How to add dish photos to your digital menu

What happens to the dish photo on your menu

The dish photo on your menu is a single field on the item, called Photo. You pick a file from your phone or computer and, when you save, qmen.us doesn't store the image as it came: it's rotated to the camera's correct orientation, resized to fit 800 pixels on the longer side, and re-saved as WebP, a format much lighter than JPG. The saved file now ends in .webp, without you doing anything.

That same image appears in three places. On the Menu list, as a 48-pixel square thumbnail next to the item name. On the public page, as a 76-pixel square (60 on phones) next to the name, description and price, with the image cropped at the center to fill the square. And full screen, on a dark background, when the guest taps that thumbnail. An item without a photo doesn't leave a hole on the page: a gray image icon takes its place.

Why it's worth adding photos to your dishes

• Guests decide with their eyes. On the public page the dish appears with photo, name, description and price together, so whoever is at the table waiting for the waiter has already made up their mind.
• The menu doesn't get heavy. A phone photo is several megabytes. Because we shrink it to 800 pixels and re-save it as WebP, the page opens fast even on the dining room's shaky 4G.
• They can take a close look without leaving the page. One tap on the thumbnail opens the big photo; another tap, or the Esc key, closes it and the guest carries on where they left off in the menu.
• No editing needed beforehand. You can send it straight from the camera: we fix the orientation and size on upload, and your photo's proportions are always respected.
• Photos cost nothing. qmen.us is free for the restaurant with no commission per order, so putting a photo on every dish doesn't change your bill at the end of the month.

How to upload an item's photo, step by step

Six steps, from the Menu to the enlarged photo on the guest's screen.

1. Open the item in the Menu

   On the Dashboard, open the Menu. For a dish that already exists, tap edit on its row; for a new dish, use the + Item button at the top of the page.

2. Tap Choose photo

   In the item's form, the Photo field shows a gray square and, next to it, the Choose photo button — if the item already has an image, the button says Change photo. Both the square and the button open the device's picker, which takes any image format: on a phone you can take a picture on the spot or pick one from the gallery.

3. Check the thumbnail before saving

   Once you pick the file, it shows up in the square right away and its name sits just below the button. It's worth checking the framing before saving: since the photo is cropped to a square on the menu, anything too close to the edges disappears.

   Tip: The field's own help text says it: a square photo works best. If yours is rectangular, keep the dish in the center and the crop won't get in the way.

4. Tap Save

   The Save button is at the end of the form. That's when the conversion happens: the image is shrunk to fit 800 pixels on the longer side and re-saved as WebP, keeping its original proportions. Nothing stretches and nothing ends up sideways, even in a photo taken in landscape.

5. See how it looks on the public page

   Open the restaurant's public address, the same one the guest opens with the table QR code. The photo appears as a little square to the left of the item name. Tap it: the image opens enlarged in full screen, with a dark background and an X in the top corner. To close it, tap the photo, the dark background or the X — or press Esc, if you're on a computer.

6. Change or remove the photo later

   Back in edit, the button becomes Change photo and the Remove current photo checkbox appears. Check the box and tap Save to leave the item without an image: the gray icon goes back in its place and the rest of the item stays exactly the same.

Frequently asked questions

Glossary

Item

Each product you sell, with a name, description, photo and price; it's what the waiter adds to the tab.

Category

A section of the menu that groups similar items, like Starters or Drinks, and sets the order everyone sees.

Public page

The page at qmen.us/your-code where guests see your menu, phone numbers, address and opening hours.

Table QR code

The code printed on the table that guests scan with their phone, no sign-in needed.

Related resources