Square for Restaurants Review 2026: Features & Pricing
Square’s restaurant plans have fewer industry-specific features than some competitors. But they’re also much cheaper.
The bottom line:
Square’s point-of-sale (POS) system for the food and beverage industry is a good fit for small quick-service restaurants, cafes and bars. You’ll find a variety of features, like menu management tools and basic reporting, in its free plan. But its Plus plan is better for most food service businesses. That’s because it has tip splitting capabilities and lower processing rates. Regardless of plan, Square is still cheaper than competitors like Toast.
Software details
Payment processing fees
In-person: 2.6% + $0.15
Online: 3.3% + $0.30
Monthly fee
$0
Free plan; $49 Plus plan; $149 Premium plan.
Pros & Cons
Pros
Free plan option available.
Offers helpful related services, like payroll, that integrate closely with its POS system.
No long-term contracts or termination fees.
All plans include a free online ordering page.
Cons
Free plan only includes phone support for the first 90 days.
Complex restaurants might prefer a more specialized system.
Free plan processing rates are more expensive than competitors.
Compare to other products
Payment processing fees
In-person: 2.6% + $0.15
Online: 3.3% + $0.30
Payment processing fees
2.49% + $0.15
if you buy hardware upfront; 3.09% + $0.15 for pay-as-you-go option.
Payment processing fees
N/A
Quote-based.
Payment processing fees
1.99% + $0.25
For most cards in paid plans.
Need more options? Check our picks for best payment processing systems
Toast: Best for restaurant analytics. Square has shift, menu and kitchen performance reporting. But Toast gives you access to deeper analytics, like recipe costing, with its xtraCHEF add-on. Read our full Toast review.
» MORE: Toast vs. Square
TouchBistro: Best for reservation management. TouchBistro has a built-in reservation management platform, along with upsell suggestions for servers to follow. These features can go a long way for larger restaurants — especially fine dining ones. You’ll need to integrate with third-party apps to get these features with Square. Read our full TouchBistro review.
SpotOn: Best for customizability. SpotOn is ideal for restaurants that want to pick and choose which features they pay for. It has plans with preselected capabilities, but it also offers a variety of add-ons that allow for more customization. These include online ordering, marketing and gift cards. Read more about SpotOn Restaurant in our roundup of the best restaurant POS systems.
Full review
Square makes a version of its POS system specifically for businesses in the food and beverage industry. The company used to call it Square for Restaurants. But in 2025, it began marketing Square as a single unified app with features for multiple industries. Once you subscribe to it, you can choose a specific mode (e.g., bar, full-service or quick-service). This helps pre-configure features and the onboarding process to fit your business.
Square lists full-service restaurants as a supported business type. But we think it’s better suited to less complex operations. This includes cafes, quick-service restaurants and bars.
Since these businesses often have smaller food menus than full-service establishments, they also have simpler needs. Square has the tools (e.g., basic inventory tracking, sales reporting, tip splitting) to cover these. And it’s more affordable than other industry-specific competitors, like Toast, that charge additional fees for setup, integrations and online ordering.
That’s a big reason why I chose Square for my husband’s brewery. The brewery doesn’t serve food, so its menu is pretty straightforward. And since it just opened the summer of 2025, cost is still top of mind. Square has checked most of our boxes so far.
That said, Square isn't as in-depth as its pricier alternatives. For example, it doesn’t have advanced analytics for recipe costing or in-house reservation management software. You’d have to integrate with third party solutions to access these. And that’s not the most streamlined or cost-effective solution. This can put full-service restaurants at a disadvantage.
Square is best for:
✔️ Bars, cafes and casual dining.
✔️ Affordability.
✔️ Built-in payroll options.
Square overview
| Payment processing model | Flat rate. |
| Payment processing fees |
|
| Monthly fee |
|
| Hardware cost |
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| Contract length | No contract. Upgrade, downgrade or cancel at any time without penalty. |
| Customer support | Chat and email support in all plans. Free plan includes phone support only for the first 90 days. Plus plan subscribers can access phone support weekdays 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. PT. Premium plan subscribers receive 24/7 phone support. |
- Item and menu management.
- Online site.
- Invoicing.
- Discounts and refunds.
- Option to add service charges.
- Ability to create house accounts.
- Low-stock alerts.
- Basic sales reporting.
- Pickup and delivery options.
- Google reviews monitoring.
- Gift cards (2.5% load fee).
All features in Free plan, plus:
- Close-of-day procedures and reporting.
- Ability to split or reopen checks.
- Bar tab preauthorization.
- Custom floor plan.
- Ability to bulk edit items.
- QR code payments.
- Texts when orders are ready.
- Inventory tracking.
- Vendor and purchase order management tools.
- Reports on cost of goods sold, labor costs, shifts and menus.
- Option to connect to a custom domain.
- More site customization tools.
- Loyalty rewards program.
- Email marketing.
- Custom invoice templates.
- Timecards and shift scheduling.
- Tip splitting.
All features in Plus plan, in addition to:
- Integrate with reservation management platforms.
- Seat and course management tools.
- Vendor sales reporting.
- Gift cards (no load fee).
» MORE: Learn more about Square’s fees
Where Square stands out
Affordability
Square’s restaurant POS hardware setups and software plans are often cheaper than what competitors have to offer. For example, it costs $1,068.20 to get started with a Toast countertop hardware setup. If you already have an iPad, Square lets you pair it with a cash drawer, stand and receipt printer for $689.
Square also has a free POS software plan. But we think its $49-per-month Plus plan is the best option for businesses in the food and beverage industry. It has more competitive credit card processing fees, which can save you money in the long run. And it gives you access to staff management tools and preauthorized bar tabs.
Unlike competitors, such as Toast, Square doesn’t charge extra for setup, integrations or online ordering either.
No contracts or termination fees
Specialized POS systems often come with long-term contracts. That’s not the case with Square.
For instance, let’s say you subscribe to the Premium plan at the beginning of the year. A few months later, business is down and your cash flow doesn’t support the extra cost. You can downgrade to the Plus or Free plan — no strings attached. And if that doesn’t work, you can switch POS systems entirely without having to worry about termination fees.
Toast locks you into a two-year contract. TouchBistro’s terms and conditions say you cannot terminate your agreement before the “current term” ends. The company doesn’t disclose the length of that term. Instead, it suggests referring to your sales quote.
Where Square falls short
Could have more front-of-house features
Square’s restaurant software doesn’t have as many front-of-house features as some of its more expensive competitors. For example, you have to integrate with OpenTable, a separate third-party service, to access reservation management software. Toast and TouchBistro offer these solutions in-house.
It’s also missing other features, like upselling suggestions, that Lightspeed Restaurant and TouchBistro have. This tool lets you program specific prompts when servers click on a menu item. You can use the prompts to suggest wine pairings and/or additional sides.
Limited inventory management
Square has basic inventory features, like low stock alerts, counting tools and purchase order management. But it doesn’t go much deeper than that. This could be an issue if your margins hinge on ordering the right amount of inventory. That’s especially true if most of the items you’re ordering are perishable.
For instance, Lightspeed Restaurant has a wastage feature that lets staff adjust inventory levels when food expires. You can do this with a workaround in Square, but it’s not as seamless.
What small-business owners think of Square's restaurant software
NerdWallet checked online forums like Reddit and reviews from sites like TrustPilot, G2, the App Store and Google Play to gauge how users feel about Square. We used an AI tool to help analyze this feedback. Here are the major trends we spotted.
👍 User friendliness
Online commenters praise how easy it is for small restaurants and cafes to use Square. It might not have the same level of functionality as its competitors. But for a lot of businesses, sticking with the basics is perfectly sufficient. It also makes Square’s software simpler to learn and navigate.
One user acknowledges that Square’s fees aren’t the lowest on the market. But they think it’s a fair tradeoff, considering how convenient it is.
👎 Functionality for higher-volume restaurants
Reddit users say Square doesn’t cut it for restaurants with complex menus or multiple locations. One user complained that it doesn’t route orders to the correct kitchen station. Another suggested it’s not well equipped to maximize operational efficiency.
These are issues for high-capacity restaurants — think locations that can seat more than 100 people at a time. But it’s not as critical for new single-location cafes or very small restaurants.
» MORE: Best Square competitors
How we evaluated Square
NerdWallet’s writers and editors independently review POS systems, like Square, by analyzing more than 30 data points. We collected data from Square’s public-facing website, help articles and company representatives.
Our evaluations also take user sentiment into account. This involves looking through individual reviews and feedback on sites like Trustpilot, the App Store, Google Play and Reddit. Then, we use AI tools to help spot larger trends within those comments. Since we cannot verify each user’s individual experience, we don’t incorporate user reviews in our star ratings. For more information on how we score POS systems, see our full methodology.
Frequently asked questions
Square does offer a free version of its restaurant POS system, which comes loaded with many features needed to run a food service business. For more advanced restaurant POS features, businesses will need to upgrade to a paid plan and/or make use of third-party software integrations. Payment processing fees for credit card, digital wallet and other non-cash payments will always apply.
Many restaurants use Square’s restaurant POS solution, including, according to Square’s website, Parry Restaurant Group, Tartinery, Charbar and others.