best meal of the trip. There, the review is the person driving you, and it is one of the reasons I write these routes down at all: which hole-in-the-wall is worth the stop is exactly the information that does not exist online.
Questions I get on this one
Is there an English-language version?
What about TripAdvisor or Google reviews?
How do I order once I am in?
Can I book a table?
What about ordering it to the hotel instead?
From eating this way here for years, and from watching guests learn it in an afternoon. App features change; if a button has moved, tell me. Related: food delivery · finding things to do · all the apps · all essentials