Auto vs Manual Printing

The Two Print Modes

Mode	When the ticket prints
Auto print	As soon as the order is placed, whether or not it has been accepted. Pre-orders print at the scheduled time minus the printer’s Buffer; with a buffer of 0 they print straight away.
Manual print	Only when you open the order in the dashboard and click Print. Nothing prints on its own.

Accepting an order does not trigger a print in either mode. There is no “print on accept” option.

If you use order batching, the merged ticket prints when the batch closes rather than per order — see Order Batching.

Auto Accept Is a Separate Setting

Auto Accept lives under Stores → your store → Settings → Operations. When Auto accept orders is on, a new order is accepted immediately; when it is off, the order arrives as Pending in Live Orders and waits for you to click Accept. Either way, an Auto print printer prints the ticket on its own schedule — immediately for a standard order, and at the scheduled time minus the Buffer for a pre-order.

The table below describes a standard (non-pre-order, unbatched) order:

Auto Accept	Print mode	What the kitchen sees
On	Auto print	Ticket prints immediately; the order shows as Accepted. Nothing to do in the dashboard.
On	Manual print	Order is accepted, but no ticket until staff open it and click Print.
Off	Auto print	Ticket prints immediately while the order still shows as Pending in Live Orders. Someone must still click Accept.
Off	Manual print	Nothing prints and nothing is accepted until staff act on the order in Live Orders.

Auto Accept off — how do you know an order has arrived? The new-order sound plays on an open Live Orders page, the order appears as Pending, and an Auto print printer prints the ticket straight away. The printed ticket is not an acceptance: the customer only sees the order as accepted once you click Accept. See Managing Live Orders.

Choosing a Mode

Auto print suits kitchens that work from paper: the ticket is the alert, and nobody has to watch a screen for it to print.

Manual print suits venues that review every order on screen first, or that print only occasionally — for example a tablet-led counter that prints a ticket for large orders.

If you turn Auto Accept off to review orders before committing to them, keep the printer on Auto print so the kitchen still sees the ticket immediately, and accept from Live Orders.

To change the mode, go to Stores → your store → Settings → Direct Printing, open the printer and choose Auto print or Manual print. See Printer Setup for the full list of printer settings.

​The Two Print Modes

​Auto Accept Is a Separate Setting

​Choosing a Mode

The Two Print Modes

Auto Accept Is a Separate Setting

Choosing a Mode