Which POS actually manages your inventory, and on which plan?
Six POS systems compared on one question: when you sell an item, does stock drop on its own, and what happens next?
The short answer: Lightspeed Retail if inventory is the heart of your store (variants, several locations, purchase orders on every plan), Square if you're starting out, as long as you know purchase orders and cost tracking start on Plus, Shopify POS if you also sell online, Odoo if you want the register and a full inventory app in one database, KORONA POS if you want to keep your own card processor, Loyverse if you want free stock tracking and can live with paid add-ons later. Every POS says "inventory management" on its homepage. The real differences are which plan unlocks it, whether you can order from vendors, and what happens when stock hits zero.
Your profile in one line. Small shop on a budget: Loyverse or Square Free. Store that sells online too: Shopify POS. Apparel, gifts, several stores: Lightspeed Retail. Growing business that wants purchasing and accounting in one place: Odoo. Store locked into a processor contract it wants to keep: KORONA POS.
Some links are affiliate links, and a listing can be sponsored: it then carries a "Sponsored" label and keeps its limits in writing. Neither changes our scores.
Which POS really handles inventory, and on which plan?
"Inventory management" on a POS pricing page covers three levels. Level 1: a sale lowers the count, nothing more. Level 2: you get low-stock alerts and can run counts. Level 3: the POS also handles buying, with vendors, purchase orders, receiving, and the unit cost that feeds your margin. A coffee cart is fine at level 1. A boutique with 2,000 size and color combinations needs level 3.
Two terms first. A purchase order (PO) is what you send your vendor; when the boxes arrive, you receive it and stock goes up. A cycle count means counting one section a week instead of closing the store once a year. The rank follows inventory depth; the score out of 5 is the whole POS, the same as in our other POS rankings.
| What the POS does with stock | Plan that includes it, and price | |
|---|---|---|
| Lightspeed RetailLevel 3 on every plan | Variants, one stock for store and webstore, purchase orders and PO sync, transfers between locations. Landed costs on all three plans. | Basic $89/mo, Core $149, Plus $289, as listed on the US pricing page (annual billing saves up to 18%). |
| SquareLevel 1 free, level 3 on Plus | Free: items, SKUs, low-stock alerts. Plus: stock intake, vendors, purchase orders, cost of goods sold. Premium: transfer orders between locations. | Free $0/mo (2.6% + 15¢ in person). Plus $49/mo per location; Premium $149/mo. |
| Shopify POSLevel 3 with POS Pro | One stock for store and website. Counting in the POS app, low-stock alerts and purchase orders from the POS: POS Pro. | Included from Shopify Basic (from $39/mo). POS Pro $89/mo per location, billed yearly. |
| OdooLevel 3 | Every POS sale posts to the Inventory app: locations, receipts, reordering rules, valuation. Keeps selling through short offline spells. | Free for one app only. POS plus Inventory: Standard, $31.10 per user/mo in year one ($38.90 list). |
| KORONA POSLevel 3 from the Retail plan | Retail: inventory counts, real-time stock tracking, supplier ordering, barcode automations, shelf and price labels. Plus: multi-location inventory tools, ABC analysis, top and slow sellers. | Core $59, Retail $79, Plus $99 per terminal/mo, month-to-month. Bring your own card processor. |
| LoyverseLevel 2 free, level 3 paid | Free: stock for items and their components, low-stock alerts. Advanced Inventory add-on: purchase orders, transfers, deeper reports. | Free. Advanced Inventory $25/mo or $250/yr per store, 14-day trial. |
Prices checked in 2026 on each vendor's own pricing page, in US dollars. Card rates are the in-person rates the vendor publishes; KORONA POS doesn't process cards itself, so your rate comes from your processor.
Lightspeed Retail
Lightspeed Retail is the one POS here that treats inventory as a job in itself, not a checkbox. Inventory management, purchase orders and PO sync are listed on all three plans, including Basic. Variants work the way an apparel store needs them: one style in five sizes and four colors is 20 SKUs, each with its own count. The same stock feeds the store and the built-in webstore, so the last medium tee can't sell twice.
Multi-location is where it pulls ahead. Transfers move a box from one store to another without wrecking both counts, and purchasing can be consolidated for several locations. Landed costs are listed on all three plans too, so freight and duties land in your unit cost instead of being forgotten.
The catch is price. The pricing page lists Basic at $89, Core at $149 and Plus at $289 a month, says annual billing saves up to 18%, and prices extra locations and registers separately. Ask for the monthly and yearly totals for your exact setup, in writing. Owners also say onboarding is good and follow-up is thinner. Our tip: during the demo, ask them to receive a partial delivery (10 boxes ordered, 8 delivered) and transfer 3 units to a second store. If the rep struggles, you've learned something.
- Purchase orders and PO sync on every plan
- Variants and one stock for store and webstore
- Transfers between locations
- Landed costs, freight and duties in unit cost
- ✓Deepest inventory in this list
- ✓Built for several stores from day one
- ✓No need for a separate inventory app
- ✗Extra locations and registers cost more
- ✗Prices can vary by business, per the vendor
Our pick if you carry hundreds of SKUs, variants or several stores. For a single shop with 100 products, it's more than you need: Square or Loyverse will do.
Square
Square's free plan covers the basics: items and SKUs, sales reporting, and low-stock alerts you set item by item and location by location. One detail most owners miss: the alert isn't instant. Square sends a summary email after your configured closing time, one per location. If your business hours are wrong in the dashboard, the alert lands at a useless moment.
Read the retail pricing page carefully, because the real inventory tools start on Plus at $49 a month per location: stock intake, vendor management, purchase orders and cost of goods sold reporting. Transfer orders between locations are a Premium feature, at $149 a month. A two-store owner who wants to move stock between shops therefore pays $298 a month in software, before card fees. Plus also lowers the in-person rate a little (2.5% + 15¢ instead of 2.6% + 15¢).
Owners like doing cycle counts on a phone while walking the floor. The recurring complaint on Square's own forum is sync with the online store: one seller found that "Stock received" didn't update the webstore while "Recount" did. Our tip: in week one, receive a real delivery and check the number in the POS, the dashboard and the webstore.
- Low-stock alerts per item and location, free
- Purchase orders, vendors and COGS on Plus
- Transfer orders on Premium
- No long-term contract
- ✓Free to start
- ✓Cycle counts on a phone
- ✓Easy setup
- ✗Purchasing needs Plus; transfers need Premium
- ✗You must process payments with Square
The best start if you're opening a store with a few hundred items. Once you order from several vendors every week, budget for Plus, or compare with Lightspeed.
Shopify POS
Shopify POS shares one inventory between your store and your website, with no connector in between. A sweater sold at the counter is gone from the site right away. If online is a big part of your sales, that alone can decide it.
The store-side inventory tools are in POS Pro, at $89 a month per location: counting inside the POS app, low-stock alerts, purchase orders and deeper inventory reports. Without POS Pro, you can still run a Quick count of up to 1,000 items per session to spot-check a section, and do full counts from the Shopify admin, where a manager approves results before stock changes.
The big change this year: Shopify retired Stocky, the free app many stores used for purchase orders and stocktakes. Those jobs now live in the Shopify admin, and merchants on the community forum list the gaps: no reorder suggestions, and you can't email a PO from the admin (you download the PDF and send it yourself). Some moved to paid apps, others went back to spreadsheets. Our tip: if you still have Stocky exports, keep them, and rebuild your vendor list by hand, because it doesn't carry over on its own.
- One stock for store and website
- Transfers from the admin or the POS
- Counts, alerts and POs from the POS with POS Pro
- Full and cycle counts with manager approval
- ✓No sync to configure between store and site
- ✓Huge app ecosystem
- ✓Cycle counts built in
- ✗Store inventory tools need POS Pro
- ✗No native reorder suggestions since Stocky closed
Pick it if your Shopify site drives a good share of sales. If you only sell in person, you're paying for ecommerce you don't use: Square or Loyverse fit better.
Odoo
Odoo isn't a POS with some stock bolted on. It's a full business suite, and Point of Sale is one app in it. Every sale at the register posts a stock move in the Inventory app, which handles locations (back room, shelf, warehouse), vendor receipts, reordering rules and valuation. The register runs in a browser and keeps selling through short internet outages.
The trap is the free plan. It's free for one app, with unlimited users. A POS that manages inventory is two apps: Point of Sale and Inventory. The second app moves you to Standard, at $31.10 per user per month in year one, then $38.90. A store with three staff accounts pays about $93 a month in year one and about $117 after that.
The other limit is setup. Odoo can do almost anything, but you have to tell it how: categories, locations, reordering rules, costing method. Many owners hire a partner. Our tip: start with just Point of Sale and Inventory, no accounting or website, and add the rest once sales and receipts run cleanly.
- POS and inventory in one database
- Locations, receipts, reordering rules
- Inventory valuation
- Sells through short offline spells
- ✓No ceiling on inventory depth
- ✓Grows into purchasing, accounting, ecommerce
- ✓Unlimited users on the free plan
- ✗Free for one app only: POS or inventory
- ✗Long setup without help
The right call if you expect to grow and don't want to switch systems in two years. If you only want the register to count stock, it's heavy: Loyverse or Square do that for free.
KORONA POS
KORONA POS takes a different route from Square, Shopify and Lightspeed: it doesn't take a cut of your sales. The plans are processing agnostic, so you keep the card processor you already have, or pick another one. If you negotiated a good rate with your bank, that's the reason to look here.
Read the plan names carefully, because Core has no stock tools. Core, at $59 per terminal a month, covers checkout, the product database, sales reports and gift cards. Inventory starts on Retail, at $79: inventory counts, real-time stock tracking, supplier ordering, barcode automations and shelf and price labels. Plus, at $99, adds multi-location inventory tools, ABC analysis (which 20% of items make most of your sales), top and slow sellers and per-store pricing. Pricing is per terminal, so a store with two registers on Retail pays $158 a month, before hardware.
The limits: there's no free plan, add-on modules cost extra per register, and hardware prices aren't listed on the pricing page. Our tip: before the trial ends, run the slow sellers view against your last supplier order. If it flags items you just reordered, you've found the money the Retail plan can save you.
- Keeps your own card processor
- Supplier ordering and counts on Retail
- Shelf and price labels on Retail
- ABC analysis and slow sellers on Plus
- ✓No percentage taken on sales
- ✓Month-to-month, no long contract
- ✓Free trial, no credit card
- ✗No stock tools on the Core plan
- ✗Priced per terminal; hardware not listed
A good fit if your card rate is already negotiated and you want real purchasing tools at a fixed price. If you take few card payments, Square's free plan or Loyverse costs less.
Loyverse
Loyverse is free and tracks stock for items and their components, with low-stock alerts. Components matter for a café: a latte can draw down milk and cups, not just "latte". That's rare at this price, which is zero.
Purchasing is a paid add-on. Advanced Inventory costs $25 a month or $250 a year per store and adds purchase orders, stock transfers and deeper inventory reports. Two other add-ons are often needed alongside: unlimited sales history ($7 a month per store) and employee management ($25 a month per store). A single store with all three pays $57 a month, which is more than Square Plus.
Reviewers like the ease of use and complain that the useful extras add up. Our tip: start free, and only switch on Advanced Inventory in the week you place your first real vendor order, so the 14-day trial covers an actual receipt.
- Free stock tracking with components
- Low-stock alerts
- Purchase orders and transfers in Advanced Inventory
- 14-day trial per add-on
- ✓Free core POS
- ✓Component stock for cafés
- ✓No contract
- ✗Purchasing is a paid add-on per store
- ✗Add-ons stack up quickly
Good for a café or small shop that wants to start at $0. Once you need three add-ons, compare the total with Square Plus.
The traps you only see after your first stock count
This comes from our comparison and from owners on vendor forums and app stores. Seven checks to run during the free trial, not after. For a ranking without the inventory filter, see the best POS systems; for apparel, POS for clothing stores; for a standalone tool, inventory management software.
Is inventory on your plan, or the next one?
This is the question that costs the most. Square puts purchase orders and cost of goods on Plus and transfers on Premium. Shopify puts in-app counts, alerts and POs on POS Pro. Odoo's free plan gives one app, so POS or Inventory. Loyverse charges $25 per store for POs. Write down the plan that does what you need, then compare those prices.
What happens at zero?
Some systems let you sell an out-of-stock item and the count goes negative. That isn't a bug if you know it: an item at -2 tells you a receipt was missed or someone rang up the wrong size. During the trial, sell an item at zero and see what the POS does: block, warn or stay silent.
Does the alert arrive in time?
A low-stock alert only helps if it comes before your vendor order. Square emails yours after closing time, so set your business hours right. Base reorder points on lead time: if your supplier delivers in 5 days and you sell 4 a day, your threshold is 20, not 3.
Is receiving reliable?
Most count errors start at receiving, not at the register. Run a real partial receipt (10 ordered, 8 delivered) and check the number everywhere: register, back office, webstore.
Are your margins built on the right cost?
Cost of goods reports use the unit cost you enter. If you never update it, margins are wrong after your vendor's first price rise. Add freight to the unit cost: Lightspeed does it with landed costs on every Retail plan.
Who processes your cards?
Square, Shopify POS and Loyverse's own payments tie the software to one processor, and that changes the real cost. On $20,000 a month of card sales, every 0.1 point of rate is $20 a month, which is already a third of a KORONA Retail terminal. If you have a negotiated rate, price a processing agnostic POS like KORONA against the all-in-one plans, rate included.
Where do your data go if the tool changes?
This year Shopify shut down Stocky, and merchants had to export purchase orders and rebuild vendor lists. Export your products, vendors and stock value to CSV once a quarter, whatever POS you use.
- Inventory, alerts and purchase orders are on the plan you'll pay for
- A sale at zero rung up during the trial: block, warning or negative stock
- Reorder points set on lead time, not on a default number
- A partial receipt done and checked in the POS and online
- One section counted without zeroing the rest
- Unit costs entered, freight included
- One system of record for stock if you also sell online
- First CSV export of products, vendors and stock done
- Card rate and processor counted in the yearly cost
Is your tool missing from this page? Email us: hello@hackceleration.com
Frequently asked questions
What is the best POS system with inventory management?
Lightspeed Retail for complex stock: purchase orders are on every plan, with variants and transfers between stores. Square is the best start for a simple catalog, with purchasing on Plus. Shopify POS wins if you also sell online. Odoo fits if you want purchasing and accounting in the same software.
Is there a free POS with inventory tracking?
Yes. Square's free plan and Loyverse both track stock and send low-stock alerts at $0 a month. Square takes 2.6% + 15¢ per in-person card payment. Loyverse charges for add-ons, including $25 a month per store for purchase orders and transfers. Odoo's free plan gives only one app, so not POS and Inventory together.
Do I need separate inventory software if my POS tracks stock?
Not if your POS handles buying: vendors, purchase orders, receiving. Lightspeed Retail, Odoo, Square Plus and Shopify with POS Pro do. If your POS only counts sales down and you order from many vendors weekly, a dedicated tool can save time. Then pick one system of record for quantities.
Does Square for Retail include purchase orders on the free plan?
No. On Square's retail pricing page, vendor management, purchase orders, stock intake and cost of goods reporting are Plus features, at $49 a month per location. Transfer orders between locations are on Premium, at $149 a month.
What replaced Shopify Stocky?
Shopify's own admin. Purchase orders, transfers and stock counts are now native, and staff with POS Pro can count inside the POS app. Merchants miss reorder suggestions and emailing POs from the admin, so some add a paid app. Export your Stocky history and rebuild your vendor list by hand.
Can I keep my current payment processor with an inventory POS?
Yes, with a processing agnostic POS. KORONA POS lets you keep your processor and charges a flat $59 to $99 per terminal a month, with inventory tools from the $79 Retail plan. Square and Shopify POS work best with their own payments, so compare the total, rate included, not just the monthly fee.
How do I set a reorder point in my POS?
Multiply your daily sales by your supplier's lead time in days, then add a small buffer. Selling 4 a day with a 5-day lead time gives 20; add 2 or 3 days of sales for late deliveries. Square, Shopify with POS Pro and Loyverse let you set the threshold item by item, so start with your 20 best sellers.
How often should a retail store count inventory?
A cycle count works better than one big annual count: one section a week, without closing. Count by zone and only post the zone you counted. Posting a partial count as a full one sets every uncounted item to zero.
Get the next comparison in your inbox
One tool broken down every month, prices checked, limits included.