CHICAGO FOOD INSPECTION MAP
Chicago inspects roughly 15,000 food establishments and publishes every result. Below is the city’s own inspection map, plus what the results actually mean — because “Pass w/ Conditions” and “Canvass” don’t explain themselves.
To look up one specific place rather than browse geographically, search 8,153 Chicago restaurants and bars for the full violation history on each.
The city’s official inspection map
Published by the Chicago Department of Public Health. It shows the most recent 30 days by default and colour-codes each point by why the inspection happened. It covers every food establishment — including schools, daycares and grocers — not just restaurants.
Source: City of Chicago Food Inspections — Map (dataset cnfp-tsxc). GutCheck is independent and not affiliated with the City of Chicago.
What the inspection types on the map mean
The map’s legend colours points by inspection type. That label matters: an inspection triggered by a complaint fails 34% of the time, against 22% for a routine visit, so knowing why an inspector showed up changes how you read the outcome.
| Type | What it means |
|---|---|
| Canvass | A routine, unannounced visit on the city's own schedule. The most common kind by far. |
| Complaint | Someone reported the place. These fail noticeably more often than routine visits. |
| Suspected food poisoning | Someone reported getting sick after eating there. |
| License | A check tied to a new or renewed food licence, often before opening. |
| Re-inspection | A follow-up after a failure, to see whether the problems were fixed. |
| Short form complaint | A narrower complaint visit covering only the reported issue. |
GutCheck labels every inspection with this reason, so you can see at a glance whether a result came from a routine visit or a complaint.
The three possible results
Chicago does not use letter grades or numeric scores. Every inspection ends one of three ways, and the middle one causes most of the confusion:
- Pass — no violations serious enough to require correction.
- Pass with Conditions — violations were found but judged correctable, and the place stayed open. About one inspection in five.
- Fail — serious enough to warrant a failure, sometimes a closure. Roughly 80% of re-inspections afterwards pass.
City map or GutCheck?
They answer different questions, and the city’s map is the better tool for some of them:
| If you want to… | Use |
|---|---|
| Browse recent inspections geographically | The city map above |
| See every food establishment, including schools and daycares | The city map above |
| Look up one restaurant’s full history | GutCheck |
| Read violations in plain language, with pests flagged | GutCheck |
| Compare a neighbourhood’s restaurants | GutCheck |
| Analyse citywide patterns across 16 years | Our data analysis |