Setting up a golf simulator kiosk: the in-venue experience checklist

The kiosk is the most underused piece of software in most indoor golf venues. Operators buy a tablet, stick it near the door, use it for walk-in payment, and leave it at that. That's about 10 percent of what a kiosk can actually do for your venue.

Done properly, the kiosk is the in-venue experience layer. It handles check-in for booked customers, walk-in bookings, mid-session extensions, branded leaderboards, promotions, and door/locker/bay-power unlock. It replaces at least one staff member during peak and lets your venue run without staff entirely during off-hours.

Here's how to set one up properly.

The 8 functions a good kiosk should handle

Not all of these need to ship on day one. Plan for all of them and turn them on as your venue matures.

1. Check-in for booked customers

Customers who booked online tap their confirmation (QR code, member ID, or saved card) and the kiosk validates the booking, unlocks the bay, and starts the session timer. Total flow under 60 seconds. This should be the primary use case, not the edge case.

2. Walk-in booking

Walk-ins who didn't book online complete the full booking flow on the kiosk: pick a bay, pick a time, pay, sign waiver, go. Same customer-facing flow as online, just on a bigger screen.

3. Payment

Tap-to-pay (chip and contactless), Apple Pay, Google Pay, gift cards, member ID, saved cards. If a payment method works at a modern coffee shop, it should work at your kiosk.

4. Waiver and age verification

Configurable per-venue waiver text. Signed digitally, stored against the customer record, valid for the length of the membership. Age gate for venues selling alcohol.

5. Bay assignment and unlock

The kiosk picks the right bay based on availability, member tier, and configured rules. It physically unlocks the door, the locker, and the bay-power via integrations with smart-lock systems.

6. Mid-session extensions

Customers tap the kiosk to extend their current session. If the next slot on that bay is free, the system grants and bills it automatically. If not, the customer sees a polite wrap-up prompt.

7. Branded leaderboards and promotions

When the kiosk isn't handling a transaction, the screen is prime venue real estate. Daily, weekly, and monthly leaderboards. Member rankings. League standings. On-brand promotional offers. This is marketing you're already paying for.

8. Receipt and post-session prompts

After the session, the kiosk can prompt for a review, offer to rebook the same slot next week, or surface the leaderboard result if the customer set a notable score.

Hardware: what to buy

The kiosk hardware choice is lower-stakes than most operators assume. Three approaches, ranked by cost:

Option A. iPad in a locked stand. Cheapest, most reliable, best customer UI. Common stands: Heckler, Studio Proper, Armodilo. Add a Stripe Terminal M2 for tap-to-pay. Budget: $1,500 to $2,500 per station.

Option B. Android tablet (Samsung Galaxy Tab, Elo). Slightly cheaper than iPad, fewer reliable stands, but viable. Budget: $1,200 to $2,000 per station.

Option C. Dedicated kiosk PC. A full Windows or Linux kiosk unit with integrated card reader, scanner, and printer. Budget: $3,000 to $5,000. Worth it only for high-traffic venues (8 or more bays) or 24/7 unattended operations.

For most venues, Option A is right. Don't over-engineer.

Placement

The kiosk should be the first thing a customer sees when they walk in. Not a reception desk (which needs staff). Not a hallway to the bays. The front wall.

Ideal placement:

• 4 to 5 feet from the entrance
• At a height the average adult can use without bending (40 to 44 inches to screen center)
• With a clear line-of-sight to the bays (so customers can see which bay they're being assigned to)
• Lit from the front, not the back (backlit screens wash out)

If you can afford two kiosks at the entrance, do it. At peak Saturday hours, queuing at a single kiosk is a bad customer experience. Two kiosks means throughput matches your booking flow.

Integrations: door, locker, and bay-power

These are what separate a kiosk from a cash register.

Door unlock: integrate with smart-lock systems (Kisi, Salto, August, Genie). On check-in, the kiosk sends an unlock command. Required for 24/7 self-service venues, nice-to-have for staffed ones.

Locker unlock: same pattern. Most venues offer lockers for paid customers during prime hours. A locker-assignment flow on the kiosk saves the staff "which locker did you take" conversation.

Bay-power: for 24/7 venues, bay PCs and projectors shouldn't be running 24 hours a day. The kiosk should power them up on check-in and down when the session ends. Integrate with a smart PDU or a Shelly-style relay.

Without these three integrations, you have a fancy payment terminal. With them, you have self-service.

Sim software handoff (any vendor)

The kiosk should be sim-software-agnostic. A good kiosk authenticates the customer, validates the booking, unlocks the bay, and starts the session timer. Whatever runs on the bay PC after that (Trackman, GSPro, Uneekor, Foresight, E6, TruGolf, Awesome Golf, a custom PC sim, a mixed stack across bays, anything) should be fine. If a vendor tells you their kiosk only works with specific sim software, that's a limitation of the vendor, not a requirement of the problem.

Branding: every screen, every moment

Your kiosk is a screen in your venue. Customers see it more than any staff member. Design implications:

• Your logo, your colors, your typography end-to-end
• Your copy, not a vendor's default
• Your confirmation messages in your voice ("Bay 3 is ready, Jamie. Have a good round.")
• Your physical frame matches your bar, your lounge, your aesthetic

If your kiosk shows a generic SaaS logo anywhere, you're paying to advertise someone else. Demand full white-label.

Content between sessions

The kiosk screen during downtime is some of the best real estate in your venue. What it should show:

• Live leaderboards (today, this week, this month). Member-only or public, your choice.
• Member highlights (longest drive, best round, most improved this month).
• Promotions (off-peak, member nights, leagues starting soon, gift card offers).
• Venue announcements (coming hours, league sign-ups, bar specials).
• League standings (if you run them, they should be visible on the kiosk).

What it should not show:

• Corporate stock imagery
• Generic "welcome" screens
• Vendor branding
• Static QR codes

Rotate content every 20 to 30 seconds. Freshness matters for repeat visitors.

The off-hours / 24/7 case

If you're running off-hours self-service (overnight, early morning, member-only late), the kiosk is your whole venue. For the full operating checklist, see running a 24/7 simulator venue. Requirements change:

• Offline tolerance: the kiosk needs to queue check-ins and sync when the network returns.
• Identity verification: ID scan, not just card and waiver.
• Alert escalation: the kiosk should alert the remote operator on jams, declines, or anomalies.
• Door override: a way for a remote operator to unlock a door on demand.
• Session limits: cap bookings at 2 to 3 hours overnight so the bay doesn't get occupied indefinitely.

If you're planning 24/7 self-service, spec your kiosk for it from the start. Retrofitting a staffed-venue kiosk for unattended operation never quite works.

What to demand from your platform

The kiosk software, the booking platform, the control room, and the venue management back-office should all be one platform. If you're patching together three vendors, you'll have three sources of truth, three sets of credentials, and three integration failure modes.

Simbook ships all four as the Simbook platform. The kiosk handles all 8 functions above, integrates with major door and locker systems, and shows branded leaderboards and promotions between sessions. Book a 30-minute demo and we'll walk through the kiosk configured for your venue and your hardware.