What each place is, so you can pick the right one.

The island's best-known restaurant, dockside on Chimney Creek, built around the Lowcountry boil. It is loud, outdoors, on the water, and unapologetically a tourist institution — which does not make it bad, it makes it a specific thing. Go for the setting and the boil, with a group, early.

Not a quiet dinner. Nobody has ever had a quiet dinner here.

Built into the dunes with direct beach access, which on Tybee is rare enough to be the whole pitch. Seafood and cocktails with the Atlantic in front of you. This is the sunset-drink answer.

Rooftop dining near the pier with ocean views. The reason to come is the elevation — on an island this flat, a second storey is a view.

Caribbean-leaning cooking with a stated focus on sustainable, fresh seafood; the fish tacos are what it is known for. Pairs naturally with a lighthouse morning and a low-tide walk on the north end.

Pizza, beer, and enormous nachos in a shopping-district building that does not look like much from outside. A local fixture more than a destination.

Order fewer nachos than you think. This is advice, not a dare.

Coffee and fresh scones in the Tybee Oaks shopping district. The morning stop before a north-end walk.

Twenty-six years in, casual, beach-facing, known for gourmet pizza and mahi tacos, with a walk-up window that solves the problem of being sandy and hungry at the same time.

Family-owned, seafood and Southern plates, and the closest thing on the island to a proper sit-down dinner. This is the one to book if you need one nice evening out of the week.

Relaxed, local-leaning, with live music on a two-storey outdoor patio. Good when you want the evening to be long and unplanned.

Thirty-plus years of hand-dipped ice cream, including banana pudding and pralines and cream. The correct end to a beach day and a reliable bribe.