Best POS system for small business in 2026

Square takes first place because it's the one system here you can start, run and leave without signing anything long. The Free plan costs $0 a month and charges 2.6% + 15¢ per in-person payment (tap, dip or swipe) and 3.3% + 30¢ online. Square states it has no long-term contract on any plan. For a small business that doesn't know yet what it'll sell in a year, that matters more than any feature.

The paid plans are priced per location. Plus costs $49 a month and lowers the in-person rate to 2.5% + 15¢ (2.9% + 30¢ online). Premium costs $149 a month for 2.4% + 15¢. Restaurants get the clearest upgrade signal: a kitchen display (KDS) costs $30 a month per device on Plus and $20 on Premium, and Kiosk Lite costs $50 or $30. Here's the part most rankings skip. On rate alone, Plus only pays for itself above $49,000 of card sales a month, and Premium above $74,500 (our math). Below that, you upgrade for the features, not to save on fees.

The weak spot is payouts. On one large public review site, Square sits at 3.6 out of 5 across 7,514 reviews. The top complaint is payments put "under review" and accounts deactivated with little explanation. One merchant describes $9,214 held for more than 70 days. Others mention support answered by bots and a plan price that went up. If your sales are irregular or your tickets are large, keep a cash buffer, or a second way to take cards, before you rely on Square alone. To plug your sales into the rest of your stack, our Square integration guide for Make covers the main triggers.

Lightspeed Retail is the system for stores where inventory is the job. Every plan includes one register, integrated payments, inventory, loyalty, reports and API access. That's a lot of depth for an entry plan, and it's why stores with deep, variant-heavy catalogs end up here.

The price is the barrier. Basic starts at $89 a month on yearly billing, Core at $149 and Plus at $289, also billed yearly. Lightspeed says yearly billing saves up to 18%, so monthly billing costs more. Over three years, Basic alone is $3,204 in software at the yearly rate (our math), before hardware and card fees. Plus is $10,404. Get the card rate in writing on your quote, because it's part of the real cost and it isn't the same for every merchant.

Reviews of Lightspeed in Europe, mostly from restaurant owners, describe a familiar pattern for quote-based sales. Recurring complaints include a price at signup higher than the one discussed on the sales call, charges after a cancelled hardware order, and good onboarding followed by little follow-up. None of that is a reason to skip it if your stock is complex. It's a reason to get every number on paper before you sign. To push sales or stock changes into other tools, the Lightspeed Retail integration guide for Zapier shows what you can automate.

Shopify POS isn't sold on its own. In-person selling is included in every paid Shopify plan, from Basic at $39 a month, or $29 a month billed yearly. That's its whole case: if you already run your online store on Shopify, your register comes with products, customers and inventory already in place. There's no second catalog to maintain and no sync to break between the website and the shop floor.

In-person card rates depend on your Shopify plan: 2.6% + 10¢ on Basic, 2.5% + 10¢ on Grow and 2.4% + 10¢ on Advanced. The 10¢ fixed fee is 5¢ lower than Square's, which adds up on small tickets: on 400 sales a month, that's $20. POS Pro costs $89 a month per location, billed yearly, so $1,068 a year per store. It's built for shops with staff and serious stock needs. A single owner-run boutique can usually wait. New accounts get 3 days free, then 3 months at $1 a month.

The limit is the reverse of the strength, and it's why Shopify POS sits third here, and not higher. If you don't sell online, you're paying for an ecommerce platform to get a register, and Square's $0 plan does the counter job without it. It's also a retail tool: there's no table plan or kitchen flow worth comparing with Toast. If you're still choosing where to sell online, our ranking of ecommerce platforms for small business puts Shopify next to its rivals.

Toast is built for restaurants and only restaurants. Table maps, kitchen routing and ordering at the table are the core of the product, not add-ons. For a full-service dining room, it fits the floor better than any other system on this page, which is why its features score is tied for the highest here.

The pricing is where you need to slow down. Toast lists an entry point at $0 a month; its other plans cost more, and the largest setups are quoted. The $0 route isn't free. If you don't pay for hardware upfront, you pay a higher card rate instead, for as long as the contract runs. Small gaps are expensive. If the $0 route adds 0.6 points to your rate, a restaurant taking $30,000 a month by card pays $180 more each month, or $2,160 a year (our math). That's often more than the hardware would have cost upfront. Ask for both quotes, $0 hardware and prepaid hardware, and compare them on your own volume. Its cost score reflects that: you can't compare it before you get a quote.

The other cost is commitment. Toast contracts commonly run two to three years. The system also expects Toast's own hardware, network router included, so you can't bring the iPad you already own. Retail shops should look elsewhere. If you're opening your first restaurant, our ranking of website builders for restaurants covers the online side.

Loyverse gives away its register software and charges only for add-ons. The free version is not a demo. It covers the register itself, sales analytics over 31 days, essential inventory with low-stock alerts, a loyalty program, a customer-facing display, a kitchen display and multiple stores.

You pay per store, only for what you add, in US dollars before tax. Unlimited sales history costs $7 a month or $70 a year. Employee management costs $25 a month or $250 a year. Advanced inventory costs $25 a month or $250 a year. Each add-on has a 14-day free trial, and yearly billing saves you $50 on the $25 add-ons (our math). Chat support runs 24/7.

Why fifth, then? Because "free" only covers the software. Your card fees depend on whichever processor you connect, so your real monthly cost is set somewhere else. Ask Loyverse which processors it supports in your state before you buy a reader, then put that rate next to Square's 2.6% + 15¢. Its restaurant and retail tools are also lighter than the specialists' above, and you're the one assembling the setup. Its low compliance score comes from Europe, where Loyverse publishes no tax-compliance proof; in the US, payment security sits with the processor you connect. To send sales into a spreadsheet or a CRM, our Loyverse integration guide for Make shows how.

Clover makes some of the best-looking hardware in the category, and its software covers retail, counter service and restaurants. On features alone, it would sit higher. It ranks last because of how it's sold. Clover is often sold through banks and independent resellers, and your price, rate and contract depend on who signs you up.

That's where the complaints come from. Clover's plans start at $0 a month for some business types and cost more for others, with card fees on top; hardware and rates vary with who sells it to you. Hardware deals are often tied to three-year contracts with early termination fees. On one large public review site, Clover sits at 1.9 out of 5 across about 2,200 reviews. Owners describe 36-month contracts they can't get out of, $750 charged after cancelling, a card rate different from the one the reseller promised, and holds on their account.

The hardware trap is the one to understand before you sign. Clover devices are set up by your processor. Merchants who change processor often have to buy new hardware, so the screen you paid for can become a paperweight. If you go ahead, ask who your processor is, how long the contract runs, what leaving costs, and whether the hardware is yours. Get all four answers in writing. Already on Clover? Our Clover integration guide for Make covers automations.