Your goal in Rival Restaurants is to be the first restaurant to reach 20 popularity points and be crowned "The Wiener!" Players earn popularity points by buying and trading ingredients and using them to "cook" (complete) recipes. The more advanced the recipe, the more points it is worth.

Each day, players go through three phases. Players collect their income for the day and decide where they want to go. Turn economy is crucial because players are not allowed to move for the rest of the day once their location is chosen.

After that, players have one minute to purchase as much as they want, but only from the location they are in. Players can also trade/swap with anyone in the game, not just the people in their location.

Finally, any player who has all the ingredients needed for their recipe can cook it and collect popularity points.

Additionally, each player controls a chef equipped with their own "chef power". Chef powers are asymmetrical and allow players to bend the rules to their advantage. The base game of Rival Restaurants features twelve chefs and in addition each player must choose a restaurant to play at at the start of the game, with each restaurant having a unique level-up structure with rewards for reaching 3, 7 and 12 popularity points .

Finally, players can also choose to purchase "action cards", that is, development cards that are usually single-use.