Screen size is the question we get asked first and the one most people get wrong – usually by going too small to save a bit of money, then finding customers cannot read it from where they stand.
Here is how to work it out properly.
Start with viewing distance, not wall size
The only measurement that matters is how far away the reader is. Walk to where your customer actually stands – the end of the queue, the far side of the waiting room, the footpath on the other side of the glass – and measure back to the wall.
Two rules of thumb do most of the work:
- Text height: about 1cm of character height for every 3 metres of viewing distance. At 6 metres, your smallest text needs to be roughly 2cm tall on the screen.
- Screen size: a screen's diagonal in inches should be roughly 4 to 6 times the viewing distance in metres, for content with a normal amount of text. So 5 metres suggests a 43 to 55-inch screen, and 10 metres suggests something much larger, or several screens.
Work backwards from those and you will not go far wrong. If the numbers say bigger than your budget, the fix is less content on the screen – not smaller text.
Portrait or landscape
Portrait suits menus, lists, staff profiles, property listings and anything read top to bottom. It matches the shape of a shopfront window and the shape of a phone, which is what people are used to reading.
Landscape suits video, photography, wide layouts, sports and anything where images do the work rather than text.
Choose based on the content, not what looks tidiest on the wall. Commercial screens run in either orientation; consumer TVs often do not, and turning one sideways can create heat problems and void the warranty.
Menu boards: why 43 inches is the standard
Most cafe and takeaway menu boards use 43-inch panels in portrait, usually two or three side by side. There are practical reasons for it.
A 43-inch portrait screen holds one full menu category at a readable size without crowding. Two or three of them side by side approximate the proportions of a traditional menu board, so it reads naturally. They fit the wall space above most servery counters without hitting the ceiling or the bulkhead. And splitting the menu across separate screens means you can swap one category – drinks, say – without redesigning the whole board.
Step up to 55-inch panels where the queue extends further back, or where the counter is deep and the customer stands well away from the wall.
Window displays: 46, 55 or 75 inch
Window sizing is driven by the width of the glass and the traffic on the footpath.
- 46-inch: narrow shopfronts, side windows, or where the screen supports a main display rather than being the hero.
- 55-inch: the most common choice. Big enough to be read from across a two-lane street, fits most standard shopfront glass without looking cramped.
- 75-inch: wide glass on a main street or a shopping centre frontage, or where you want the screen to be the thing people notice from fifty metres away.
Remember that a window screen needs to be high brightness (3,000-4,000 nits) regardless of size. A large standard TV in a sunlit window is worse than a small high brightness one, because it is simply not visible.
Multi-screen setups
Several screens beat one big one when you have distinct content types – menu plus specials plus drinks – or when the audience approaches from different directions.
A few practical notes: keep the bezels close and the screens perfectly aligned, or the whole thing looks amateur. Match the models so colours and brightness are identical. And decide early whether each screen shows separate content or the screens work as one big canvas, because that affects the mounting and the media players.
Do not guess – get someone to look
Photos and floor plans miss things: the bulkhead that eats 200mm of wall, the afternoon sun that hits the front window at 3pm, the pillar that blocks the view from the door, the power point that is nowhere near where the screen needs to go.
Bold Media Group offers a free site assessment. We come out, measure the space and the viewing distances, check the light, work out the mounting and cabling, and give you a recommended layout with sizes and a price. There is no obligation attached to it, and even if you go elsewhere you will at least be buying the right size.
Book a site assessment and we will get someone out to you.