Digital menu boards that update from your POS menu

A digital menu board in Opero is a full-screen web page that shows your location's live menu on any TV with a browser, or on a TV you cast to from an Android tablet. It is not a separate signage product with its own copy of the menu: the board reads the exact public menu feed that the self-order kiosk and QR/online ordering read, so an item you 86 at the register or a price you change in the menu builder reaches the TV in about a minute with nothing to re-publish. Menu boards are unlimited on every plan, including Opero at $149 per location per month. This page covers what the board is, how to put it on a TV, what it shows, how it updates, and the things it does not do yet.

What is Opero's digital menu board?

Opero's digital menu board is a read-only screen that lives at a link of its own that needs no login and shows your current menu under your restaurant's name, logo and brand color. You add it as a device in Opero, open its link on the TV, and it runs on its own from then on: it re-fetches the menu every 60 seconds, sends a heartbeat so the Devices page shows it online, and reloads itself after an Opero release when nobody has touched it for a short while. Nobody logs in on the board and nobody taps it. It is a menu, not an order screen.

The difference from standalone signage software is where the menu comes from. A standalone signage vendor gives you a designer and a player, and you type the menu into it a second time; from then on the register and the board drift apart until someone notices. Opero's board has no menu of its own. It renders the per-location menu that already feeds the POS, the kiosk, QR/online ordering and the kitchen display, so there is one place to add an item, change a price or pull something that sold out.

How do I put the menu board on a TV?

Add a menu board device in Opero, then open its link on the TV. There is no media player to buy and no account to sign into on the screen. The three steps, from the admin side:

• ✓In Opero, go to Devices, choose Add device, pick the role labeled Menu board (cast to TV) and the location it belongs to. Adding a device needs an owner, admin or general manager, or a manager who has been given the devices switch.
• ✓On the TV: open the board's link in the TV's built-in browser (the device page shows the link and a QR code). If your TV has no browser, open the same link on an Android tablet and cast the tablet's screen to the TV.
• ✓Or pair by code: the device page offers a one-time, 15-minute code. On the screen, open operoos.com/pair, type the code, and the board opens. A TV with no keyboard is usually quicker to set up by typing the link or casting.

Once the board is open, bookmark it or leave the browser on it. The link needs no login, so a power cut or a reboot only means opening the bookmark again. From then on the board keeps itself current: it polls the menu every minute, shows up as online in Devices while it is running, and picks up new Opero releases on its own once it has sat untouched for about 20 seconds. A TV, a Wi-Fi or wired connection and a browser are the whole hardware list; the one piece of hardware you buy from us is the card reader on the register, and it has nothing to do with the board.

What shows on the board?

The board shows your location's full current menu, one category after another, in a fixed multi-column layout that uses one, two or three columns depending on how wide the screen is. Under each category you get every item that belongs directly to it, with:

• ✓The item name and its price at this location, including any per-location price override you have set.
• ✓A two-line description, cut off cleanly if yours runs longer.
• ✓A small photo, if the item has one in your photo library.
• ✓A Combos section listing your combos at their set price.
• ✓Your restaurant's name, logo and brand accent color across the top, taken from Admin → Appearance.
• ✓A small Powered by Opero line in the footer.

The background is a fixed dark navy, so photos and your accent color carry the look. Branding is account-wide: the color and logo you set once in Appearance appear on the menu board, the kiosk and the customer display together, at every location. There is no separate design step for the board, which is the point, and also the limit: what you can change is the menu and the brand, not the layout.

How do 86s and price changes reach the board?

The board asks Opero for the menu again every 60 seconds, so any change that is live in the menu shows on the TV within about a minute, with no reload and no publish step. That covers the changes that matter mid-service:

• ✓86 an item from the admin bar's quick 86, the 86 board or the item itself, and it drops off the menu board at that location on the next refresh. Un-86 it and it comes back the same way.
• ✓Change a price in the menu builder, or set a per-location price override, and the board shows the new price.
• ✓Add a new item to a category, or add a combo, and it appears on the board without anyone touching the TV.
• ✓Upload or swap a photo and the board picks it up.

Floor staff can 86 without being able to edit prices, so the person who sees the last portion go out can pull the item, and the board, the kiosk, QR/online ordering and the register all stop offering it together. An 86 is per location: pulling the brisket downtown leaves it on the board at your other store, and an all-locations 86 pulls it from every board at once.

What the menu board does not do

Opero's board is a live, honest copy of your menu on a TV, and that is all it is today. If any of the items below is a must-have, a dedicated signage product is the better buy, and you can still run Opero's board next to it for the categories that change.

• ✓No dayparts or scheduled menus. The board always shows the whole current menu; it will not switch from a breakfast board to a lunch board on a clock. The only way to change what it shows is to 86, un-86 or remove items in the menu itself.
• ✓No video, animation, promo tiles, templates or drag-and-drop layouts. There is one fixed multi-column text-and-thumbnail layout, no portrait template and no image-hero tiles.
• ✓No per-board content. Every menu board at a location shows the same full menu. You cannot assign categories to one screen and the rest to another, or spread a menu across a three-panel row.
• ✓Items that live only in a subcategory do not appear. The board renders each category's direct items; a category whose items are all in subcategories is dropped from the board entirely. If a board item is missing, check whether it sits inside a subcategory.
• ✓No Spanish or second language on the board. Opero's built-in Spanish is a kiosk, QR/online and receipt feature; the board's headings are English.
• ✓No offline or cached playback. The board needs a live connection; after a drop it stays on its last fetched menu and resumes updating on its own on the next refresh once the connection is back.
• ✓Refresh is about a minute, not instant, and it is a poll rather than a push.
• ✓The Powered by Opero footer cannot be turned off, the dark background cannot be re-themed, and branding is one color and one logo for the whole account rather than per location.
• ✓No modifier lists or option prices on the board, and no ordering from it: guests order at the counter, the kiosk or from their phone.

How the board connects to the rest of Opero

Opero keeps one account-wide catalog of products, modifier groups and combos, and one menu per location built from it. That per-location menu is what the POS, the kiosk, QR/online ordering, the kitchen display and the menu board all read directly; there is no sync between them because there is nothing to sync. A per-location override can re-price or 86 an item at one store, and that override is applied in the same public menu feed the board pulls, which is why a price change at one location shows on that location's board and nowhere else.

One thing to know: the kiosk's hidden list does not apply to the board. Opero lets you hide an item from the self-order kiosk while keeping it on the POS and QR menu, and the board does not honor that switch, so an item hidden from the kiosk still shows on the menu board. If something should be off the TV as well, 86 it or take it off the menu rather than hiding it from the kiosk. The board also ignores nothing else: there is no board-only hide, no board-only price and no board-only name, which keeps it honest with the register by construction.

Because the board is a device in Opero like a kiosk or a register, it shows up on the Devices page with the rest of your screens: whether it is online by heartbeat, when it was last seen, and which location it belongs to. You can rename it, switch it off or retire it from the office. Boards pick up new Opero releases on their own by reloading the web page once it has sat untouched for about 20 seconds.

What does a digital menu board cost on Opero?

Nothing beyond your location's plan. Menu boards are unlimited on every tier, including Opero at $149 per location per month, Opero Full-Service at $249 and Enterprise at custom pricing. There is no per-screen fee and no entitlement that gates the board, so a second TV over the pickup window is just another device row. Plans are month-to-month. The hardware is a TV with a browser you already own, or a TV plus an Android tablet you already own to cast from; Opero does not sell or lease TVs, and the board needs nothing bought from us. The card reader, one per location and bought from us, is required for the register, not for the board.

Who the menu board is for

• ✓Counter-service and quick-service restaurants replacing a printed or chalk board that is always one price change behind the register.
• ✓Coffee shops and pizza counters where items sell out during a shift and the board has to stop offering them without someone climbing up to the TV.
• ✓Operators who already run the Opero kiosk or QR ordering and want the TV to say exactly what the kiosk says.
• ✓Multi-location owners who want the downtown price on the downtown TV and the suburban price on the suburban TV, from one menu builder.
• ✓Anyone who wants a menu on a TV without buying a media player or paying a signage subscription per screen.

It is not for you if you need a breakfast board that flips to lunch by itself, video or animated promos, a different layout per screen, or a bilingual board. Those are real gaps, listed above, and a signage product does them today.

The other guest screen: the customer display

Opero has two read-only guest screens besides the self-order kiosk, and the menu board is the one that faces the whole room. The other is the customer display: a second Android tablet at the counter, paired in Devices to one specific register, that mirrors the order as the cashier rings it. The guest sees each item with its quantity and modifiers, the subtotal, the tax rate, any card processing-fee note and the total, then a tip picker once the order is sent, and a thank-you screen when the card clears. Like the board, it is added from Devices, opens by link or pairing code with no login, carries the same account-wide branding, and is unlimited on every plan. The two screens answer different questions, so most counters run both: the board tells the line what you sell, the display tells the guest what they are paying.