Cooks, Short Order
Prepare and cook to order a variety of foods that require only a short preparation time. May take orders from customers and serve patrons at counters or tables.
138,650 people do this job in the US. $35,880 a year.
of the working time. Estimate.
- 3%
- 0%
- 97%
Measured, from Anthropic's usage data (2025). Counts help on part of a task.
On the chosen pace and reliability. Estimate.
Share of the working time within reach, now to 2030
What each choice means: , , , , . Every pace starts from .
At this date and pace, models finish tasks up to 4.4 h long four times in five.
How far this has come
With GPT-4, measured in March 2023, 0% of this job's working time was within reach at . With Claude 3.7 Sonnet, measured in February 2025, 2%. With Claude Mythos Preview (early), measured in April 2026, 3%. Today's estimate: 3%.
A backcast: today's task data with the best model METR had measured by each date. It shows how fast the models have moved, not what anyone forecast at the time.
The tasks
Sorted by . 11 tasks from .
| Task | Kind | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Perform general cleaning activities in kitchen and dining areas.Done daily by most who do it. | 20% | 33 min13 min to 1.3 h | Stays with people | |
| Perform food preparation tasks, such as making sandwiches, carving meats, making soups or salads, baking breads or desserts, and brewing coffee or tea.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 19% | 25 min8 min to 42 min | Stays with people | |
| Clean food preparation equipment, work areas, and counters or tables.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 18% | 21 min8 min to 38 min | Stays with people | |
| Restock kitchen supplies, rotate food, and stamp the time and date on food in coolers.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 14% | 21 min8 min to 50 min | Stays with people | |
| Grill and garnish hamburgers or other meats, such as steaks and chops.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 7% | 13 min5 min to 21 min | Stays with people | |
| Grill, cook, and fry foods such as french fries, eggs, and pancakes.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 7% | 10 min4 min to 21 min | Stays with people | |
| Order supplies and stock them on shelves.Done more than weekly by most who do it. | 4% | 50 min17 min to 1.7 h | Stays with people | |
| Take orders from customers and cook foods requiring short preparation times, according to customer requirements.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 4% | 10 min4 min to 17 min | Stays with people | |
| Complete orders from steam tables, placing food on plates and serving customers at tables or counters.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 4% | 7 min3 min to 17 min | Stays with people | |
| Plan work on orders so that items served together are finished at the same time.Done hourly or more by most who do it. | 3% | 4 min2 min to 13 min | 100%Half by now | |
| Accept payments, and make change or write charge slips as necessary.Done more than weekly by most who do it. | 0.4% | 3 min1 min to 7 min | Stays with people |
Within reach, per task: the share of the task's time whose instances are short enough for a model to finish at the chosen date, pace and reliability. Half by: the date half of that time comes within reach.
Jobs that share skills with this one
From O*NET's related occupations. Within reach now and by the end of 2028, long-run pace, four in five.
Where this job works
The industry groups that employ the most of it (BLS, May 2025).
Where the most of these jobs are
The metro areas with the most people in it (BLS, May 2025).