Key takeaways
- A kiosk menu is not your printed menu on a screen. Fewer categories, bigger buttons and clear photos make ordering faster.
- Build modifiers as required choices and sensible defaults, so guests cannot send incomplete orders to the kitchen.
- Upsell prompts work best when they are relevant and easy to skip. CCS encourages an opt-in approach to optional add-ons.
- Design for everyone: readable contrast, large touch targets and a way to get help. Then time real guests ordering and fix the slow steps.
Why kiosk menu design matters
Restaurant kiosk software gives you a lot of control over the ordering screen: categories, photos, options and prompts. That control cuts both ways. A well-designed kiosk menu lets a guest order in a short time and suggests the drink or side they would have wanted anyway. A badly designed one creates a queue at the kiosk instead of at the counter.
This guide is about the menu on the screen. If you are still choosing hardware or a vendor, start with our comparison of the best self-order kiosks in Singapore and our guide to self-ordering kiosk costs.
Screen layout: categories and the home screen
Guests should see what they came for within one tap. Practical rules:
- Keep top-level categories short. Around five to eight is easier to scan than fifteen. Merge thin categories.
- Put best-sellers first. A “Popular” or “Sets” category at the top catches most orders. Use your POS sales data to decide what goes there.
- Show the basket at all times, with the running total, so guests know what they have ordered and what it costs.
- Keep the path to payment obvious. One clear “Checkout” button, the same place on every screen.
- Allow easy restarts. A visible “Start over” and an automatic reset after a period of no activity stop the next guest inheriting someone else’s order.
Kiosk vendors describe similar principles. Eats365’s self-service kiosk page, for example, talks about organising the menu into categories, writing clear descriptions, offering upgrades on single items, and using bright images, clear icons and legible text.
Photos and descriptions
On a kiosk, the photo often does the selling. Good kiosk photos are:
- Taken of the dish as it is actually served, in the portion and packaging the guest will receive.
- Consistent in angle, lighting and background, so the menu looks tidy.
- Cropped so the food fills the tile, readable at the size shown on screen.
Keep descriptions short: the main ingredients, anything spicy, and allergens or dietary notes that guests need to know. Long descriptions belong on a detail screen, not the tile. Our menu engineering guide explains how to decide which dishes to feature, based on popularity and margin.
Modifiers and options
Modifiers are where kiosk orders go wrong most often. If a noodle dish needs a choice of soup or dry, and the kiosk lets guests skip it, the kitchen gets an incomplete ticket. Build modifier groups carefully:
- Required choices for anything the kitchen must know: size, doneness, soup or dry, spice level.
- Sensible defaults so most guests can accept and move on.
- Clear prices on paid add-ons, shown before the guest taps.
- Limits on how many options can be chosen, for example “choose up to two toppings”.
- Short option lists. If a group has more than about eight choices, consider splitting it.
Our guide to setting up menu modifiers in your POS covers required and optional groups, pricing and combos in detail, and applies directly to kiosk menus.
Upsell prompts that do not annoy
A kiosk never forgets to suggest a drink, which is one reason operators install them. But a prompt on every item slows ordering and irritates guests. Guidelines:
- Make prompts relevant. Suggest a drink with a main, a side with a burger, a larger size on a coffee. Not dessert with a morning coffee.
- Limit the number. One prompt on the item and one before checkout is usually plenty.
- Make “No thanks” as easy to tap as “Add”. Same size, same prominence.
- Offer set upgrades. “Make it a set” is often the most effective prompt.
The CCS Guidelines on Price Transparency encourage an “opt-in” or “opt-neutral” approach to optional add-ons, so consumers actively choose the options they want. On a kiosk, that means add-ons should not be pre-selected. The same guidelines say mandatory charges should be included in the headline price or disclosed clearly with it. On price display, IRAS states that GST-registered businesses must show GST-inclusive prices, while F&B outlets that impose a service charge may display GST-exclusive prices with a prominent statement that prices are subject to GST and service charge. Make sure the kiosk follows whichever rule applies to you. For more ideas, see our guide to restaurant upselling techniques.
Accessibility: design for every guest
Kiosks are used by children, seniors, tourists and people with limited vision or dexterity. A few design choices help everyone:
- Contrast. The W3C’s web accessibility guidance on contrast (minimum) sets a ratio of at least 4.5:1 for normal text and 3:1 for large text. Kiosk screens are often viewed under bright lights, so treat these as a floor.
- Touch targets. The W3C’s target size (minimum) criterion in WCAG 2.2 sets targets of at least 24 by 24 CSS pixels, to avoid tapping the wrong control by accident. On a kiosk, bigger is better.
- Reach. Place key buttons where a seated or shorter guest can reach them, not only at the top of a tall screen.
- Language. Offer the languages your guests use. Our guide to multilingual menus in Singapore covers which languages to offer and how to translate dish names.
- Help. Keep a staffed counter or a call-for-help option for anyone who cannot or prefers not to use the kiosk.
These W3C criteria were written for web content, not kiosks specifically, but they are a well-documented benchmark for readable text and tappable buttons.
Testing order speed
Do not guess whether your kiosk menu is fast; time it. A simple test:
- Pick five common orders, from a single coffee to a family meal with modifiers.
- Ask staff who have not seen the new menu, and a few friendly regulars, to place each order while you time from first tap to payment.
- Note where they hesitate: a missing category, an unclear option, a confusing prompt.
- Fix the slowest step, then test again.
After launch, watch the real thing at peak. Look for abandoned baskets, guests calling for help and queues at the kiosk rather than the counter. If your kiosk software reports average order time or abandoned orders, review them weekly for the first month. Compare kiosk average spend with counter orders using your POS reports, but remember that the guests who choose the kiosk may differ from those who queue at the counter.
Keeping the kiosk menu up to date
- Sold-out items must disappear or show as unavailable straight away.
- Dayparts: switch breakfast and lunch menus automatically if your software supports it.
- Promotions: remove expired offers on time. A promotion that runs on past its stated end date is a pricing problem as well as a design one.
- Photos: reshoot when a dish or its packaging changes.
How ChaChaCha fits
ChaChaCha, powered by AppsPOS, offers a self-order kiosk with a built-in card terminal, and a retail kiosk mode for shops. The kiosk hardware is supplied by AppsPOS as part of the package. The POS supports custom modifiers, and orders go to a kitchen display with station routing, order prioritisation and prep timers. The interface and kitchen tickets work in English and Chinese, and payments cover PayNow, PayLah!, NETS, Visa/Mastercard and GrabPay.
For the details of kiosk screen design, such as how upsell prompts, photos and on-screen languages are set up for your menu, ask us to confirm what is available and we will walk you through it. Pricing is quote-based; contact us to plan your kiosk menu.
