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Guide — about 10 minutes

How to make a digital menu board

A digital menu board is just a TV running a live menu you can edit from anywhere. Here's the whole process, from blank screen to a menu that updates itself.

What you actually need

Despite what signage companies imply, you don't need a commercial display or an expensive media player. A digital menu board has three parts: a screen, something to play the content on it, and software to control what shows. For most cafés, pubs and takeaways, the TV you already own plus a £30 streaming stick does all three.

  • A TV — any size, wall-mounted or on a stand, ideally with its brightness turned up
  • A way to get online content onto it: a Fire TV Stick, Chromecast with Google TV, or the smart TV's own browser
  • Menu board software — this is the part SlideLobster provides

Step by step

  • Pick your screen — any TV with an HDMI port works, plus a Fire TV Stick, Chromecast or the TV's built-in browser.
  • Create a free SlideLobster account and set up your first display.
  • Open the display link on your TV and enter the short pairing code.
  • Add the Menu widget and type in your items and prices — or upload photos of your dishes.
  • Apply your branding: logo, colours and fonts on the Pro plan.
  • Publish. The menu goes live on the TV instantly and updates whenever you edit it.

Getting the design right

The difference between a menu board that sells and one that gets ignored is readability. Keep item names short, use big type, and group items into no more than five or six sections. SlideLobster's menu widget handles item names and prices as separate fields, so price changes take seconds and everything stays aligned.

Photos help for hero items — a great burger photo outsells a line of text. Upload shots of your best sellers and keep the rest as clean text.

What about PowerPoint?

Plenty of venues start by putting a PowerPoint slide on a USB stick. It works, but every price change means editing the file, exporting it, and walking a USB stick over to the TV. There's no scheduling, no live content, and if the stick gets unplugged the screen dies. For a menu that never changes it's fine; for anything you update weekly, cloud software pays for itself in saved trips behind the telly.

Keeping it fresh

Once it's live, the point of a digital board is that it never goes stale. Swap in daily specials before service, schedule breakfast and evening menus, and add a QR code so customers can browse the full menu on their phones. All of that is editable from your phone, from behind the bar, in under a minute.

Try it on your own screen.

SlideLobster is free forever for one display — no credit card. Works on any TV browser, Fire TV Stick or Chromecast.

Create your display