A web-only KDS is a tempting shortcut — until the venue Wi-Fi flickers at 7:45pm on a Friday. We picked Android-first for three reasons that compound:
- Offline survival is a first-class behaviour. Already-loaded orders stay on screen, status actions queue locally and replay on reconnect.
- Printers are a driver problem, not a network problem. Epson ePOS and Star StarIO10 sit on the LAN with the tablet as the print client — no separate print server, no cloud print service.
- Rugged hardware is cheaper than downtime. Android-first means we can certify a small set of devices and guarantee behaviour, instead of chasing browser-version drift.
The cost is real: native engineering is harder than shipping a PWA. The benefit is a kitchen that does not stop when the Wi-Fi does.