Menu Tests are designed for QSR brands and food-service researchers who need to validate menu board designs before launch. Whether you're testing a drive-thru board, an in-store display, a tabletop menu, a kiosk layout, or a delivery app screen, Menu Tests capture the interactive signals that static image surveys miss.

In This Article

• Adding a Menu Test Question
• Uploading a Menu Image
• Recognizing a Menu with AI
• Drawing Sections
• Adding and Editing Menu Items
• Assigning Menu Items to Sections
• Configuring the N/A Option
• Configuring Delivery Options
• Bulk Uploading Menu Items via CSV
• Logic References

Adding a Menu Test Question

To add a Menu Test to your survey:

1. Drag and drop the Menu Test icon from the left sidebar into the Survey Editor, or click the icon to insert it directly. Alternatively, click Add a question at the bottom of the page and select Menu Test from the Research Tests group.
2. Type or paste instruction text into the Question field, including what behavior you would like respondents to perform after looking at the menu image.
3. Drag and drop an image onto the Browse drop-zone, or upload a file from your computer.
4. Type or paste the menu items you'd like to test into the Menu items field, and click the card to the right of each line to enter menu item detail (price, info note, and an optional item image).
5. Use the drawing tools to create sections on the menu image, and assign items to each section.
6. Click the checkboxes below the menu items to configure N/A and delivery options.

💡 Tip: You can skip steps 4 and 5 by letting Skipper read the menu for you. See Recognizing a Menu with AI below.

Uploading a Menu Image

The menu image is the foundation of your Menu Test—it's the image respondents will interact with.

1. Click the image upload zone or drag and drop an image file onto it.

⚠️ Note: Supported formats are PNG, JPEG, GIF, BMP, and WEBP. Maximum file size is 30 MB. For best results, use a high-resolution image (at least 1200 px wide) so respondents can zoom in comfortably.

You can also upload an optional brand logo via the drop zone next to the question text. The logo appears in the cart dialog that respondents see when reviewing their order.

⚠️ Important: Replacing or deleting the menu image removes all sections. This action folds into a single undo step, so you can undo it if needed.

Recognizing a Menu with AI

Instead of typing every item and drawing every section by hand, you can have Skipper read the menu image for you. Click Recognize and Skipper reads the uploaded image and returns menu items—with prices and info notes—plus sections with borders drawn around them, ready for you to touch up.

1. Upload your menu image.
2. Click Recognize on the sections toolbar. The button is also available in fullscreen view. While a section is selected, the toolbar shows that section's actions instead—click outside the canvas to deselect.
3. A progress dialog opens over the image while the run is in progress. A typical run finishes in 15–100 seconds; large images can take up to 2 minutes. The question is locked until the run completes, and you can cancel at any time.
4. Review the result. Rename sections, nudge borders, correct prices, and delete anything Skipper picked up that you don't want to test.

⚠️ Important: Recognition replaces the question's entire item list and section list—it does not merge with what's already there. If you run it a second time after editing, your manual edits are replaced too. Your N/A item is always preserved, and a single undo restores the state from before the run.

💡 Tip: Skipper can make mistakes—human review is strongly recommended. Recognition is not capped to the editor's limits, so a dense board can return more than 200 items or 100 sections. Delete the surplus by hand before launching.

If recognition can't read the image, you'll see "We couldn't spot any items here"—try a clearer or higher-resolution picture. If a run takes too long, you'll see "Menu recognition timed out"; simply try again.

⚠️ Note: AI menu recognition is enabled team by team. If you don't see the Recognize button on the sections toolbar, it isn't turned on for your team yet—contact your account manager.

Drawing Sections

Sections are the clickable regions respondents tap to browse menu items. Once your image is uploaded, the section drawing toolbar appears above the canvas with three shape tools.

Each new section is automatically named "Section 1", "Section 2", etc. The drawing tool stays active after each shape, so you can draw multiple sections without re-selecting the tool. Click outside the canvas to deselect.

Editing sections

• Select—click a section shape on the canvas to select it.
• Move—drag the body of a selected section to reposition it.
• Resize—drag a corner or edge handle. Hold Shift while resizing to preserve the aspect ratio.
• Duplicate—hold Alt and drag a selected section to create a copy (with the same assigned menu items and a "(1)" name suffix).
• Delete—press Delete or Backspace with a section selected to remove it immediately. Alternatively, click the trash icon in the toolbar to see a confirmation prompt.

💡 Tip: Use the fullscreen canvas view (click the zoom icon on the image toolbar) for precision editing on large menu images. All drawing tools and the sections dialog work in fullscreen mode.

Sections can overlap—there are no restrictions on placement. Coordinates are always stored in original image pixels, regardless of the canvas zoom level.

Adding and Editing Menu Items

After uploading a menu image, start adding menu items. Click + Add menu item to add a new item, up to 200.

To edit an item's details, click the card icon on the item row to open the menu item dialog.

Use Clone menu item in the dialog to quickly duplicate an item—the clone keeps the original's price, info, and image. Deleting an item automatically removes it from every section it was assigned to.

Adding menu item images

You can attach an image to any menu item so respondents see the product on its own—larger than it appears on the board, or when the board has no picture of it at all. The image shows on the respondent's item card, in the Menu Item Metrics table on the stats page, and in the presentation export.

There are three ways to add one:

• From the item row—click the image control on the row. It shows an upload button when the item has no image, and a thumbnail once it does.
• From the menu item dialog—drag and drop onto the image block beside the Name, Price, and Info fields, or click it to browse. Once filled, the block shows a large preview with a Delete image link.
• By pasting—paste an image directly into the item's text field and it uploads to that item.

⚠️ Note: The N/A item can't have an image. Menu item images are not translated, since Menu Test isn't available in multilingual surveys.

Assigning Menu Items to Sections

After adding menu items, assign each one to the desired sections. Open the sections dialog by double-clicking a section shape, clicking the pencil icon on a selected section, or clicking the Edit sections button.

The sections dialog has a sidebar listing all sections and a detail panel for the active section. The detail panel shows a cropped preview of the menu image clipped to the section's shape, the section name (editable, max 120 characters), and a multi-select picker for assigning menu items.

Working in the sections dialog

• Assign items—use the Add menu item picker to select items. A filter row appears when you have more than 5 items. The N/A item is automatically excluded from the picker.
• Remove items—click the × on an assigned item to unlink it from this section.
• Reorder items—drag assigned item cards to change the order within the section.
• Show or hide the section preview—use the Enable section preview checkbox under the preview image. It's on by default. See Section previews below.
• Navigate—use the sidebar, Prev/Next buttons, or the ←/→ arrow keys to switch between sections.
• Delete a section—use the Delete section button in the dialog footer.

💡 Tip: The same menu item can be assigned to multiple sections. This is useful for items that appear in more than one area of the menu (e.g., a drink that shows up under both "Beverages" and "Combo Meals"). Each section maintains its own quantity count during the respondent experience.

Section names must be unique (case-insensitive). If you rename a section to match an existing name, the editor automatically appends " (1)" to keep them distinct.

Section previews

When a respondent opens a section on desktop, the section dialog shows that section's crop of the menu board alongside the item list. The Enable section preview checkbox on each section card controls whether that crop appears. It's on by default—clear it for any section where the crop isn't helpful, such as a section drawn over a photo or a decorative area of the board.

⚠️ Note: The setting applies to the desktop experience only. On mobile, respondents never see the section crop, whether the checkbox is on or off. The section thumbnails on the stats page are unaffected by this setting.

Configuring the N/A Option

Enable the N/A checkbox in the options panel below the items list. When enabled, a special "I don't want to buy anything" item is appended to the items list, and respondents see an opt-out checkbox during the experience.

• The N/A item is always pinned at the bottom of the items list and cannot be dragged.
• The N/A item cannot be assigned to any section.
• You can edit the N/A item's text inline (default: "I don't want to buy anything").
• When a respondent checks N/A, the order is preserved in memory but hidden—if they uncheck it, the order is restored.

Configuring Delivery Options

The delivery options control lets you choose which order types respondents can select when placing their order.

1. Check the Enable pickup and delivery options checkbox to enable the feature.
2. Click the dropdown chevron to see the four sub-options: Dine in, Drive thru, Pick up, and Delivery. All four are selected by default.
3. Check or uncheck individual options as needed.

⚠️ Note: Choose a minimum of 2 options. When fewer than 2 are selected, the delivery picker is automatically hidden from respondents. The parent checkbox shows as checked only when 2 or more options are selected.

Bulk Uploading Menu Items via CSV

For menus with many items, use the bulk upload feature instead of adding items one by one.

Downloading the template

1. Click the Menu sheet .csv dropdown below the items list.
2. Select Download.
3. A file named menu_design_download.csv downloads with columns: name, price, info, and one column per section (labeled section 1, section 2, etc.). Existing items and their section assignments are pre-filled.

Uploading items

1. Fill in the CSV with your menu items. The name column is required. Price and info are optional.
2. To assign an item to a section, enter the section's name in the corresponding section column. Section matching is case-insensitive.
3. Click the Menu sheet dropdown and select Upload, then choose your file (CSV or XLSX).

⚠️ Important: Uploading replaces the entire menu item list—it does not merge with existing items. Any images on the replaced items are removed along with them. The N/A item (if enabled) is preserved automatically.

💡 Tip: The upload isn't truncated—every row in your file is inserted. If the result goes over the 200-item limit, the editor flags the overflow so you can delete the surplus before launching.

Logic References

Menu Test supports logic piping and show/skip rules. You can reference individual menu items in downstream questions using standard logic labels (e.g., Q2A1 for the first menu item). For advanced logic, use in section / in shape / in cluster clauses to check whether a respondent ordered a specific item from a specific section.

Related Articles

• Menu Test Overview
• How to Analyze a Menu Test
• Menu Test Logic