Most common restaurant inspection violations in Seattle (2026)

We counted every violation cited at routine restaurant inspections in Seattle from October 1, 2025 to September 30, 2026, once per inspection. The share is the part of all 4,572 inspections that cited it. Codes and points are the County's. The County marks the food handling practices most likely to cause foodborne illness red, and mostly maintenance and sanitation issues blue. TCS food is food that needs time and temperature control for safety.

What each one means

4100 Dishwashing setup, sanitizer or test strips not right

A dish machine or three-compartment sink not set up or used properly, sanitizer at the wrong strength, or no test strips to check it.

3400 Wiping cloths or sanitizer not right

Wiping cloths left out of the sanitizer bucket, or sanitizer that is too weak or too strong.

2110 Cold food above 45°F

Cold food in a cooler, prep unit or display that is above 45°F, well over the 41°F limit.

3200 Insects, rodents or animals inside

Signs of insects or rodents, or animals in the restaurant, or entrances not kept closed against them.

0600 Handwashing sinks not adequate

No handwashing sink where staff need one, or a sink that is blocked, used for other things or out of soap or paper towels.

4200 Food-contact surfaces not maintained or clean

Worn or dirty surfaces that touch food, such as cutting boards, slicers and the inside of ice machines.

2120 Cold food at 42°F to 45°F

Cold food in a cooler, prep unit or display that is just over the 41°F limit.

4800 Floors, walls and ceilings not maintained or clean

Floors, walls and ceilings that are dirty or damaged, or people in the kitchen who do not need to be there.

4300 Non-food surfaces not clean

Grease and build-up on shelves, gaskets, equipment and other surfaces that do not touch food.

0100 No person in charge who knows the rules, or no certified food protection manager

Nobody on shift can show the inspector they know the food safety rules and make sure staff follow them, or the restaurant has no certified food protection manager on staff and is not exempt.

What to check before service in each of these areas is in the restaurant health inspection checklist.

King County lists controlling temperature among its red violations: keeping food hot enough until it is served, keeping food cold enough and cooling food properly. Codes 2110, 2120, 1710, 1720 and 1600 together were cited at 827 of 4,572 routine inspections (18%).

A restaurant cited in more than one group counts once in each group, so the rows add up to more than 700.

The inspector sees one visit. A log shows the days in between. On paper or in an app, these are the parts of a temperature log that matter for cold holding, hot holding and cooling:

• A reading at set times. Each cooler and hot holding unit, at the times your plan sets, for example at opening and before dinner service.
• The limit next to the reading. In Seattle, 41°F for cold holding and 135°F for hot holding.
• A corrective action for every reading out of range. What was done, and who did it.
• A name and a time on every entry. A reading is written when it is taken, not from memory at the end of the week.

Patrono keeps temperature logs and checklists in the browser on any phone, tablet or computer. Your staff enter each reading by hand. A reading out of range cannot be saved without a corrective action. A saved temperature record cannot be edited or deleted, and a correction is a new entry next to the original. Every record keeps who entered it and when, and an owner or manager can print any month's log for a location.

If you keep logs on paper, our refrigerator and freezer log, hot holding log and cooling log use the same 41°F and 135°F limits as Washington's code. We email each one as a fillable PDF and a Word file.

King County scores with points, not a letter grade. Every violation on its list carries a fixed number: red ones from 5 to 25, blue ones from 0 to 5. The score is the sum, on what the County calls a 400-point system.

From October 1, 2025 to September 30, 2026, 2,988 routine inspections ended Satisfactory (65%) and 1,584 ended Unsatisfactory (35%). 1,985 of all 4,572 (43%) found no violation at all.

Closure. If the red violations total 90 points or more, or red and blue together total 120 or more, the County closes the restaurant. It also closes a restaurant for sewage backing up, no hot water or running water, a power outage and other imminent health hazards. 14 routine inspections in this count ended in a closure.

Return inspections. A red violation has to be corrected immediately, and the manager is taught the correct procedure. Based on the risk, a return inspection and education follow. A restaurant that hasn't improved after that is closed. A repeat return inspection costs half of your annual permit fee: $504 in 2026 for a Risk 3 restaurant with 13 to 50 seats, whose permit costs $1,008.

The sign in your window. The County gives one of four ratings: Excellent, Good, Okay or Needs to improve. At Risk Category 3, the rating is the average score of unsafe food handling practices at your last four routine inspections: 3.75 or less is Excellent, 3.76 to 16.25 is Good and 16.26 or more is Okay. Those practices are the County's red violations, so blue points add to the inspection score but do not move the sign. Needs to improve means closed by Public Health within the last 90 days, or multiple return inspections to correct unsafe food handling.

What one violation does. A single 25-point violation averages out to 6.25 over four inspections. Even with three clean inspections beside it, that takes a restaurant out of Excellent until it drops out of the last four. 367 routine inspections (8%) cited at least one 25-point violation.

Posting the sign. The sign goes within five feet of the main public entrance, or in a spot the inspector approves, clearly visible to people passing by. A sign that isn't posted correctly can cost 50% of your annual permit fee for the first offense in two years, 100% for the second and 200% after that.

Appeals. Only an owner or operator can appeal a finding, within 10 days of the inspection.

1,611 of the 4,572 routine inspections (35%) cited at least one red violation.

385 of 4,572 routine inspections (8%) cited at least one of these three codes. You can fix them before the inspector walks in:

• Person in charge and certified food protection manager (code 0100, 229 citations, 5 points). A person in charge who is present, knows the rules and keeps food handling under control, and a certified food protection manager on staff unless the restaurant is exempt.
• Food Worker Cards (code 0200, 83 citations, 5 points). Current cards for every food worker, and new food workers trained.
• Permit, plans and written procedures (code 2600, 131 citations, 10 points). Following your permit, your operating and risk control plans, and the written procedures you are required to keep.

Keep the cards, certificates and written procedures in one place, and check them when someone new starts.

• Source. Public Health - Seattle & King County's Food Establishment Inspection Data on King County Open Data, dataset r878-4sxa, as of November 2, 2026, the day the County last updated its rows. The County lists the dataset's license as Public Domain.
• Period. Inspections dated October 1, 2025 to September 30, 2026: 12 full months, ending with the last month that had at least a week to settle. The page reads the County's data again every day, and the 12-month period moves forward once a month.
• Seattle. The dataset covers all of King County. We count the inspections whose address the County records as Seattle or West Seattle, which is the address on file, not the city limits. All of King County, counted the same way: 35% ended Unsatisfactory, 3,288 of 9,346, and 18% cited food at the wrong temperature.
• Restaurants. The County's data has no restaurant category. We count general food service at Risk Category 3, one business ID per restaurant. The County's Board of Health defines general food service as any stationary food establishment that provides food to the public, guests, patrons or its personnel, and the County gives a restaurant as its example of Risk Category 3. So bars, cafeterias and coffee shops with a kitchen can be in the count. Grocery stores, schools, caterers and food trucks have their own categories and are not. Neither are Risk Categories 1 and 2, whose examples are coffee stands and ice cream shops. With Risk Categories 1 and 2 added, 31% ended Unsatisfactory, 1,691 of 5,387.
• Routine inspections. The County's routine inspections and the return inspections that follow them, when they ended Satisfactory or Unsatisfactory. Educational inspections are not counted. They list no violations, and most end Complete. Neither are the few routine or return inspections that ended Complete.
• Counting. An inspection is one County serial number. The dataset has one row per violation, and a code counts once per inspection. At each release we check the County's counts against our own recount of every row in the period.
• Satisfactory and Unsatisfactory. These are the County's words, and we did not find its definition on its food safety pages. In this count, 1,581 of the 1,584 Unsatisfactory inspections cited at least one red violation.
• Red violations and the sign. The County says the rating uses unsafe food handling practices, and it calls its red violations food handling practices. It does not say red points only in those words, so we checked. Of the 2,551 Risk Category 3 restaurants in Seattle with at least four routine inspections since January 1, 2023, the average of red points alone matches the County's current rating at 2,524 (99%). Red and blue together match at 1,819 (71%). Checked on November 2, 2026.
• What a violation is. A finding is what the inspector recorded at that visit. An owner or operator can appeal it within 10 days of the inspection, and the dataset does not mark appeals.
• Temperature groups. Cold holding is codes 2110 and 2120, hot holding 1710 and 1720, cooling 1600. Codes 1900 and 2200 are shown separately. With code 1900 in the group, the share is 19%.
• Other scopes. The 35% counts routine and return inspections. Routine inspections alone: 35% Unsatisfactory, 1,534 of 4,413. Every inspection type that ended in a result: 34%, 1,584 of 4,610, and 18% cited food at the wrong temperature, 827 inspections. Counts over more years, or over only the inspections that cited a violation, give other shares.
• Rounding. Shares are rounded to the nearest whole percent from the counts shown, below 1% to one decimal.
• We never name or rank individual restaurants.

Source: Public Health - Seattle & King County, "Food Establishment Inspection Data", King County Open Data, dataset r878-4sxa, as of November 2, 2026. The counts, groups and labels on this page are Patrono's, not the County's.

Data provided by permission of King County