How to set up an Arabic and English menu (and more for tourists)

Picture a Friday evening at a seafood restaurant in Hurghada: an Egyptian family at one table, a Russian couple at the next, a group of Italian divers by the window, and a Saudi family who just arrived. One printed menu in English with a few Arabic headings serves none of them well. The Egyptian family reads English dish names that nobody uses, the Russian couple guesses, and your waiter spends the night translating.

This is a hands-on setup guide, not an argument for why multilingual menus matter (that case is made in why your menu needs to speak your customers' language). It covers choosing your languages, getting Arabic right-to-left layout correct, naming Egyptian dishes for foreigners, when AI translation is enough and when a human must check, handling tourist languages in the Red Sea and Sinai, and making prices clear to visitors.

1Choose languages from who actually sits down

Do not pick languages from a list of "tourist languages". Count your own guests. For one ordinary week, ask the floor staff to tally the language each table used when ordering. Then use a rule like this:

Venue type	Typical starting set	Add another language when
Neighbourhood restaurant or café in Cairo, Alexandria, Delta cities	Arabic and English	Rarely needed
Downtown, Zamalek, Giza pyramids area, Luxor, Aswan	Arabic and English, English-first layout	A single language group shows up at a meaningful share of tables every week
Hurghada, Sharm El Sheikh, Marsa Alam, Dahab	English, Arabic, plus your largest visitor group	Your tally shows a second large group, or a hotel partner sends you a specific market
Sahel and North Coast	Arabic-first with English	Rarely needed; most guests read Arabic

The tally matters because visitor mix differs between towns, resorts and seasons. A Red Sea venue might see mostly Russian-speaking guests in one season and Europeans from several countries in another. Three well-maintained languages beat six neglected ones.

2Getting the Arabic side right

Arabic reads right to left, and a menu built in English and then "flipped" often breaks in small ways that make it look careless. Check these on a real phone, not only on the laptop:

• Direction: the whole layout (category list, item names, prices) flows right to left, with prices aligned on the left side of the line.
• Mixed text: names that combine Arabic and Latin text ("بيتزا 4 Cheese") can reorder oddly. Write them fully in Arabic where possible, or test how each one displays.
• Digits: decide between Western digits (1, 2, 3) and Eastern Arabic digits (١، ٢، ٣) and use one consistently. Western digits are readable by every guest, which helps in tourist areas.
• Currency: write "ج.م" or "جنيه" on the Arabic side and "EGP" on the English side, and keep the number identical in both.
• Language register: write descriptions in clear Modern Standard Arabic, which Egyptian and Gulf guests both read comfortably, while keeping familiar Egyptian dish names as people say them.
• Font: use a proper Arabic typeface; a Latin font's fallback Arabic glyphs often look thin and hard to read at small sizes.

3Naming Egyptian dishes for foreign guests

Translating a dish name literally rarely helps. "Jew's mallow" does not sell molokhia to anyone. The approach that works: keep the original name, transliterated, and add a short plain explanation.

Arabic	English menu name	Explanation line
كشري	Koshari	Rice, lentils and pasta with spiced tomato sauce and crispy onions. Vegetarian.
ملوخية	Molokhia	Green leaf stew with garlic and coriander, served with rice and chicken.
طعمية	Ta'meya	Egyptian falafel made from fava beans and herbs.
حواوشي	Hawawshi	Baladi bread stuffed with spiced minced beef, baked until crisp.
محشي	Mahshi	Vegetables and vine leaves stuffed with herbed rice.
أم علي	Om Ali	Warm pastry pudding with milk, nuts and raisins.

Pick one spelling for each transliterated name (koshari or kushari, not both) and use it everywhere: menu, signage, Instagram. For the description line itself, the formula in our menu description guide applies in every language.

4AI translation versus human translation

This is less of a choice than it looks. For most menus the sensible workflow uses both: AI for speed, a human for the parts where mistakes are costly.

	AI translation	Human translator
Speed	Minutes for a whole menu	Days, depending on availability
Cost	Low or included in your menu tool	Paid per word or per menu, every time you change it
Strength	Consistent, instant updates when items change	Nuance, cultural fit, catching ambiguity
Typical failure	Literal dish-name translations, wrong culinary terms	Out of date after the next menu change

A workable routine: finalise the Arabic and English master menu first, run the AI translation, then give a native speaker of each language 20 to 30 minutes with the result. Ask them to check dish names, allergen words, anything humorous or clever in your descriptions, and that no price or portion has changed. A hotel guest-relations colleague, a tour guide or a regular guest is often happy to help.

In Menyo, multi-language menus are part of the Professional plan (up to three languages; Enterprise removes the limit). The built-in AI translation currently covers Arabic, Italian, Spanish and Russian, keeps brand names intact and uses native culinary terms, and you can edit any line afterwards. If you need a language outside that list, check the current options in your dashboard before planning around it.

5Language switching: automatic detection plus a visible choice

A good digital menu opens in the guest's phone language automatically, and also shows an obvious switcher. You need both: plenty of travellers keep their phone in English, and some Arabic speakers prefer reading menus in English.

• Label languages in their own script ("العربية", "English", "Русский", "Italiano"), not with flags. Flags map badly to languages; Arabic is spoken in many countries and English is not only British.
• Put the switcher at the top of the menu, where a confused guest looks first.
• Remember the choice so the guest does not switch again on every page.

Menyo's public menu detects the browser language, shows an in-menu language switcher and remembers the guest's choice.

6Prices, taxes and service charge for visitors

With visitors, friction often comes from the bill rather than the food: additions they did not expect, or a price per kilo they misread. Prevent that on the menu:

• State clearly whether prices include VAT (14% in Egypt) and service charge. One line at the top of every language version is enough.
• Keep prices in EGP only. Showing euro or dollar conversions invites disputes when exchange rates move, unless you update them daily and accept that currency at that rate.
• Say which payment methods you accept (cash, cards, and whether foreign cards work) so guests are not caught out at the end.
• Make portion sizes explicit for sharing plates and seafood sold by weight, which are easy to misunderstand.

Hotel restaurants with an international mix have extra considerations (room charging, all-inclusive exclusions); see our guide for hotels and resorts.

7Frequently asked questions

Which languages should a restaurant in Sharm El Sheikh or Hurghada offer?

English and Arabic, plus the language of your largest visitor group this season. Tally the languages your tables actually use for a week before deciding, because the mix varies by resort area and time of year.

Is AI translation good enough for a restaurant menu?

For the bulk of the text, usually yes, provided a native speaker reviews dish names, allergen terms and anything that relies on wordplay. The review takes far less time than translating from scratch.

Should Egyptian dish names be translated into English?

Keep the Egyptian name, transliterated consistently, and add a short explanation. Literal translations confuse guests more than the original name does.

Should the menu open in Arabic or English by default?

Let it follow the guest's phone language, with a clear switcher. If you must choose one default, pick the language most of your actual guests read.

8Set it up in this order

Finalise the Arabic and English master menu first, since every other language copies its mistakes. Fix right-to-left layout and dish-name spellings, add tourist languages based on your own tally, have a native speaker review each one, and print the available languages on your table cards. When you change a dish, change it in every language the same day.

If you want AI translation, automatic language detection and a switcher on your QR menu, the Professional plan includes them; you can create your Menyo account and compare plans on the pricing page.