What’s new

• More accurate translation progress — The progress bar on your menu cards now tracks real elapsed time instead of an estimate, keeps counting even if you background the app or close it entirely, and updates the moment your translation finishes — no need to reopen the app.
• Failed translations clean up after themselves — If a translation fails, you’ll see a brief notice, then it fades away and disappears from your history automatically.
• More TTS voices — Waiter replies are now spoken naturally in German, Spanish, French, Italian, and Arabic, instead of falling back to an English voice.

Bug fixes

• Order chat waiter replies are now translated into your selected language instead of always defaulting to English.
• Fixed voice messages in the order chat sometimes failing to translate on certain devices, and reduced background noise picked up by the microphone.

Under the hood

• More reliable translation tracking — The backend now tracks each menu’s translation status more precisely, so failures are reported accurately instead of getting stuck or disappearing without explanation.

What’s new

• Get the app — The web experience now keeps shared menus available while guiding you to the iOS or Android app for features that need it, with a handy download drawer and clearer store links.
• Smarter support prompts — Support requests now alternate between a quick tip and a review invitation, with a feedback option when the app has not met your expectations.
• Smoother order conversations — The order chat now follows the latest message automatically and includes a jump-to-latest button when you scroll back through the conversation.

Bug fixes

• Translation notifications now open the correct results, including completed multi-page menus.
• Menu photo error messages now appear in the language you selected.
• Waiter messages now show pronunciation for the restaurant-language text, instead of a duplicated translation or a placeholder.
• The “Try anyway” button is now translated along with the rest of the app.

What’s new

• Shake alerts — If you try to translate without a photo or a selected language, the missing field now shakes to grab your attention as the app scrolls to it.

Bug fixes

• Fixed menu item highlights occasionally appearing slightly off from the dish they belong to.

What’s new

• Try anyway — If the AI thinks your photo isn’t a menu, you’ll now see a “Try anyway” button so you can still attempt a translation — handy for chalkboards, handwritten menus, or unconventional photos.
• Swipe to dismiss — On iOS and Android, pop-up sheets can now be swiped down to close, just like other apps on your phone.
• Fullscreen button — A new button in the translation results lets you expand the original menu image to fullscreen.
• Refreshed tap hint — The nudge encouraging you to tap a dish for details now sits at the top, has a pointer icon with a bounce animation, and shakes for new users so it’s hard to miss.

Bug fixes

• Photo uploads now automatically retry on a weak connection, reducing failed uploads on spotty Wi-Fi.
• Fixed a black frame that could flash when scrolling between pages in the image viewer.
• Dish highlights on multi-page menus now appear page by page as they become ready, rather than waiting for all pages to finish.
• Fixed a photo error message not clearing after successfully adding a new photo on mobile.
• Fixed a rare loop where the app would keep reloading itself after clearing the cache.
• Language fields on the translate screen now correctly block submission if left blank.
• The special requests box in the order form now starts collapsed to a single line and expands when tapped, keeping things tidy.
• Fixed long dish names causing a layout issue in the order form.

What’s new

• Order notes — You can now add a note or special request to individual items when building your order — useful for “no spice”, “extra sauce”, or anything else you want the waiter to know per dish.

Bug fixes

• Fixed filled-in menu images writing quantities in the wrong column.

Under the hood

• Smarter filled-in menus — Quantity marks on your filled-out menu image now anchor more precisely to each item’s printed number, making the result cleaner to hand to the waiter.

What’s new

• Cute guest names — When you start translating without an account, the app now gives you a friendly, memorable guest name instead of a plain anonymous placeholder.

Bug fixes

• Slow or stalled network requests now fail quickly so you can retry, instead of leaving the app hanging indefinitely.
• Fixed the app occasionally refreshing twice — or getting stuck on a loading spinner — right after an update.
• Removed an unreliable “offline” banner that could pop up on the translate screen even when you were connected.
• If every page of a multi-photo menu upload fails, you now get a clear error message instead of silence.
• Fixed the “Order Now” button briefly showing up empty when reopening a saved menu.
• Long pop-up titles that wrap onto two lines now stay centered.

Under the hood

• More accurate wait times — Recalibrated the estimated translation times so the on-screen countdown better matches how long things actually take.
• Faster image loading — Switched the app’s illustrations to a more efficient image format, so screens load a little quicker.

What’s new

• Translate before signing up — Tap “Get Started” from the home screen and translate a menu straight away — no account needed. After a few translations, you’ll be gently invited to create a free account to save your history and unlock everything.
• Native-app polish on web — The web version now has pull-to-refresh, haptic feedback on camera actions, and a smoother splash screen fade-in, bringing it much closer in feel to the iOS and Android apps.
• Redesigned support section — The tip and subscription screen has been refreshed with real community reviews, a new shortcut to leave a review on the App Store or Play Store, and a warm thank-you moment when you support the app.

Bug fixes

• Login buttons now show a loading indicator while signing in with Google or Apple, so it’s clear the app is working.
• Fixed images in pop-up dialogs briefly appearing blank before they finished loading.
• Fixed the navigation drawer staying open when a sign-up prompt appeared at the same time.

Bug fixes

• Fixed a rare error right after an app update where part of the app could fail to load — it now recovers on its own.

Under the hood

• Faster menu translations — We trimmed the delays in the steps that run right after you upload a menu photo, so the “analyzing” wait is noticeably shorter and your results start coming through sooner.
• More reliable order cards — Improved the order-card fill-out feature so it succeeds more consistently and gives clearer feedback if something goes wrong.

What’s new

• Demos in your language — The “Try it now” preview and sample menus now match the language you’ve selected, so you always see a relevant example. We also brought back the demo picker so you can choose which sample to explore.
• Photo access helper — If you’ve previously denied camera or photo access, the app now shows a friendly prompt explaining how to turn it back on, instead of quietly doing nothing.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the order options sheet zooming in or getting hidden behind the keyboard on iPhone.
• Fixed the order note field opening the keyboard on its own before you tapped it.
• Made the “tap to view” hint easier to read.

What’s new

• Special requests on orders — When building your order, you can now add a note for the waiter — allergies, dietary restrictions, or anything else. The AI works your request into the order it generates, so your needs are communicated clearly.
• Automatic connection recovery — If the app loses your connection mid-translation, it now retries automatically and shows a clear “connection lost” message if it can’t recover. No more confusing generic errors.

Under the hood

• Smarter progress bar — The loading bar during translation now adapts to the complexity of your menu, so the progress you see is more accurate and less likely to stall near the end.
• More resilient storage — The app handles edge cases in device storage more gracefully, so translations are less likely to get stuck in rare low-storage situations.

What’s new

• Menu card appears right away — As soon as you submit a photo, the new menu card shows up in your list with a loading indicator. You don’t have to wait for the AI to finish before seeing it appear — it’s there immediately, updating live as the translation comes through.
• Share button now has a label — The share button on menu images now shows a “Share” label alongside the icon, making it easier to spot and tap.

Bug fixes

• Fixed menu item highlights sometimes being incomplete or missing when reopening a previously translated menu.

What’s new

• Password reset — You can now reset your password from the login screen. Tap “Forgot password?”, enter your email, and a reset link will be sent to your inbox.

Bug fixes

• Fixed dishes sometimes appearing in a different order each time you opened the same menu.
• Fixed a deleted menu sometimes still appearing in the list until the next refresh.

Under the hood

• Menus load instantly — Your most recent menus now appear immediately from cache when you open the app, with fresh data loading quietly in the background. No more blank loading screen on startup.
• Faster sign-in — The app now restores your session from cache on launch, so you land on your menus faster after opening.
• Graceful navigation recovery — If a link takes you to a menu that no longer exists, the app now quietly redirects you to your menu list instead of showing an error.

What’s new

• Swipe through menu pages — When viewing a multi-page menu in fullscreen, you can now swipe left and right between pages. The viewer stays in sync with the translation list below, so the page you’re reading always matches what you’re looking at.
• Tip dialog shows the real price — The in-app tip nudge now fetches the current store price before it appears, so the amount on the button is always accurate.

What’s new

• 9-page menus — The upload limit has jumped from 4 to 9 pages. Long tasting menus, multi-section prix-fixe menus, or any sprawling menu that never fit before — now you can bring the whole thing in one go. The upload screen label updates dynamically to reflect how many pages you’ve added.
• Accurate progress tracking — The translation progress bar now correctly reflects how many pages have been processed, updating page-by-page as results come in.

What’s new

• Order quantity badges — Added dishes to your cart? The quantities now appear as badges directly on the menu image overlay, so you can see at a glance what you’ve ordered and where it sits on the menu.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the native camera forcing a square crop when taking a menu photo — it now captures the full frame as intended.
• Fixed ordered dishes losing their visual style when viewed in the image lightbox.

What’s new

• Say button loading state — When you tap Say to hear a dish name or phrase, the button now shows a spinner while the audio loads so you know something’s happening.
• What’s New translated — The “What’s New” walkthrough is now shown in your language, alongside the rest of the app interface.

Bug fixes

• Fixed translated dish names occasionally using awkward phrasing or incorrect grammatical agreement — results now read more naturally.
• Fixed the language selector occasionally overflowing off-screen on narrow devices.
• Fixed animated language text on the home screen getting clipped when showing longer language names.

What’s new

• Simplified & Traditional Chinese — When translating to Chinese, you can now choose between Simplified (Mainland) or Traditional (Taiwan/HK) script. The right characters show up for your destination, and pronunciation guides, text-to-speech, and the Pleco dictionary lookup all follow suit.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the notification badge getting stuck on the app icon — it now clears as soon as you open the app.

What’s new

• 10-language app interface — Menu, please! now speaks your language. The app detects your device language automatically and switches to German, Spanish, French, Italian, Arabic, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, or Traditional Chinese. If your preferred language isn’t detected or you want to switch, head to your profile to pick one manually.

Bug fixes

• Fixed dish label text occasionally overflowing outside the highlight box on the menu overlay.
• Fixed a rare case where adding menu pages could exceed the four-page limit.
• Fixed currency symbols appearing next to dishes that have no listed price.
• Translation results are now more reliable — edge cases that could occasionally produce incomplete or garbled text are now handled gracefully.

What’s new

• Sideways dish labels — Dish names that run vertically on the menu overlay now rotate sideways instead of stacking letter-by-letter, making them much easier to read at a glance.

Bug fixes

• Fixed a noticeable delay when returning to your menu history — past menus now appear instantly.

What’s new

• Basket review — Tapping “Order now” opens a basket sheet where you can adjust quantities before placing your order. No more accidentally ordering three of something when you meant one.
• Multi-page order highlights — If your menu spans multiple pages, the order highlight view now shows all pages in a swipeable carousel so you can see exactly what you’re ordering on each page.
• Tap to view dish details — In the order highlight view, tap any highlighted dish to see its full translation and description.
• Smarter dish labels — Dish labels on the menu overlay now automatically shrink on crowded menus and grow on spacious ones, so text stays readable no matter how packed the menu is.
• Swipe transitions — Swiping between menu pages in the lightbox now follows your finger smoothly, matching the feel of a native photo gallery.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the “translating…” indicator not appearing when starting an order.
• Fixed dish highlight overlays occasionally appearing behind the menu image on iOS.
• Fixed highlight overlays not aligning correctly with the menu image on some screen sizes.
• Fixed the Order Now button sometimes getting stuck in a loading state.
• Fixed past order messages in chat showing images and controls that only apply to the current order.

What’s new

• Full image preview — The menu photo on the results page now shows the entire image without cropping. Empty space is filled with a soft blurred accent so it still looks polished, whether your menu photo is landscape or portrait.
• Clearer category badges — Category badges are now grey by default, with only the currently viewed category highlighted in color. This makes it much easier to spot which section you’re looking at as you scroll through your translation.

Bug fixes

• Fixed dish highlights on the menu preview not aligning correctly in some cases.
• Fixed dish highlights replaying their entrance animation every time you revisited a completed menu.
• Fixed pages not starting at the top when navigating between screens.

What’s new

• Better-timed support prompt — The “Enjoying Menu, please?” prompt now appears while your menu is being translated, instead of after the results load. This way you can read it during the wait instead of having to dismiss it to see your translation.

Bug fixes

• Fixed a rare issue where menus with many dishes could fail during the options detection step.
• Fixed competing app store buttons showing on the native app.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the order button sometimes submitting twice if tapped quickly.
• Fixed order progress and selections disappearing after a page refresh.
• Fixed a loading spinner that could get stuck while dish options were still being prepared.
• Fixed login via Google occasionally failing when the app tried to clean up the URL too early.

Under the hood

• More reliable connections — The backend now handles high-traffic moments more gracefully, reducing occasional timeouts when many users are active at once.

Bug fixes

• Fixed in-app purchases occasionally failing on native devices.
• Fixed the supporter badge not appearing immediately after a purchase.
• Fixed an error appearing when cancelling a purchase.
• Fixed the support section not hiding correctly on native when the feature isn’t available yet.
• Fixed the support button showing the wrong style depending on platform — native now shows the in-app option, web shows the external link.
• Fixed logout occasionally getting stuck if the session had already expired.

What’s new

• Support the app — You can now tip the developer with a boba tea or bento box, or become a monthly supporter — all directly inside the app. On the web, the Buy Me a Coffee link is still available.
• Supporter badge — Supporters get a badge displayed next to their name in the app. Buy a tip and you’ll have the badge for 30 days; monthly subscribers keep it as long as their subscription is active.
• Support nudge — After translating a few menus, a friendly nudge may appear inviting you to support the app. It only shows occasionally and never to existing supporters.
• Restore purchases — Switched devices? You can restore your previous purchases from the Settings page.

Bug fixes

• Fixed dishes without selectable options showing a permanent “loading” indicator instead of displaying correctly.
• Fixed ordering sometimes failing when dishes had missing option data.
• Fixed the Picture-in-Picture thumbnail not appearing when viewing multi-page menus in the image viewer.

Under the hood

• More reliable ordering — The order creation flow is now more robust, handling edge cases in dish data more gracefully.

What’s new

• Multi-page menus — You can now photograph multiple pages of a menu and upload them all at once. They’re grouped together in your history with a page carousel so a multi-page menu stays organized as one unit.
• Background options loading — Dish options (sizes, spice levels, toppings) now load in the background after the main translation finishes, so you see your translated menu faster and options appear when you need them.
• Faster iOS photo capture — Taking a menu photo on iPhone now skips the crop/edit screen, getting you straight to translation with one less tap.
• What’s New v1.1.0 — The onboarding modal now highlights the latest features when you update to a new version.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the image viewer occasionally appearing behind other elements on certain screens.
• Fixed multi-page menus sometimes losing their dish highlights when switching between pages.
• Fixed the image picker on iOS occasionally failing when selecting multiple photos from the gallery.
• Fixed duplicate notifications being sent for multi-page menu translations — you now get one notification per menu, not per page.
• Fixed dish highlights not appearing correctly on some menus with unusual formatting.
• Fixed large menus occasionally failing to save to history.

What’s new

• Dish options — Some dishes come with choices like spice level, size, or toppings. You can now select these per item before adding to your order, so the waiter gets exactly what you want.
• Restaurant info banner — Menus that include general ordering instructions (e.g., “all dishes are meant for sharing” or “lunch sets available until 2pm”) now show a banner at the top of the translation results.
• Clickable dish details in order — Tapping a dish in your order now opens its full details so you can double-check before ordering.
• Android back button — The hardware/gesture back button on Android now navigates through the app naturally, just like a native app.
• Overlay text scaling — Menu overlay labels now stay readable as you zoom in and out, automatically adjusting size to remain legible.

Bug fixes

• Fixed layout jumping when images were loading or when navigating between screens.
• Fixed the Picture-in-Picture thumbnail sometimes showing a photo from a previously viewed menu.
• Fixed the progress bar not catching up correctly after navigating away and returning to a translating menu.
• Fixed menu data being cleared when navigating back to an already-translated menu.
• Fixed overlay text on vertical menus (like some Japanese izakaya menus) appearing sideways.
• Increased tap target size for the close button on dish detail sheets.

Under the hood

• Faster uploads — Menu photos are now compressed more efficiently before uploading, reducing wait times on slower connections.
• Snappier progress bar — Translation time estimates are now more accurate and the progress animation feels faster.

What’s new

• Live menu overlays — As the AI translates your menu, labeled rectangles now appear on the photo in real time, highlighting each dish as it’s identified. Tap any overlay to see its full translation.
• Picture-in-Picture thumbnail — A floating thumbnail of your menu photo stays visible while you scroll through results, so you always know which item you’re looking at.
• Dish detail drawer — Tap any dish to open a slide-up panel with the full description, photo region, and ordering info.
• Jisho dictionary — On Japanese menus, each dish name now links to its Jisho dictionary entry so you can explore kanji and ingredients.
• User feedback voting — You can now submit and vote on feature ideas directly from the app. Your votes help decide what gets built next!
• Onboarding carousel — New users see a walkthrough of the app’s main features on first launch, and returning users see a “What’s New” summary after updates.

Bug fixes

• Fixed the microphone button on Android opening the keyboard instead of starting audio recording.
• Fixed the feedback drawer’s close button being hidden behind the keyboard on iOS.
• Fixed the chat input being hidden behind the keyboard on Android.

What’s new

• Onboarding modal — New users now see a friendly onboarding carousel that walks through the app’s main features: scan, translate, order. It also doubles as a “What’s new” screen after major updates.
• User feedback voting — You can now vote on features and report issues directly from the app. Your votes help decide what gets built next!

Bug fixes

• Android mic button — Fixed a bug where tapping the microphone button on Android would open the keyboard instead of starting audio recording.
• Feedback drawer keyboard — Fixed the feedback drawer’s close button being hidden behind the keyboard on iOS.
• Keyboard overlap on Android — Fixed the chat input being hidden behind the keyboard on Android.

What’s new

• Pinch-to-zoom lightbox — The full-screen image viewer now supports smooth pinch-to-zoom and panning, making it easy to read tiny menu text on your phone.
• Adaptive loading progress — The translation loading bar now estimates completion time based on the actual menu size (number of pages, density of items), so the progress feels accurate rather than arbitrary.
• Landing page refresh — The public landing page got visual improvements and a new modal that lets visitors try sample translated menus before signing up.

Bug fixes

• Fixed status bar content overlapping the app on both iOS and Android by adding a fixed backdrop behind it.
• Fixed the order page scrolling the entire document on iOS when the keyboard was open, causing the navigation bar to jump around.
• Fixed Android safe area insets not being applied correctly on the order page.
• Locked body position on iOS to prevent the keyboard from pushing the navbar off-screen.

What’s new

• Native iOS & Android app — Menu, please! is no longer just a web app! It now runs as a true native app on both iOS and Android. Same features, but with native performance and platform integration.
• Native camera — On mobile, tapping “Scan menu” now opens your phone’s native camera with a crop/confirm screen. No more fumbling with the browser file picker.
• Push notifications — Get notified when your menu translation is ready, even if you’ve switched to another app. Especially useful for large multi-page menus that take a moment to process.
• Splash screen — A proper branded splash screen now shows while the app loads, matching the sushi mascot branding on both platforms.

Bug fixes

• Fixed an issue where creating a menu while the app was backgrounded could cause a silent failure.
• Fixed camera permissions on iOS requiring additional photo library access descriptions.

What’s new

• Learning mode audio settings — If you’re using Menu, please! to learn a language (not just translate), you can now control audio playback settings from your profile. Hear dish names pronounced so you can practice ordering out loud!
• Cantonese support — Cantonese (with Jyutping romanization) is now a fully supported source language. Perfect for dim sum menus in Hong Kong and Guangdong.
• No more beta labels — All languages that were previously marked as “beta” have graduated. They’re stable and ready for your next trip.

Under the hood

• Improved analytics — Upgraded our analytics setup so we can better understand how people use the app and fix issues faster.
• Faster AI model — Switched to a newer, faster AI model for quicker translations while maintaining quality.
• Translation history — Your past translations are now saved locally so you can revisit them without re-translating.

What’s new

• Fill-out menu — After building your order, the AI generates a copy of the original menu image with your selected quantities written directly onto it. Hand this to the waiter and point — no language barrier needed!
• Image lightbox — Tapping any menu image now opens a full-screen lightbox so you can pinch-to-zoom into small text or examine dishes more closely.
• Translator page rebuild — The real-time translator page got a complete overhaul. The new layout keeps the input always visible, fixes scroll issues on smaller screens, and adds navigation history so the back button works as expected.

Bug fixes

• Fixed a bug where the “Order now” buttons were disabled while a menu image was still loading.
• Auto-display the AI-generated fill-out menu image in the chat without needing an extra tap.

Under the hood

• Image caching — Menu images are now cached on your device, so revisiting a translated menu loads instantly instead of re-downloading everything.
• Smart fill-out detection — The app now detects whether a menu is suitable for the fill-out feature and only shows the option when it makes sense.

Under the hood

• Translation monitoring — Every translation is now tracked end-to-end. This means I can see exactly how long translations take, what the AI receives and returns, and spot quality issues before you do.
• Faster prompt iteration — Translation instructions can now be updated without redeploying the app. This makes it much faster to experiment with and improve translation quality.
• Safe testing pipeline — Changes to how translations work are now tested in a safe environment before they reach you, so quality stays consistent.

What’s new

• Ordering instructions — Menus often have small print about how to order (e.g. “pick one from each section”, “minimum 2 pieces”). These now show up in a dedicated “Good to know…” section so you won’t miss them.
• Currency display — Prices now show the local currency symbol alongside the dish, so you know exactly what you’re paying.

Under the hood

• Smarter AI — Upgraded to a new AI model that’s noticeably more accurate, especially on handwritten menus. It now “thinks through” tricky layouts before translating.
• Full menu translations — Fixed an issue where very long menus would get cut off mid-translation.