Best way to split a restaurant bill in 2023

1. Tabbot

Upload an image of your receipt to Tabbot's phone number and it will respond with a unique URL for your itemized bill. You can share this link so your friends can claim the items that they ordered. Tabbot will automatically identify the quantity and price of the items on the receipt. Tax and tip are automatically included if they are printed or written on the receipt. The details of the receipt can only be edited by the person who originally sent the receipt. Everyone has access to a list of who has claimed their items and what they owe.

Pros

• Free to use
• No need to manually input items
• Available to use on iOS
• Easy to share with others
• Can easily see which items were automatically detected

Cons

• Only supported in the US for now
• Only on iOS for now
• Receipts without a tip field may require manual adjustment
• No way to pay within app

2. Plates by Splitwise

Plates is available for iOS on the Apple App Store. When you first open Plates, you are immediately asked how many people you would like to split a new bill with. You can split a bill with up to 10 others. Each person is assigned a virtual plate. When you add a new item, you can drag it to a plate to associate it with a person in your group. After adding tax and tip, you are left with a visual representation of what everyone owes.

Pros

• Nice user interface
• Free to use
• Manual input leaves no room for errors

Cons

• No Android support
• Required to manually input each item
• Can only split a bill between 10 people
• No way to share with others
• Cannot name "plates" - can be confusing
• No way to pay share within app

3. Tab

Tab is available for both Android and iOS. You can join an existing tab, or you can create a new one. Create a new tab by either taking a new picture within the app, or by uploading a saved image of your receipt. After the receipt is processed, you can manually add additional items or edit the items Tab detected. Add people by sharing a link or giving them the unique code generated for the receipt so that others can access your tab in their app. Once everyone has claimed their items, you are asked to manually add tax and tip for your receipt and then you are given everyone's share.

Pros

• No need to manually input items
• Android and iOS support
• Ability to share tab with others
• Free to use

Cons

• Advertises Venmo integration but didn't seem to work
• Interface is a bit confusing
• Larger receipts seem to cause issues
• Many items were mislabeled by the automatic detection
• Required to manually input tax and tip
• Everyone in your party has to download the app to claim their items
• You can't see which items were correctly detected

Wrapping up

Next time, rather than annoying your server by asking them to provide separate checks for everyone at the table, volunteer to put your card down and use one of these apps to divvy up the bill. You shouldn't feel like you need to split evenly, there are tools at your disposal to make sure everyone pays their fair share. Skip the messy math and try one of these apps at your group dinner.