AI Restaurant Menu Maker

Menu typography that works in a dim room

Restaurants are darker than design studios. A menu set at 8 point in a light grey looks elegant on screen and becomes unreadable at a candlelit table, which is the single most common menu design failure.

Keep body text at 10 point or larger, use near-black rather than grey, and put real space between sections. Design Maker AI errs toward legibility and you can push the type larger in one chat message.

Structuring a menu people can scan

Guests do not read menus linearly. They scan for a section, then a price range, then a dish. Five decisions make that possible:

Obvious section headings

Starters, mains, sides, desserts. A guest should locate the right section without reading a single dish name.

Dish names distinct from descriptions

The name in a heavier weight, the description smaller and quieter. When both are set the same, nothing is scannable.

Six to nine items per section

Past that, guests stop comparing and default to something familiar. A shorter section sells the dishes on it harder.

Prices in a predictable position

Right-aligned in a column, or set tight after the dish name. What matters is that every price sits in the same place.

Leader lines for long menus

The dotted run between dish and price. Unfashionable in some circles and extremely effective for anything past a dozen items.

Paste your sections and items in the order you want them read, and the layout follows that structure rather than reflowing it into something prettier and harder to use.

Menu sizes and formats

The format is decided by how the menu is handed over and how often it changes:

A4 — 210 × 297 mm

The full à la carte page. Room for four or five sections without crowding, and the size most menu printers price around.

A5 — 148 × 210 mm

Drinks, desserts and set menus. Small enough to sit on a laid table without covering the cutlery.

DL card — 99 × 210 mm

The long narrow strip for table tents, specials inserts and wine-by-the-glass lists. Cheap to reprint weekly.

US Letter — 8.5 × 11 in

The North American equivalent of A4, and what a US print shop assumes unless told otherwise.

Single panel for a counter or truck

Read standing, from a queue, at distance. Far fewer items and much larger type than anything handed to a seated guest.

Portrait 4:5 for a phone

For a menu shared as an image or linked from a QR code. Ask for it as a separate cut so the type is sized for a screen rather than for paper.

Whatever the format, keep 10 mm of clear margin. If the menu will be handled constantly, plan for lamination or a heavier stock — both change how the colour prints, so proof one before running fifty.