Toast VS Square POS
Trying to decide between Toast or Square as your restaurant's point of sale system? Read our guide to discover the best fit for your business.
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WRITTEN & RESEARCHED BY
Editor & Senior Staff Writer
Last updated onUpdated
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REVIEWED BY
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Key Takeaways
- Toast delivers more advanced, restaurant-specific features but at a higher cost.
- Square is the more affordable, transparent, and easy-to-use option for smaller restaurants.
- Choose Toast for depth and durability; choose Square for simplicity and predictable pricing.
New and growing food businesses often compare Toast POS vs Square POS when choosing a restaurant system. This guide breaks down which option is better for your business size, budget, and specific needs.
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| Processing Fees |
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| What’s Missing |
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| Visit Site Read Review |
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Table of Contents
Toast VS Square For Restaurants: At A Glance
Toast and Square are both strong restaurant POS systems, but they’re built for different types of businesses.
Toast is best for small to midsize restaurants that need deeper restaurant-specific tools. It includes customizable ordering, tipping, reservations, strong kitchen workflows, ingredient-level inventory, easy 86-ing, and automatic menu syncing across locations. Toast’s Android hardware is also built to survive spills and drops.
However, Toast can get expensive, especially once you add online ordering or loyalty features, and many businesses are required to sign long-term contracts.
Square is the best free or low-cost option for small food service businesses. You get a free website, online ordering, gift cards, Google Ordering, and social media integrations. The system works on unlimited iPads (free plan), Square Register, or Square’s mobile Android kit, and the card readers are cheap—great for restaurants, food trucks, and events.
Square becomes costly for multi-location businesses, lacks perishable inventory tracking, and some users experience occasional fund holds.
Where Toast Wins
Toast delivers more advanced, restaurant-specific tools, especially for full-service or higher-volume operations. Here’s where it stands out:
- Advanced floor planning for complex or frequently changing dining rooms
- Deeper restaurant analytics to optimize menus and operations
- Built-in restaurant add-ons like catering tools and reservation management
Where Toast Falls Short
- Higher overall cost with unclear processing fees and required long-term contracts
- Clunky payroll add-on that many users find difficult to set up and manage
- Longer support wait times and declining customer service satisfaction
Where Square Wins:
Square is easy to set up, simple to operate, and surprisingly feature-rich for the price. You can start on the free plan and scale up only when you need to. Here’s where it shines:
- Free online store with built-in online ordering for any user
- Built-in scheduling tools for catering, reservations, and basic bookings
- Month-to-month pricing with no long-term contracts and straightforward processing rates (with volume discounts)
Where Square Falls Short:
- Higher costs for multi-location setups as registers and locations add up
- No perishable inventory tracking, putting it behind Toast for detailed food-cost management
- Occasional fund holds or frozen accounts, especially for higher-risk merchants
Toast VS Square Pricing Comparison
| Toast | Square | |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly Subscription Pricing |
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| In-Person Payment Processing | 2.49% + $0.15 | 2.4% - 2.6% + $0.15 |
| Online Payment Processing | 3.5% + $0.15 for Visa, Mastercard, and Discover, and 3.89% + $0.15 for AMEX | 2.9% - 3.3% + $0.30 |
| Equipment | $0+ if you agree to a higher processing rate | $0 - 799 |
Both systems offer free plans, but Toast’s “free” option comes with higher processing fees and costly add-ons like online ordering and eGift cards. Toast is more advanced overall, but Square includes many of these features for free, making it cheaper for most small food businesses.
Toast VS Square Features
| Toast | Square | |
|---|---|---|
| Split Tickets | ||
| Custom Tipping | ||
| Offline Payments | Swiped card payments only | Only available with Square Terminal |
| Menu Management | ||
| Inventory Tracking | ||
| Online Ordering, Takeout, & Delivery | Additional fees | Free online ordering platform with optional paid branded domain name |
| Self-service Kiosks | ||
| Reservations | ||
| Floor Planning | ||
| Open Tabs | ||
| Marketing Tools | ||
| Employee Management | ||
| Multilocation Management | ||
| Restaurant Reporting |
Toast and Square share strong core features, but they excel in different areas. Toast offers deeper customization and far better inventory management, while Square provides stronger online ordering, marketing tools, and offline payments.
Square also has more free or low-cost solutions for things like reservations, whereas Toast typically relies on paid add-ons or integrations.
The biggest difference is hardware: Toast requires its own proprietary devices; Square lets you use iPads or inexpensive Square hardware.
Here’s how the two compare in detail.
Which Is Best For My Business: Toast Or Square?
Here’s the quick rundown of which system fits your restaurant best.
Choose Toast If…
- You run a larger or full-service restaurant that needs advanced features and durable hardware.
- You have multiple locations that benefit from centralized menus and inventory.
- You’re comfortable with Toast’s fees and contract terms.
- You handle catering or hotel-based operations.
- You want order-ready screens for takeout and delivery.
Choose Square If…
- You need a free or low-cost POS.
- You want flexible, affordable hardware.
- You prefer a simple, easy-to-use system.
- You don’t process high transaction volumes.
- You want access to Square Loyalty, Payroll, and other add-ons.
- You prefer month-to-month pricing.
Toast VS Square Comparison: The Final Verdict
Toast offers more advanced, restaurant-specific features, but it’s also more expensive and less transparent. Square is the more affordable, consistent, and easier-to-use option.
Choose Square if cost and reliable support matter most.
Choose Toast if you need a top-tier, fully loaded restaurant management system and don’t mind paying for it.
If neither fits, explore our full list of the best restaurant POS systems to find the right match.
Erica Seppala
Editor & Senior Staff Writer at Merchant Maverick
Erica has been writing about small business finance and technology since 2008. She joined Merchant Maverick in 2018 and specializes in researching and reviewing business software, financial products, and other topics to help small businesses manage and grow their operations. Her expertise has been cited in MSN, Reader's Digest, Vox, U.S. News & World Report, and Real Simple. She is a Certified ProAdvisor for QuickBooks Online and QuickBooks Payroll, a graduate of Limestone University, and currently resides in Greenville, South Carolina.
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