Volume 2 - Issue 2, March - April 2026

Manual canteen operations in educational institutions often lead to long queues, delays, and students arriving late for lectures due to peak-hour crowds. This paper presents a Canteen Automation System—a web-based solution enabling students to place food orders online and set precise pickup timers, ensuring minimal wait times and synchronized collection with class schedules. The system features a modular full-stack architecture: MySQL database (designed by Sanchita Suresh Sonawane) for efficient order/inventory management; Flask and React backend (developed by Aman Jabbar Sahikh) handling API-driven real-time validations and notifications; and responsive frontend (built by Prerna Madhav Patwari) using Bootstrap, HTML, and CSS for intuitive ordering interfaces with timer selectors. Implemented for campus-scale use, it reduces peak crowding by enabling staggered pickups (e.g., <10 minutes post-order), streamlines kitchen workflows, and supports scalability for 500+ users. Testing demonstrates over 40% reduction in average wait times compared to traditional methods, promoting operational efficiency and student productivity. Future enhancements include payment integration and predictive inventory analytics.

Sanchita Suresh Sonawane, Aman Jabbar Shaikh, Prerna Madhav Patwari,"Canteen Automation System: An IoT-Enabled Smart Ordering and Inventory Management Platform" International Journal of Advanced Multidisciplinary Research and Educational Development, V2(2): Page(488-491) Mar-Apr 2026. ISSN: 3107-6513. www.ijamred.com. Published by Scientific and Academic Research Publishing.