Toast’s 2026 Restaurant Employee Survey: How Industry Workers Feel About Pay, Tips, Benefits, and AI
Business Wire•22/10/2026•08:00 ET
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Key Highlights
- ➤Pay satisfaction reached 67%, up 12 percentage points year-over-year
- ➤Benefits satisfaction reached 62%, up 16 percentage points year-over-year
- ➤42% of tipped employees reported tips increased in the past 12 months
- ➤Approximately 20% of workers were extremely open to workplace AI
- ➤Poor hourly pay remained the top pain point, cited by 31%
Toast’s 2026 Restaurant Employee Survey: How Industry Workers Feel About Pay, Tips, Benefits, and AI
Toast (NYSE: TOST) released its 2026 Voice of the Restaurant Employee Survey. Toast annually polls restaurant employees about their jobs, and the takeaway in 2026: While restaurants are feeling the pinch of a shrinking workforce — perhaps for that very reason — there’s been an uptick in restaurant industry employees’ pay and satisfaction.
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