Booking restaurants in advance of our travels

Really depends what type of place. Michelin starred places? Probably too late. Mom and Pop places, may not even be possible.

The places I eat, stopping, in person, earlier in the afternoon, or the day before is more than sufficient, but many places I go without reservations. You may also be able to ask your hotel to call and set it up.

If the place is well known, and has a website, then they usually have a link, sometimes a third party, that you can make the reservation online. Second easiest may be to email (they can then use an app to translate if needed. As a last effort, call.

In your communication, due to date format (MM/DD/YYYY vs DD/MM/YYYY) I suggest either saying or spelling out the Month, ideally with day first (15 August) just to avoid any confusion.

We were in Rome in February. We typically made reservations the day before or day of. For every place we ate, people that arrived without a reservation were told that the restaurant was "full" (and it was). There were a few places we tried to eat and book a week or so in advance that were already fully booked.

Its been about 4 years since we were in Florence and my understanding is that it is even busier.

We were in Venice September of 2024. When we arrived our host made our reservations for the five restaurants we were interested in.

If you are looking to go to very popular restaurants, like those recommended by food critics/bloggers or have been on various tv shows, I'd start looking at their websites to see how far out people book.

In Venice last August, staying in Dorsoduro, booked some places when passing earlier in the day, and in others were able to walk in.
We eat early (7pm).

You won't have a problem unless it's a Michelin starred place. Most restaurants, if they take reservations, will take them the day before or the same day. Restaurant booking websites are also becoming more common in those larger cities. You'll have no problem finding something great.

I would do some deep research starting right now, but don't look towards Michelin-starred places. I can't speak for Venice but I know for a fact that in Florence & Rome there are scores of ristorantes & trattorias that are tremendous, strictly from online reviews or word-of-mouth. We were there in April and booked about 4-6 weeks before. Very, very busy then, and will be worse when you're traveling..

There is no reason why you should not make online reservations. It costs nothing to book, nothing to cancel if you find a more worthwhile place. We zigged & zagged a little while in Italy, and ended up with some great choices.