Kitchen display (KDS) or kitchen printer? Which suits your kitchen?

Most kitchens run on thermal tickets and can keep doing so. A kitchen display system (KDS) does something tickets cannot: it shows how long each order has waited and which one comes first. So which suits your kitchen?

Kitchen printer

• Pros: everyone knows it, it is cheap, it works as long as there is power and paper, and the ticket sits next to the plate.
• Cons: tickets get lost and wet; nobody sees which order is late; waiters walk to the kitchen to ask what is ready.

Kitchen display

• Pros: orders by station on screen; timers and colours set priority; ready items on the expo view; no paper.
• Cons: the screen has to be mounted and protected; staff need a few days to get used to it.

A short comparison.

Which kitchen, which option?

Small café, few hot items

One printer is usually enough. If the drinks bar and the counter can see each other, a screen is not essential.

Busy full-service kitchen

A screen makes a difference: cooks see order and timing, waiters follow ready items on their tablet, and courses (starters first, then mains) are managed on screen.

Fast food and delivery

Speed and sequence matter; the screen shows which channel each order came from and how long it has waited.

Both together

You do not have to choose: the hot kitchen can run on a screen and the bar on a printer, or a printer can stand by as a backup. What matters is that every item reaches the right station.

When switching to a screen.

In ari adisyon the kitchen display and printers work together; a tablet or TV is enough for the screen. See our kitchen display page, and our thermal printer guide for choosing a printer.