Restaurant POS Systems: Toast vs Square vs Clover (2026)

Toast, Square and Clover are the three restaurant POS systems most US operators end up choosing between. As of October 2026, Square for Restaurants starts at $0 a month (2.6% + 15¢ per in-person card payment), Toast’s Point of Sale plan starts at $69 a month (2.49%), and Clover’s restaurant bundles cost $135 to $354 a month over 36 months (2.3% + 10¢). For almost every restaurant, card processing costs far more than the software.

That last point is the one the sales pages bury. A $100 difference in monthly software fees is $1,200 a year. A 0.2-point difference in card rate on $750,000 of card sales is $1,500. Compare systems on what you will actually pay at your own volume first, then on whether the software fits the way you serve.

Restaurant POS Comparison Table (October 2026)

All figures come from each vendor’s own US pricing pages, checked in October 2026: Toast pricing and its Starter Kit page, Square for Restaurants pricing and Square hardware, and Clover’s full-service and quick-service restaurant pricing. Prices are for a single location, before tax and shipping.

Read the fine print on each. Toast’s Starter Kit pricing applies to new customers and single locations and includes the first terminal; extra devices cost more. Square offers custom pricing (Square Pro) to businesses processing over $250,000 a year. Clover states that its listed prices are only available on Clover.com, so a bank or reseller selling you Clover can quote different rates and terms.

Toast vs Square vs Clover: Which Is Best for You?

Choose Square if you run counter service, a café or a food truck and want no monthly fee to start. Choose Toast if you run a full-service or multi-unit restaurant and want restaurant-specific tools with 24/7 support included in the subscription. Choose Clover if you want hardware and software folded into one fixed monthly payment and the lowest published in-person card rate of the three. Then run your own card volume through each before you sign.

Toast: The Restaurant Specialist

Toast started as a restaurant-only POS (it now sells a retail version too), and the depth shows: kitchen display systems, tip pooling, payroll, inventory and menu tools that understand modifiers and courses. If you run a full-service restaurant with a real kitchen operation, that depth earns its keep.

There are three plans. The Starter Kit is aimed at single-location restaurants that need one or two terminals and costs nothing upfront on pay-as-you-go: Toast covers the basic hardware and software and charges 3.09% on every card transaction instead. The Point of Sale plan starts at $69 a month, you buy the hardware, and processing drops to 2.49%. Build Your Own is custom-priced for operators who want the full platform.

Do the math on pay-as-you-go before you take it. The 0.6-point difference costs $4,500 a year on $750,000 of card sales, every year you stay on the plan. It is a good way to open with no capital; it is an expensive way to run a busy restaurant.

Two other things to know. Toast’s services only run on Toast-approved hardware, so the iPads you already own won’t work. And support is better than its old reputation: Toast Care is included in every subscription and is open 24/7/365 by phone or web messaging. Toast also has an offline mode that keeps orders, tickets and card payments going during an internet outage.

Square: The Cheapest Way to Start

Square was built for every kind of small business, then grew solid restaurant features on top. Square for Restaurants has three tiers: Free ($0), Plus ($49 a month per location) and Premium ($149 a month per location). It runs on iPad or a phone, which matters if you already own Apple hardware.

The catch is what Square Free leaves out. According to Square’s own plan comparison, Free does not include split checks, bar-tab preauthorization, tableside ordering, the KDS app, tip pooling, timecards with breaks and overtime, or inventory tracking. That makes Free a good fit for a food truck or a coffee counter and a poor fit for a table-service dining room. Most full-service restaurants need Plus at minimum.

Premium adds coursing and seat management, cheaper KDS licences ($20 per device versus $30), 24/7 phone support and the lowest rate (2.4% + 15¢). On card rate alone, Premium only beats Plus above about $1.2 million in annual card sales, because the extra $100 a month has to be earned back 0.1 points at a time. Below that, buy Premium for the features, not the rate.

Square also lets you take payments offline, with a condition worth knowing: offline payments are declined if the device doesn’t reconnect to the internet within 24 hours of the first offline payment, and you carry the risk of any that fail.

Clover: Bundled Hardware, Lowest Published Rate

Clover sells restaurant systems as bundles that combine devices and its Restaurant Growth software plan. For full-service restaurants, the Starter bundle (Station Solo terminal) is $179 a month, Standard (adds a Flex handheld) is $239, and Advanced (adds a Station Duo with a customer-facing screen) is $354, each for 36 months. Pay for the hardware upfront instead and you pay $1,799, $2,548 or $4,447 plus $89.95, $109.90 or $129.85 a month. Quick-service bundles run $135, $185 and $245 a month for 36 months, or $849 to $2,648 upfront.

Every Clover restaurant bundle on Clover.com processes in-person cards at 2.3% + 10¢, the lowest published rate of the three. Check what each bundle includes, though. Clover’s own table shows the full-service Starter bundle without tableside ordering and firing, and without tap-to-pay and mobile wallets, which arrive only with the Flex and Station Duo in the bigger bundles.

The interface is simple to learn, which helps if you have high staff turnover and train new people every few weeks. Clover also has a large app market for adding features, though each paid app raises the monthly bill.

Clover vs Toast: How Do Their Pricing Models Compare?

Toast separates the pieces: a software subscription (from $69 a month), hardware you buy or finance, and processing at 2.49%, or a $0 Starter Kit paid for through a higher 3.09% rate. Clover bundles them: one monthly payment of $135 to $354 for 36 months covers hardware and software, with processing at 2.3% + 10¢. Both can start with nothing upfront; the difference is where the hardware cost sits.

The rate comparison depends on your check size, because Clover adds a fixed 10¢ and Toast’s pricing pages list a percentage only. Ask Toast whether your quote adds a fixed per-transaction fee. If it doesn’t, Toast’s 2.49% is cheaper than Clover’s 2.3% + 10¢ on any payment under about $53, and Clover is cheaper above that. A coffee bar with $9 tickets and a steakhouse with $140 tickets can reach opposite answers from the same two quotes.

Pay-as-you-go versus a fixed bundle follows the same logic. A rate-based hardware plan costs more the more you sell; a fixed payment costs the same whether you have a slow January or a record December. Busy restaurants usually come out ahead with the fixed payment.

How Much Does a Restaurant POS System Cost?

A restaurant POS costs three things. Software runs $0 to about $150 a month per location for Toast, Square or Clover, plus per-device add-ons such as a $20 to $30 KDS licence. Hardware ranges from $0 upfront to several thousand dollars for a multi-terminal setup. Card processing takes roughly 2.3% to 3.1% of card sales, and it is usually 85% or more of the yearly total.

Software

The subscription is the number vendors lead with, and the smallest of the three. Watch for per-device and per-module fees: Square charges for each KDS screen and kiosk, Toast’s Build Your Own plan prices modules individually, and Clover apps add monthly fees.

Hardware

A small counter-service setup can run on a $59 Square reader and an iPad you own. A full-service dining room needs more: two fixed stations, a few handhelds, a kitchen printer or KDS screens, cash drawers and receipt printers. At Square’s list prices, two Registers and three Handhelds come to $2,995 before KDS screens and printers. Clover’s full-service Advanced bundle is $4,447 upfront with a cash drawer and receipt printer included. If you’d rather not pay cash, compare vendor financing with the options in our guide to restaurant equipment financing.

Processing

Processing is a percentage plus, often, a fixed fee per payment, and the fixed part hurts small tickets most. Square’s 15¢ adds 1.5 points to a $10 payment and 0.3 points to a $50 one. Keyed-in payments cost more on every platform (3.5% plus the fixed fee on Square and Clover), so a phone-order business should model that rate separately.

Total Cost of Ownership Example

Here is one year for a single restaurant with $750,000 in card sales and a $30 average card payment (25,000 payments), at October 2026 list prices. Hardware is excluded except where a bundle includes it.

Three things stand out. Processing is 87% to 100% of the total in every row. Pay-as-you-go costs $3,672 more than Toast’s traditional plan at this volume, and that gap repeats every year while hardware is a one-time cost. And Toast’s rows are a floor: its pricing pages list only percentages, so add $3,750 a year for every 15¢ of fixed fee your quote includes. Square Free is in the table for comparison only, since it lacks split checks and tableside ordering that a $750,000 table-service restaurant needs.

List rates are the starting point, not the ceiling. Above $250,000 a year Square offers custom pricing, Toast prices Build Your Own individually, and independent processors offer interchange-plus pricing. If you are opening, put the POS line in your restaurant startup costs budget at its full annual cost, not just the hardware.

What Is the Cheapest POS for a Restaurant?

Square Free is the cheapest restaurant POS to start: no monthly fee, it runs on an iPad or phone, and a card reader costs $59. Toast’s pay-as-you-go Starter Kit is the cheapest way to get dedicated restaurant hardware with nothing upfront. Neither stays cheapest as you grow, because both carry the highest card rate in their lineup: 2.6% + 15¢ on Square Free and 3.09% on Toast pay-as-you-go.

The cheapest POS to run is the one with the lowest effective rate at your volume and check size, plus software you actually use. For a small café doing $200,000 in card sales, Square Free’s $0 software is hard to beat. For a $1 million full-service restaurant, a paid plan or a negotiated rate will save thousands a year.

Be careful with “free POS” offers. Several providers advertise free hardware or $0 to get started and recover the cost through processing rates or long contracts. Free hardware is fine if the effective rate and the exit terms are, too. Ask for both in writing before you sign.

What’s the Best Mobile POS for Tableside Ordering?

The best tableside POS is the handheld that belongs to the system you already run, because it has to share menus, tickets and payments with your stations and kitchen. Toast sells Wi-Fi and cellular handheld kits. Square’s Handheld costs $399, and tableside ordering needs Square Plus or Premium. Clover’s Flex has an 8-hour battery and a built-in receipt printer and comes in Clover’s Standard and Advanced full-service bundles.

Handhelds change the floor more than the spec sheet suggests. When servers fire orders and take payment at the table, they stop walking to a terminal for every ticket, and the server station shrinks to a supply point. Tables turn faster because the check doesn’t wait on a trip to the station.

Test these in a real service before you buy:

• Battery life across a double shift, not a demo
• Wi-Fi coverage on the patio and in the far corners of the dining room (cellular models solve this for patios and food trucks)
• Course firing and seat numbers (Square limits coursing and seat management to Premium)
• Pay-at-table speed with tap, chip and split payments
• Whether the handheld prints, or whether guests get receipts by text or email

TouchBistro, an iPad-based restaurant POS, is also built around tableside ordering and split bills if you prefer Apple hardware. QR order-and-pay is the other route: Clover includes QR ordering and payment in its restaurant bundles, and Square includes QR code ordering on its paid plans.

Which POS Systems Include Online Ordering?

All three sell first-party online ordering that feeds orders straight into the POS. Square includes an online ordering page with pickup and local delivery on every plan, including Free, and charges 3.3% + 30¢ per online card payment on Free or 2.9% + 30¢ on Plus and Premium. Clover includes no-fee online ordering, an online menu page and third-party menu integrations in its restaurant bundles. Toast sells online ordering and delivery with its starter kits; confirm the price in your quote.

Direct online ordering matters because marketplace commissions are much higher than card fees; our delivery platform comparison breaks those down. What you want from the POS is one order rail: direct orders, marketplace orders and dine-in tickets landing on the same KDS without anyone retyping a ticket. The National Restaurant Association’s 2024 technology research found 7 in 10 limited-service customers would order through a smartphone app, so for counter service this is no longer optional.

Other Restaurant POS Systems Worth a Look

The big three aren’t the only serious options. These are quote-based, so get pricing in writing and model it the same way.

• SpotOn is strong on staff communication during service, a real advantage in busy, multi-section dining rooms.
• Lightspeed Restaurant goes deeper on reporting, inventory and food cost analysis than most, and suits multi-location operators who want central control.
• TouchBistro is iPad-based and built around table management, tableside ordering and split bills.
• Shift4 Dine (formerly SkyTab; skytab.com now redirects there) advertises getting started for $0 and bundles marketing, loyalty, reservations and a website builder. Read the processing and contract terms closely.

Features That Matter More Than the Spec Sheet

Every vendor lists dozens of features. These are the ones that change your daily operation, and what to check in the demo.

Cloud is now the default: every platform in this guide is cloud-based, which gives you live menu changes across locations, reports from anywhere and automatic updates. The trade-off is dependence on your internet connection, which is why the offline-mode row matters.

How to Choose a Restaurant POS in Five Steps

1. Define your service model. Full service needs tableside ordering, coursing and split checks. Quick service needs transaction speed, kiosks or online ordering, and KDS. Delivery-heavy concepts need clean marketplace integration.
2. Map every integration. List the accounting, payroll, reservation, delivery and loyalty tools the POS has to talk to, and confirm each integration works today with a reference customer.
3. Model the total cost on your numbers. Use your card volume, average check and keyed-in share, as in the example above.
4. Pilot with your team. NovaTab’s vendor evaluation framework recommends testing with both front- and back-of-house staff. One real lunch or dinner shift reveals more than hours of demos. If your servers can’t learn it in one or two sessions, keep looking.
5. Read the contract and exit terms. Term length, auto-renewal, early-termination fees, rate-change clauses, who owns the hardware, and how you export your menu, customer and sales data if you leave.

Two checks sit alongside those steps. Any POS that takes cards must support PCI DSS compliance, so ask about the vendor’s compliance status and security update cadence. And look at the vendor’s position: the market is consolidating (DoorDash bought the reservation platform SevenRooms in 2025), and a vendor under pressure tends to stop investing in the integrations you rely on.

Common POS Mistakes

Choosing on the monthly fee is the classic one: as the cost example shows, processing dwarfs software. Close behind is ignoring the fixed per-transaction fee, which can make a “low” rate expensive for a café with small tickets.

Operators also underestimate switching costs. Moving POS means rebuilding the menu and modifiers, retraining every employee, migrating customer and gift card data and risking a rough first week, so get the decision right once. Overbuying is the opposite trap: you don’t need kiosks, AI voice ordering and a loyalty module on day one if your service model doesn’t use them.

Finally, test the offline mode before go-live, not during your first Friday outage, and budget real training time for the switch. Even the best POS fails if half the team works around it.

POS Evaluation Checklist

• The system matches your service model (counter, full service, bar, multi-location)
• Your team can learn it within one or two training sessions
• You have the effective processing rate at your volume and average check, in writing
• You know the in-person, keyed-in and online rates, plus any fixed per-transaction fee
• Total yearly cost includes software, per-device add-ons, hardware and processing
• It integrates with your accounting, payroll, reservation and delivery tools today
• It includes or integrates with a kitchen display system
• Offline mode keeps orders and payments running, and you know its limits
• Handhelds work across your whole floor and patio
• Contract length, auto-renewal, early-termination fees and data export are clear
• Reporting is readable on a phone and shows sales and labor in real time
• The vendor can support you if you add locations, catering or online ordering

If you are torn between two systems, the deciding factor is rarely a feature. It is the effective rate at your volume and how your servers handle each one on a Friday night. Get both answers before you sign anything.