Delete categories safely

Deleting a category never deletes its items — but it does leave them without a section, and therefore invisible to guests. This page covers doing it without losing anything.

What happens when you delete a category

1. The screen asks for confirmation and warns that there might be items assigned to it.
2. The category is removed.
3. Every item that had only that category is now unassigned, and appears in Uncategorized Items at the top of All items.
4. Those items stay published but are not shown to guests until they are reassigned.

Items that also belonged to another category keep that one and are unaffected.

The safe order of operations

Move the items first, then delete the empty category.

1. Open All items and filter by the category you intend to remove.
2. Reassign every item to its new section.
3. Confirm the filtered view is now empty.
4. Open All categories.
5. Save any pending reordering — the screen asks you to save pending changes before deleting.
6. Delete the category and confirm.
7. Check Uncategorized Items is still empty.

Done this way, no item is ever left stranded.

If you deleted first

Nothing is lost, and the fix is quick:

1. Open All items.
2. Work through the Uncategorized Items panel.
3. Assign each item to the correct section.
4. Drag each one into position, since a reassigned item does not arrive in a meaningful place.

Deleting a parent category

Deleting a parent affects its children. Before removing one:

• decide whether the children should be promoted to top level or moved under another parent;
• make that change on All categories and save it;
• only then delete the parent.

Restructuring first and deleting second keeps the tree valid at every step.

Consider not deleting at all

A category with no published items is not rendered on the public menu. For a section that returns — a summer menu, a Christmas selection, a rotating tasting theme — leaving the empty category in place is safer than deleting and rebuilding it:

• the items keep their assignment while they are on Draft;
• the order and nesting are preserved;
• any QR code pointing at that category keeps working.

Printed material

A category's archive has its own address. Deleting the category invalidates any printed QR code that pointed at it, and no reprint can be avoided afterwards.

This is why table codes should point at a menu archive or the home page rather than at a category. See Print and test a QR code.

Multilingual sites

A translated category is a separate record. Deleting the source category does not remove its translations, so check the other languages after a clean-up and remove the leftovers deliberately.

Checklist

• [ ] Items moved out, or intentionally left to be reassigned.
• [ ] Child categories re-parented or promoted.
• [ ] Pending reordering saved before the deletion.
• [ ] Uncategorized Items empty afterwards.
• [ ] No printed QR code pointed at the deleted category.
• [ ] Translated categories cleaned up.
• [ ] Public menu checked signed out.