How much does an AR menu cost in the UK?
Three ways to get an AR menu, what each costs in pounds, and what drives the price.
Quick answer
In the UK in 2026 there are three price points. Self-service subscription AR menu services list from about £49 to £199 a month, usually with AI or photo-based models. Studio-made menus, like VR Express, charge a one-off set-up plus a fee per dish for real scans of your own plates with a manual quality pass. Fully custom AR apps cost tens of thousands. What you pay depends mainly on the number of dishes, who scans them, and how often the menu changes.
The three price points
- Subscription services: about £49 to £199 a month as listed by UK providers in November 2026, often with no set-up fee. Models are usually generated from photos; quality and accuracy vary by dish.
- Studio-made menus (VR Express): a one-off set-up, typically in the thousands of pounds, covering the capture kit, onboarding, your menu page and print-ready QR codes, plus a per-dish fee in the low hundreds of pounds that covers the scan clean-up, quality check and hosting.
- Custom AR apps: published agency estimates for custom AR projects start around $5,000 and run to $50,000 or more. This is rarely needed for a menu now that phones open AR from the browser.
What drives the price
- Number of dishes and drinks. Most venues start with their signature items rather than the whole menu.
- Who scans. Your team with our kit costs less than on-site captures by us.
- Difficulty. Glass, liquid, foams and fine garnish need more manual clean-up than bakes or burgers.
- Menu changes. Seasonal menus mean regular new captures.
- Number of sites. For chains plating to a spec, one capture serves every site.
Subscription or studio-made?
A subscription is the cheapest way to try AR with a few photo-based models. A studio-made menu costs more because every dish is a real scan of your own plate, checked by hand for scale and accuracy, which matters when the model sets the guest's expectation of what arrives. Venues where presentation is the product, such as fine dining, cocktail bars and hotels, usually choose the second.
For a quote, send us your dish count and whether you want to scan yourselves or have us on site in London.
See it and read the case study
Try it on your phone: open the demo menu and tap “See it on your table”. VR Express has built AR, VR and WebXR since 2015, including the AR Menu platform for restaurants and bars. Start with the overview of AR menus for London restaurants or compare AR and QR menus.
Frequently asked questions
How much does an AR menu cost per dish in the UK?
With a studio-made menu, expect a per-dish fee in the low hundreds of pounds on top of a one-off set-up. Subscription services price by the month instead, from about £49 to £199.
Is there a monthly fee?
Subscription services charge monthly. With VR Express, hosting is covered by the per-dish fee; there is no app to maintain.
Do I need a custom app?
Almost never. iPhone and Android phones open AR straight from the browser, so a web menu page with QR codes does the job without an app build.
Can I start with a few dishes?
Yes, and most venues do: start with signature items, then add dishes with the same kit.