St. Petersburg & Pinellas County: Which Restaurants Are Actually Clean?

Behind the Kitchen Door — a data-driven series from InspectFL

Pinellas County packs a lot into a small peninsula — from St. Pete’s booming downtown dining scene to Clearwater Beach’s tourist strips, Dunedin’s craft breweries, and Tarpon Springs’ legendary Greek restaurants. But behind those waterfront views, what are inspectors finding?

We analyzed state inspection data for 2,724 restaurants across Pinellas County — and the results are a mixed bag.

Pinellas County at a Glance

About 44% of Pinellas County restaurants earn an A grade, while roughly 7% have failing grades. There’s room for improvement, but the majority of restaurants are earning passing marks.

City-by-City Comparison

Clearwater leads the pack with the highest A rate (48.0%) and a low F rate of just 5.4%. Tarpon Springs has the lowest F rate at just 4.0%, though its A rate is also modest at 37.6%. St. Petersburg and Largo land in the middle, while Dunedin has a slightly higher F rate (9.6%) relative to its size — worth watching for such a small dining scene.

🏆 Pinellas County’s A-Grade Restaurants

With 44.1% of Pinellas County restaurants earning an A grade, there’s a solid base of clean restaurants in the St. Pete area. But here’s the thing — many of these restaurants have only had a single inspection on record after recent data cleaning. One clean inspection is a good start, not a proven track record.

The restaurants worth watching are the ones that consistently pass inspections over time. As the booming St. Pete dining scene continues to evolve and more inspection data accumulates, we’ll update this section with restaurants that have earned their reputation through repeated clean visits — not just a single passing grade.

Want to check any restaurant’s full history? Search for it on InspectFL — every inspection, every violation, all public record.

😬 Restaurants That Need Improvement

These spots received F grades, meaning inspectors found a high weighted violation score:

An F grade doesn’t mean a restaurant is dangerous right now. Many violations get corrected quickly after inspection. But it does mean inspectors found significant issues at some point.

What Can You Do?

1. Look up any restaurant before you go — search by name or address at inspectfl.org/search
2. Check the grade — A means a low weighted score (improving!), F means a high score (needs work)
3. Read the violations — not all are equal. A dirty floor is different from improper food temperatures
4. Check recent dates — a restaurant with old violations may have cleaned up since

Browse All Pinellas County Restaurants

Want the full list? Check out the Pinellas County page for all 2,724 restaurants with grades, violation counts, and inspection histories.

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👉 Browse all Pinellas County restaurants →

👉 See all F-graded restaurants in Florida →

Related: Tampa & Hillsborough County inspections · Tampa Bay brunch inspection guide · St. Petersburg city page

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Data based on Florida DBPR inspection records. Grades use a weighted time-decay system — recent violations count more than older ones. See inspectfl.org/how-to-read for details. Current as of March 2026.