QR menu Bahrain: printing one that works in two languages

A QR menu is a small printed code that opens your menu on a guest's phone. In Bahrain it has a job most guides skip: it usually has to work in Arabic and in English, for the same dish, on the same page, without one of them being a year out of date.

This is a practical guide. How big to print the code, what to decide before you send anything to a printer, and what the guest can do once the page opens. We make Get Menu, so the section on limits is where to look for the balance.

Decide these three things before you print

Which languages the menu carries. A laminated card usually solves this by printing both sides, which means two decisions every time a price changes and one of them getting forgotten. A page can hold Arabic item names and descriptions beside the English ones, edited in the same place at the same time.

Where the code lives. A card on the table, a sticker on the shutter, a small code at the end of the counter, and one on the takeaway bag are four different jobs. The one on the table is the only one that can know where the guest is sitting.

What the code opens. This is the choice that decides everything else. A code that opens a PDF gives the guest a photograph of paper. A code that opens a live digital menu gives them today's prices and the ability to order. The printing cost of the menu card is identical either way.

Reach is not the problem here. DataReportal's Digital 2025 report for Bahrain records a population of 1.63 million with almost all of it online, which is why a printed code is a reasonable thing to put in front of a stranger in a cafe in Muharraq without an explanation attached.

Sizing the printed code properly

Most codes that fail on the table were printed too small for the amount they carry. The maths is not difficult and it is published.

Denso Wave, the company that developed the format, works the size out from two numbers: how many modules the code is made of, and how big you print one module. Its guidance shows a version 3 symbol as 29 modules across, which at a 0.254 mm module comes out at 7.366 mm plus the margin. Longer web addresses need higher versions, which means more modules in the same square, which means each module gets smaller unless the card gets bigger.

Two practical results from that. Keep the address short, because a short link prints as a simpler code that scans faster in dim light. And when in doubt print the card bigger rather than the code denser. A cafe table card at roughly the size of a drinks coaster is usually right.

One more habit worth copying from print shops: matte lamination, not gloss. A gloss card under a downlight throws the light straight back at the camera.

What the guest gets after the scan

Get Menu opens your own page on your own address, with 12 page layouts so a short drinks list and a long grill menu can each be laid out sensibly rather than sharing one shape.

The menu behaves like a menu, not a document. Categories and items are reordered by dragging. Options and add-ons carry their own prices, so bread choice, sugar level or a side is a priced choice rather than a note somebody has to read. Required choices mean an order cannot arrive at the pass missing the thing the kitchen needs to start.

Stock counts fall as orders come in. When the last portion goes the item greys itself out for everyone at once, which is the moment a paper menu becomes a small argument.

Every line is priced again at checkout from your live menu. The price on the phone is the price on the bill, and there is no version of the menu anywhere that disagrees with another one.

Then the part a PDF cannot reach. If you print a code for every table, the table is the address. Get Menu generates the set for you, gives you a designer so the card carries your own colours and logo, and emails a print pack ready for the printer. A room with 30 tables is one job, not thirty. A group at a table can order from their own phones into a single bill.

When the order is confirmed, a ticket lands in your managers' group on WhatsApp with the table number on it. Nobody has to be flagged down and nothing is carried in someone's head across the room.

Ramadan, and the rest of the calendar

This is where a printed menu costs the most and nobody counts it.

A seasonal menu on card means printing, laminating, distributing, and then quietly living with the old one at the corner table for another fortnight. On a page you add a section, change the hours, and remove it when the season ends. The cards on the tables never know anything happened, because they only ever carried an address.

Get Menu also carries ready-made campaigns for Ramadan, Eid and National Day, so the message to your regulars is written and waiting rather than typed at eleven at night. Coupons carry caps, exclusions and expiry dates, which is what stops a Ramadan offer from running until August.

"A cafe owner in Muharraq showed me his menu and apologised for the Arabic side. It had three prices that were wrong. He was not careless. He had simply reprinted the English one on a laptop and the Arabic one was a design file somebody else owned. One page, two languages, one edit. That was the whole fix."

— Agha Shah Zaman, co-founder of Get Menu

The parts that keep working after month one

A code on the table is also the cheapest introduction you will ever get to a regular. Get Menu keeps loyalty stamps and tiers your regulars grow into, with the card in the guest's Google Wallet updating itself, and no app to install. Rewards for scanning again on the next visit turn a one-time scan into a second one.

For the books, VAT invoices carrying your registration number download as a PDF without a login, numbered in one unbroken sequence, and old order details are cleared automatically after 120 days so your records do not sprawl.

What a QR menu will not do

It will not take payment. Payment is cash or your own card machine at the table. There are no online payments in Get Menu at all, which is a real limit and also the reason no guest card details exist in it.

It will not replace a waiter for guests who would rather ask a person, and it should not try. Keep a few printed menus behind the counter for anyone who wants one.

It will not fix a menu nobody can understand. If the dish names are unclear on card, they will be unclear on a phone.

If you want the general version of this, our full guide to QR code menus covers printing and ordering from first principles, menu QR codes looks at the ordering side, and QR codes in a cafe is the small-site version of the same argument.

Get Menu takes 0% of your sales, charges one flat monthly amount, and the trial runs 15 days without asking for card details.

Frequently asked questions

Can the menu show Arabic and English at the same time?

Yes. Item names and descriptions can carry Arabic alongside the English, edited in one place, so the two versions cannot drift apart.

Can guests pay from the QR menu?

No. The code takes the order. Payment is cash or your own card machine at the table or the door, and no card details are stored anywhere.

Do I need a separate code for every table?

Only if you want orders to know where to go. One code by the entrance is fine for browsing. A code per table lets the order route itself, and the print pack makes producing the set a single job.

How big should the printed code be?

Big enough that each module stays clear on a small card. Keep the web address short, print matte rather than gloss, and leave the plain border around the code empty.

What happens when I change a price?

The next guest who scans sees the new price. No reprinting, and no card on a table showing a number you no longer charge.