Taxi website design: what a taxi website needs to get bookings
The short answer
A taxi website that gets bookings puts a tap-to-call phone number and a Book button at the top of every page, shows fixed prices for your common journeys, takes a booking in a short form and loads fast on a phone: Google's target is the main content showing within 2.5 seconds. It also shows who you are, from your licensing council to your company details.
Good taxi website design has one job: get the visitor to ring or book before they go back to Google. Looks matter less than you'd think. This guide goes through what a taxi booking website needs, in the order passengers look for it, and the legal details a UK taxi or private hire website has to show.
What should be at the top of a taxi website?
Your phone number, a way to book and one line saying what you do and where. A passenger looking for a car is on a phone more often than not, and won't scroll to find your number.
On a phone screen, before any scrolling, show:
- Your phone number as a tap-to-call link, so one tap rings the office
- A Book button that opens your booking form
- A WhatsApp button, if you take bookings that way
- One plain line, such as "Local journeys and airport runs from Reading, licensed by Reading Borough Council"
Build for the phone first. Google says it uses the mobile version of a site's content for indexing and ranking, so the phone layout is the one that counts for passengers and for Google alike.
Use the same number everywhere. The number on the website should be the one on your Google Business Profile, your cars and your cards.
Should a taxi website show prices?
Yes, for the journeys you do most. A passenger who can see the fare for an airport run doesn't have to ring round for it, and a published fixed price is easy for the office to stand by.
If you show a price, consumer law has a say. The Competition and Markets Authority's guidance on the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024 treats a price with a description of the service as an "invitation to purchase". That has to give the total price, including any compulsory fees, or explain how the price is worked out when it can't be calculated in advance. Showing a low headline price and adding compulsory charges later, which the CMA calls drip pricing, is banned for anything done from 6 April 2025.
So if every drop-off at your local airport carries a charge you pass on, it belongs in the fare you show.
| Journey | What to show on the page |
|---|---|
| Airport and station runs | A fixed fare from your main pickup areas, including any charge every passenger pays |
| Local journeys | Your zone prices, or how the fare is worked out |
| Waiting time and extra stops | What you charge and when the charge starts |
| Larger vehicles and late nights | Any extra, shown next to the fare it applies to |
Our guides to setting taxi zone prices and pricing taxi fares cover working the numbers out.
What makes a good online booking form?
A good online booking form is short and asks things in the order a passenger thinks of them: where from, where to, when and how many. Every extra field is another place to give up.
- Pickup address or postcode, and the flight number for an airport pickup
- Destination
- Date and time
- Passengers, luggage and any need for a wheelchair-accessible car
- Name, mobile number and email address
- The price, shown before they confirm
- A confirmation on screen, then by text or email
The form should collect what your council expects you to record. Section 56 of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976 says operators outside London must record the particulars of every booking before the journey. The Department for Transport's statutory standards ask councils to require the passenger's name, the time of the request, the pickup and destination, and the driver and vehicle, and suggest keeping those records for at least 6 months. A form that captures the passenger's half saves the office typing it again. Our guide to private hire record keeping has the full list.
If you'd rather not build the form yourself, booking software can supply it. Dispatch AI, for example, gives you an online booking page and a chat assistant for your website, with your fixed prices. There's more on the choices in our guide to online booking for a taxi website.
Do you need WhatsApp on a taxi website?
You need it if you'll answer it. A button that opens a WhatsApp chat with your firm suits passengers who would rather type than ring.
The catch is the reply time. A message that sits unread for an hour loses the job just as surely as a phone that rings out. If nobody watches the WhatsApp inbox at night, don't show the button as a booking route at night. Our guide to WhatsApp taxi booking covers running it properly.
How fast does a taxi website need to load?
Fast enough that the main content appears within 2.5 seconds. Google's Core Web Vitals set three targets for page speed and stability, and Google says to measure them at the 75th percentile of visits, on mobile and desktop separately.
| Measure | What it checks | Good is |
|---|---|---|
| Largest Contentful Paint | How quickly the main content appears | 2.5 seconds or less |
| Interaction to Next Paint | How quickly the page reacts to a tap | 200 milliseconds or less |
| Cumulative Layout Shift | How much the page jumps about while it loads | 0.1 or less |
Layout shift is the one taxi sites get wrong. A booking widget or cookie banner that loads late pushes the phone number down the page just as someone goes to tap it, and they ring the wrong thing or nothing at all.
The usual causes of a slow taxi site are photos uploaded straight from a camera, sliders, and chat or booking widgets loaded from slow third-party servers. Resize your photos, drop the slider and test the home page in Google's PageSpeed Insights before and after each change.
What legal details must a taxi website show?
More than plenty of firm websites carry. These come from company law, the e-commerce rules and consumer law:
| Detail | Who it applies to | Where the rule comes from |
|---|---|---|
| Company registered number, registered office, where it's registered and that it's a limited company | Limited companies | Companies House rules, set out on GOV.UK |
| Your name, geographic address and email address, and prices that are clear and unambiguous | Anyone selling a service online | Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002, regulation 6 |
| Your trading name and business address in any advert that shows prices, unless they're already clear from the context | Anyone advertising prices to consumers | DMCC Act 2024, as explained in the CMA's guidance |
| Consent before setting cookies that aren't strictly necessary | Any website using such cookies | The ICO's guidance on cookies |
London private hire firms have one more rule. Section 31 of the Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998 bans the words "taxi", "taxis", "cab" and "cabs" from London private hire adverts in any medium, unless the vehicles are London cabs. "Minicab" is allowed, so a London private hire website should use it, or "private hire", instead.
On cookies, the ICO says it's consulting on revised guidance, so read its current page before you add tracking or advertising tags.
What makes passengers trust a private hire website?
Proof that you're licensed and real. Show the council that licenses you and your operator licence number, so a passenger, hotel or school can check it with the council. Use photos of your own cars and office, not stock images. If you have wheelchair-accessible vehicles, say so and say how to book one.
Reviews help, with two cautions. The CMA's fake reviews guidance says a business that publishes reviews on its own website is a publisher too: showing only the good ones, or giving them more prominence than the bad ones, is publishing reviews in a misleading way. And Google's review snippet rules say a business that controls the reviews shown about itself isn't eligible for review stars in search results, so adding star markup to your own site won't put stars next to it in Google. Our guide to getting more Google reviews covers both.
Finally, give account customers a page of their own: who you work for, how invoicing works and who to call. Our guide to winning corporate taxi accounts covers what business bookers look for.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a separate page for every town I cover?
Only for places where you have something specific to say, such as pickup points, fixed fares from there and how long the airport run takes. Google's spam policies treat near-identical pages aimed at different cities, made to funnel visitors to one page, as doorway abuse. Our guide to SEO for taxi firms explains where the line is.
Can I show my Google reviews on my own website?
Yes, as long as you don't pick only the good ones. The CMA treats suppressing negative reviews, or giving positive ones more prominence, as publishing reviews in a misleading way. Google won't show review stars in search results for reviews a business shows about itself.
Can a London private hire firm call itself a taxi firm online?
No. Section 31 of the Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998 bans "taxi" and "cab" from London private hire adverts in any medium unless the vehicles are London cabs. Breaking it is an offence. "Minicab" and "private hire" are fine.
Does a taxi website need a cookie banner?
It does if the site sets cookies that aren't strictly necessary, such as advertising or tracking cookies. The ICO's guidance says you need the visitor's clear consent before setting those. A site with no such cookies doesn't need to ask.
How often should I update the prices on my website?
The same day your fares change. Under the DMCC Act rules a price you advertise has to be the total price the passenger pays, including compulsory charges. A website showing last year's fares invites complaints and arguments at the kerb.
Sources
- Understanding Core Web Vitals and Google search results (web.dev, Google) LCP 2.5 seconds, INP 200 milliseconds, CLS 0.1, 75th percentile
- Mobile-first indexing best practices (Google Search Central) Google indexes the mobile version
- Unfair commercial practices, CMA207 (Competition and Markets Authority) invitations to purchase, total price, drip pricing, from 6 April 2025
- Running a limited company: signs, stationery and promotional material (GOV.UK) what a company website must show
- Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002, regulation 6 information an online service must give
- Cookies and similar technologies (Information Commissioner's Office) consent for non-essential cookies; guidance under revision
- Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998, section 31 "taxi" and "cab" in London private hire adverts
- Fake reviews, CMA208 (Competition and Markets Authority) publishing reviews in a misleading way
- Review snippet structured data (Google Search Central) self-serving reviews aren't eligible for stars
- Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976, section 56 booking records
- Statutory Taxi and Private Hire Vehicle Standards (Department for Transport) section 8, operators' records
- Google's spam policies for web search (Google Search Central) doorway abuse
Checked 9 October 2026. Rules and fees change, so check with your licensing authority before you rely on a figure.