Menu Categories
Create and organise the categories that group your menu items â Starters, Mains, Beverages, Desserts, and whatever else your menu needs. Drag to reorder, toggle visibility, and build the logical structure that makes ordering faster for your staff and browsing easier for your customers.
Why Categories Matter More Than You Think
When staff take orders â on the Quick Orders screen, the Tables screen, or the mobile app â they browse the menu by category. The category tabs appear in whatever order you arrange them on the Categories page. If your categories are poorly organised â too many, poorly named, or in the wrong order â it slows down order-taking during service. A waiter looking for "Plain Rice" who can't remember if it's under "Mains", "Rice Dishes", or "Sides" loses 10â15 seconds per order. Over a busy service with 80+ orders, that adds up.
Good category organisation also benefits customers who use your QR code digital menu. When they scan and browse, they see the same category structure. A clear, logical category layout â with the most popular categories first â makes browsing faster and can genuinely increase orders by making items easier to find.
Creating a New Category
Click Add Category to open the category creation form. The form is intentionally simple â categories are just names and a few settings:
- Category Name: The display name that appears on the order form tabs and customer digital menu. Keep names short and clear â "Starters" is better than "Starter Appetisers and Snacks". The name should be immediately recognisable to both staff and customers.
- Description (optional): A short description that appears in the customer-facing digital menu under the category name. For example, "Starters" might have a description "Light bites, soups, and appetisers to begin your meal." This adds context for customers browsing the digital menu but is not shown on the staff order form.
- Visibility: Toggle whether the category is currently visible on the order form and digital menu. A hidden category still exists with all its items but doesn't appear in the menu during service. Useful for seasonal menus â a "Summer Specials" category can be created, hidden during off-season, and made visible when the season starts, without deleting and recreating it each year.
Once created, the category appears in the list and is immediately available for use when creating or editing menu items. You can create the category structure first, then populate the items, or add categories on the fly as you add items.
Reordering Categories
The order of categories in the list is the order they appear on the order form tabs and the digital menu. To reorder, drag a category row by the drag handle (the â ŋ icon on the left of each row) and drop it in the new position. The order is saved automatically â no need to click Save after reordering.
Think carefully about category order from your service context:
- Put your most-ordered categories first. If 60% of your orders include items from "Mains" and "Beverages", those should be the first two tabs. Staff should reach the most used categories with zero scrolling.
- Group logically. A typical ordering: Starters â Soups â Mains â Biryani â Breads â Rice â Sides â Beverages â Desserts. Items flow in the natural order of a meal, which matches how staff take orders ("What starter? What main? Any drinks?").
- Put rarely-used categories near the end. "Catering Add-ons" or "Packaged Products" that are ordered infrequently belong at the end of the list where they don't clutter the frequent-use area.
Editing and Deleting Categories
To rename a category or change its description, click the Edit (pencil) icon on the row. Make your changes and save. The updated name appears immediately everywhere in the system â order form, KDS, order history, digital menu. Historical orders that used items from this category will now show the new category name (since the category record is the same; only its display name changed).
To delete a category, click the Delete (trash) icon. If the category contains menu items, Unavakam will warn you before deleting â you must first either move those items to another category or delete them. An empty category can be deleted immediately. Deleting a category is permanent and affects how items in that category appear on the menu â which is why the system prevents deletion of non-empty categories as a safeguard.