Waiting room screens
Waiting room screens
A waiting room screen has one job that actually matters, and it is not entertainment: it is telling someone how much longer, so they can stop wondering.
An honest number beats a distraction
The measurable complaint in a waiting room is almost never the length of the wait — it is not knowing the length of the wait. A posted estimate that turns out to be roughly right is worth more than a screen playing something pleasant, because it lets someone decide whether to make a call, get a coffee, or just settle.
Which means the number has to be maintained. A wait-time board showing "about 10 minutes" at 4pm when the room is visibly full is worse than no board, because it tells people the screen is decorative and they stop reading it — including the parts that matter later.
Now serving, and who it is for
A now-serving display is worth a screen only where people are genuinely queued by number — a service counter, a pharmacy, a parts desk. In a clinic where people are called by name, it is theatre.
If you do run one, put it where someone can see it from a seat, not only from the queue. The point is that people can sit down.
The rest of the rotation
Opening hours over a holiday period is the single most-asked question in most waiting rooms, and it changes a few times a year — exactly the shape of thing a screen handles better than a printed notice taped to a door.
A QR code to a form, a portal or a feedback page turns dead time into something useful, but only if the destination is worth the scan. Point it at a thing someone would actually do while sitting down.
Templates that fit
Wait Time Display
Clinics, urgent care centers, service desks, restaurants
18 editable fields
Now Serving
Service counters, pharmacies, deli counters, workshops
12 editable fields
Holiday Hours
Retail, restaurants, clinics, anywhere with a seasonal week
32 editable fields
Weather Display 1
Lobbies, cafés, break rooms, transit waiting areas
7 editable fields
What three free screens covers
The free plan runs 3 screens with no time limit and no card. For a lot of the sites on this page that is the whole installation. Past that, $29 a month covers 25 screens — flat, not per screen — so the fourth display costs the same as the twenty-fifth. Full detail on the pricing page.
One honest limitation
What this cannot do: it does not know your queue. Wait times and now-serving numbers are fields somebody updates, not a feed from your booking or ticketing system. If you need the number to move on its own, that is an API integration — the API can set these fields, but you would be building the bridge.
Other use cases
Retail and storefront screens · School and campus screens · Warehouse and production floor screens · Hotel and hospitality screens · Digital menu boards · Office and lobby screens · Gym and studio screens · All use cases