What about a photograph of the printed menu?

It has all the problems of a PDF plus one more: it is usually even larger to download. If the image has no alt text, which is normal, the menu is invisible to search engines, screen readers and anyone on a slow connection.

Can I use a menu widget from a delivery platform?

You can embed one, but it puts your menu on somebody else’s infrastructure, usually loads slowly, and often carries their branding and their tracking. Your own menu page is faster and it stays yours.

Do I need to mark up the menu with structured data?

It is worth doing. Marking up the restaurant, its hours and its menu helps search engines display them correctly. It is not a substitute for the menu being real text — it is an addition to it.

How to put your menu online without a PDF

Put the menu on a web page as ordinary text — sections as headings, each dish as a line with its price and description. Do not link to a PDF and do not upload a photograph of the printed menu. A text menu loads instantly on a phone, can be read by search engines and screen readers, and can be changed in a minute.

The PDF menu is the most common mistake on restaurant websites, and it is entirely understandable. You already have the file, the designer already made it, and putting it online takes ten seconds. The problem is what happens on the other end.

What actually goes wrong with a PDF menu?

On a phone it either downloads or opens in a separate viewer, and it arrives at page width, which means the text is unreadably small until the person pinches and drags.
A search engine cannot reliably read the dishes inside it, so somebody searching for the thing you are known for does not find you.
A screen reader usually cannot read it either, which excludes people and, in several countries, is a legal problem.
It is typically two to six megabytes, against roughly fifteen kilobytes for the same menu as text.
Changing one price means going back to whoever has the source file.

What does a menu-as-text look like?

Structurally it is simple. Each section of the menu is a heading. Each dish is a line with a name, a short description, a price, and allergen or dietary markers if you use them.

Visually it can look like anything, including exactly like your printed menu. Text on a web page is not a constraint on design; dot leaders, columns, section rules and your own typeface are all available. The difference is that the words are words.

How do you handle a menu that changes constantly?

Split it. The parts that never change — the core menu, the drinks list — sit on the page permanently. The parts that change weekly go in one clearly dated section, and updating that section is a two-minute job rather than a redesign.

If somebody else maintains your site, this is exactly the kind of change that should be inside a monthly fee. Ask for it as a number of changes with a turnaround time before you agree to anything.

Does a text menu help you get found?

Yes, and it is the most direct benefit. Every dish name on the page is a phrase you can be found for. A restaurant known locally for one particular dish, with that dish trapped in a PDF, is invisible to the person searching for it.

It also matters for AI assistants, which increasingly answer "what is on the menu at ___" directly. They read HTML. They mostly do not open PDFs.

Should you keep a PDF at all?

Keep it for printing. If you want to offer a download for people who want one, put it after the real menu as a small link. It should never be the only version, and it should never be the first thing on the page.

Questions people actually ask

What about a photograph of the printed menu?: It has all the problems of a PDF plus one more: it is usually even larger to download. If the image has no alt text, which is normal, the menu is invisible to search engines, screen readers and anyone on a slow connection.
Can I use a menu widget from a delivery platform?: You can embed one, but it puts your menu on somebody else’s infrastructure, usually loads slowly, and often carries their branding and their tracking. Your own menu page is faster and it stays yours.
Do I need to mark up the menu with structured data?: It is worth doing. Marking up the restaurant, its hours and its menu helps search engines display them correctly. It is not a substitute for the menu being real text — it is an addition to it.