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6 Best Grocery Store POS Systems To Boost Sales In 2023

These grocery store POS options offer robust inventory management, and most have EBT, WIC, lottery, and regulated substance capabilities as well.

    Nicolette Kier
  • UPDATED

Advertiser Disclosure: Our unbiased reviews and content are supported in part by affiliate partnerships, and we adhere to strict guidelines to preserve editorial integrity.

Grocery store POS systems help grocery store owners take in-person payments, print receipts, monitor inventory, and manage employees. Grocery store POS systems can also include a customer loyalty program, EBT/WIC sales, online ordering, regulated item sales features, and made-to-order food sales capabilities.

We reviewed over 15 grocery store POS systems based on pricing, POS hardware, grocery store POS features, and POS provider contracts to help you find the best grocery store POS system for your business.

Don’t know what to look for in a POS system? Check out our best POS systems to find out our recommendations and advice.

Learn More About Our Top Picks

CompanyBest ForNext StepsBest For
Lightspeed Retail POS

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  • Best for specialty stores and co-ops focused on retail item sales.
  • Excellent inventory/vendor management, membership and subscription sales, wholesale accounts
  • $89+/month ($69+/month with annual billing)
  • Best for specialty stores and co-ops focused on retail item sales.
  • Excellent inventory/vendor management, membership and subscription sales, wholesale accounts
  • $89+/month ($69+/month with annual billing)

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Square For Retail

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  • Best for small grocers looking for a free all-in-one POS system
  • Free POS software, free online store builder, and excellent mobile sales option
  • $0-$60/month/location
  • Best for small grocers looking for a free all-in-one POS system
  • Free POS software, free online store builder, and excellent mobile sales option
  • $0-$60/month/location

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Clover POS

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  • Best for training employees quickly
  • Easy to train cashiers and stockers, has lots of POS hardware options, and a built-in loyalty program
  • $44.95+/month
  • Best for training employees quickly
  • Easy to train cashiers and stockers, has lots of POS hardware options, and a built-in loyalty program
  • $44.95+/month

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Revel POS Systems

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  • Best for midsize and larger grocery stores that also offer food services
  • Retail and restaurant POS in one software plan, built-in purchase ordering/receiving, EBT, and regulated item sales
  • $198+/month
  • Best for midsize and larger grocery stores that also offer food services
  • Retail and restaurant POS in one software plan, built-in purchase ordering/receiving, EBT, and regulated item sales
  • $198+/month

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POS Nation

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  • Best for grocery stores that also sell regulated items
  • Lottery sales and payouts from POS system, alcohol/cigarette-specific inventory management, and loss prevention features
  • $149+/month
  • Best for grocery stores that also sell regulated items
  • Lottery sales and payouts from POS system, alcohol/cigarette-specific inventory management, and loss prevention features
  • $149+/month

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IT Retail

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  • Best for supermarket and supermarket chain businesses
  • Custom department/section settings, employee theft monitoring, EBT/eWIC certified POS
  • $199+/month
  • Best for supermarket and supermarket chain businesses
  • Custom department/section settings, employee theft monitoring, EBT/eWIC certified POS
  • $199+/month

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Read more below to learn why we chose these options.

Table of Contents

Choose The Best Grocery Store POS System

To find the best POS systems for grocery stores, we looked at applications that offer several payment types, including EBT/WIC sales. We found POS systems with regulated, online, and hot food sales; loyalty programs; and great inventory management. We considered how easy it is to train cashiers as well.

1. Lightspeed Retail: Best For Specialty Stores & Co-ops

Lightspeed Retail POS


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Pricing

Starts at $89/month ($69/month billed annually)

Contract

None

Equipment Cost

Contact Lightspeed for a quote

Pros

  • Subscription memberships (great for co-ops and food box programs)
  • Comprehensive inventory management
  • Wholesale account management
  • Excellent multilocation management

Cons

  • No EBT/WIC integration
  • No built-in restaurant management capabilities
  • Early termination fee

Lightspeed Retail POS

Why We Chose Lightspeed POS System For Grocery Stores

We love Lightspeed because it is one of the best retail POS systems, especially when it comes to inventory management and sales reporting, which is great for specialty stores that carry a lot of items and for co-ops that require easy-to-easy reports for members to go over. This POS system also has a great loyalty program, eCommerce store builder, and customer account manager.

With Lightspeed Subscriptions, grocery store owners can start a subscription box for specialized meal prep items or hidden gem snacks. Co-ops can also use the subscription manager to charge a recurring monthly fee until new members have reached their investment total if they opt out of a one-time payment.

We also like that Lightspeed offers third-party apps to give you functions such as employee scheduling, appointment bookings, and taking customer feedback.

Lightspeed Grocery Store POS System Pricing

Lightspeed Retail POS Plans Price  When To Use
Lightspeed Retail POS Lean $89/month ($69/month billed annually) For mid- to large-sized businesses that want a POS with retail-specific features
Lightspeed Retail POS Standard $149/month ($119/month billed annually) For businesses that want a POS with retail-specific features plus accounting integration & eCommerce
Lightspeed Retail POS Advanced $269/month ($199/month billed annually) For businesses that want a POS with retail-specific features, accounting integration, eCommerce, & loyalty

Additional registers cost $59/register/month.

Lightspeed Grocery Store POS Features

Lightspeed Retail POS Features Availability
Multi-Store Support
Contactless Payments
Multi-Channel Selling Standard plan & up
Gift Cards
Customer Loyalty Advanced plan
Marketing Tools Standard plan & up
Online Ordering Standard plan & up
Inventory Management
Reporting
Menu Management
Delivery Management
EBT Acceptance
Employee Management
Text Messaging

Lightspeed is heavily focused on retail and offers these excellent retail inventory management features:

  • Item bundling and automated breakdowns
  • Inventory matrices
  • Stock transfer across locations
  • Pricing rules based on location and customer segment
  • Purchase ordering from a vendor catalog
  • Master purchase orders, so you can order for multiple locations from a single vendor
  • Custom reorder points and low-stock alerts

Pricing rules allow you to create special prices for co-op members and give discounts for specialty store shoppers who sign up for a monthly membership account. Lightspeed’s vendor catalog manager makes it easy for other businesses to request space on your shelves and easy for you to feature certain vendors on an eCommerce site.

Lightspeed Subscriptions allows co-op owners to create fixed subscriptions so that customers can pay their membership fee incrementally.

Specialty stores can also use Lightspeed Subscriptions to create rolling monthly subscriptions for specialty items (e.g., “wine of the month”) or even allow people to buy fixed subscriptions for certain months or as a gift for someone else (such as a month-long weekly Valentines chocolate box delivery for a loved one).

Lightspeed POS for grocery stores.

Lightspeed also has excellent customer management tools, including the ability to create a B2B customer experience on your grocery store’s website. You can create custom prices and minimum order requirements for different customer segments, then force customers to sign up before they can place a wholesale order. If you only want to work with certain businesses, you can mark all signups as “approval required” and approve accounts as you see fit.

Hardware Cost

You may source your hardware yourself, as Lightspeed lists compatible hardware, or purchase your hardware through Lightspeed (you’ll have to ask for a quote first, though). Lightspeed register kits range from roughly $500 to $1,000.

Lightspeed software runs on iOS devices, which Lightspeed does not sell.

Note: Lightspeed Retail now requires all new qualified merchants in the US and Canada to use Lightspeed Payments, Lightspeed’s payment processor. If you currently use a card reader from a third-party payment processor, you can’t use it anymore. Since you can’t use any existing payment terminals (card readers) with Lightspeed Payments, Lightspeed is currently running a free terminal replacement promotion for eligible merchants that includes two free Lightspeed POS terminals (card readers) per qualified merchant.

Eligible merchants include business owners that process a minimum of $100/day in credit card payments, as measured by a monthly average. Apple products are not included in this promotion, so you’ll still need to source an iPad to take sales.

Payment Processing

Lightspeed has its own in-house payment processor, Lightspeed Payments. Business owners in the US and Canada are required to use this payment processor.

With Lightspeed Payments, you’ll pay a processing fee of 2.6% plus $0.10 for tap, chip, and swipe payments. For online orders, you’ll pay a fee of 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction. This is on par with other POS providers that include integrated payment processing, such as Square and Clover.

Note: Lightspeed will buy out payment processing contracts, paying off merchants’ early cancellation fees if you process a minimum of $25,000 in card sales and then submit documentation of your previous payment processing contract that states your early termination fee within six months of meeting this minimum processing amount.

It’s important to note that the “paying off” comes in the form of discounted payment processing fees, not a chunk of cash that goes towards your termination fees when you decide to switch to Lightspeed Payments.

Contract Requirements/Warnings

Lightspeed’s annual plans are more cost-effective than monthly ones. However, Lightspeed does charge early termination fees if you cancel your plan, so start with a monthly plan before committing to Lightspeed for the long run.

If you purchase POS hardware from Lightspeed, you must verify that you have received your items within five business days of receiving them. If you do not, the equipment is not covered under Lightspeed’s 30-day warranty (14 days for Apple products).

Get Started With Lightspeed Retail POS

Read our in-depth review

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2. Square For Retail: Best For Small Grocers

Square For Retail


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Pricing

$0-$60/month

Contract

None

Equipment Cost

$0-$799/month

Get a free card swiper from Square at no cost when you create a free account. Claim your card reader.

Pros

  • Free plan available
  • Versatile online selling features
  • All-in-one sales option
  • EBT and WIC sales capabilities

Cons

  • Limited inventory management

Square POS for grocery store

Why We Chose Square POS For Grocery Stores

We love that Square has such a low barrier to entry when it comes to selling both in-person and online. Square offers one of the best free POS systems with a completely free in-person sales app, free online store builder, and the ability to use an unlimited number of devices as POS systems.

Square’s affordable mobile POS app and Bluetooth-compatible card reader make Square an excellent option for small business owners who sell at farmers’ markets, events, and pop-up shops. The countertop POS is also highly affordable and efficient for small grocers with a physical location.

There’s no better option for grocery store owners with a small budget than Square.

Square Grocery Store POS System Pricing

Square For Retail Plans Price  When To Use
Free Plan $0/month (2.6% + $0.10 processing fees) You have a retail store with basic inventory and reporting needs
Pro Plan $60/month (2.5% + $0.10 processing fees) You have a small to mid-sized retail establishment with advanced back-end needs
Premium Plan Custom pricing (2.5% + $0.10 processing fees) You sell more than $250,000 a year

With each plan, you are allowed to have an unlimited number of registers, which is not true for many other grocery POS providers.

Square Grocery Store POS Features

Square For Retail Features Availability
Multi-Store Support
Contactless Payments
Multi-Channel Selling
Gift Cards Add-on
Customer Loyalty Add-on
Marketing Tools
Online Ordering
Inventory Management
Reporting
Menu Management
Delivery Management
EBT Acceptance
Employee Management
Text Messaging

Square is unique because all of its best features are free for all users. These free features include:

  • Unlimited free POS system licenses and unlimited users
  • Free online store builder that customers can use to order groceries for curbside pickup, local delivery, and/or shipping
  • Free Square online checkout link generator that allows you to take payments over text, email, or QR code
  • Free social media marketing channel integrations

Mobile sellers can use Square online checkout links as a way for customers to pre-order items when they’re running low. For example, if you sell your store’s baked goods at a community event and start running low, customers can pre-order items that they really like for pickup or delivery using a QR code (which you can easily print on paper for free).

Square grocery store POS system

Square grocery store POS system QR code generator.

Square also supports CBD sales, gift card sales, sales by weight, and EBT/WIC transactions (through a Totilpay integration).

Farmers with a storefront or who sell a CSA/farm share can integrate Square with Local Food Marketplace, a farm production and logistics software. With these two, you can sell recurring produce subscriptions online and upsell customers when they come to pick up their orders.

Paid Square plans offer more inventory management features, such as automated purchase ordering, inventory counts, and multilocation stock management, at a highly competitive price point.

On a paid plan, you can schedule item updates, which is great for creating and advertising weekly specials. You can also create time-sensitive and recurring sales, such as a weekly discount on produce items.

  • Related: Read our guide to accepting EBT payments if you’re not sure how to become an EBT-authorized merchant.

Hardware Cost

Grocery store owners need a way to accept mobile payments and may also need a barcode scanner, printer, weight scale, and cash register.

The Square contactless credit card reader starts at $49. The Square scale is $500, and if you buy a scanner new from Square, you’ll pay around $150, depending on the model. A Square register kit costs $1,329.

Read our Square POS hardware guide to decide what equipment you’ll need and how to get the best deals.

Payment Processing

  • In-Person Payments: 2.5%-2.6% plus $0.20 per card-present transaction (dependent on subscription plan)
  • Online Payments: 2.9% plus $0.30 per transaction (online orders placed for pickup or local delivery)
  • Card-On-File/Manual Keyed-In Cards: 3.5% plus $0.15 per transaction

Contract Requirements/Warnings

Square is one of the most transparent POS system providers and payment processors out there. Contracts are month-to-month, and you may cancel at any time.

Hardware purchased through Square is under warranty. If you break your hardware within that warranty period, you may order a free replacement, but you must send your broken hardware back within 14 days of receiving your new equipment.

This warranty even extends to products that aren’t purchased through Square.

Get Started With Square For Retail

Read our in-depth review

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3. Clover: Easiest To Train Employees

Clover POS


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Pricing

Starts at $0/month

Contract

Depends on merchant services provider

Equipment Cost

$49-$1,799 per device

Pros

  • Easy modification
  • Streamlined setup
  • Free EBT transaction app
  • Integrated hardware

Cons

  • Must use Fiserv payment processor
  • Steep initial costs
  • Sketchy resellers

Clover POS system for grocery stores

Why We Chose Clover POS System For Grocery Stores

We love that Clover is a POS system that’s as easy to use as any smartphone, with a simple user interface and inventory management. Businesses with high employee turnover can quickly get employees trained and restrict user permissions so that they don’t touch anything they shouldn’t.

Clover is also straightforward when it comes to POS setup. This system has lots of POS hardware, software plans, and merchant services provider options. Small to mid-size grocery stores can choose only the hardware and software features they need and get custom payment processing rates that may be lower than other payment processing providers, such as Square.

Clover offers a huge app market that will give your POS system the specific grocery store POS features you need to run your business. This includes a free EBT payments app, lottery payments/payouts app, and barcode management app.

Built-in Clover features include an online ordering platform, loyalty program, and payments via card, mobile wallet, check, cash, and gift card.

Clover Grocery Store POS System Pricing

Clover POS Plans Price  When To Use
Clover Payments $0/month If you only need to process payments and don’t need any POS hardware
Clover Essentials $14.95/month If you have a small retail/service-based business and don’t take returns
Clover Register $44.95/month or $54.90/month If you have a small to mid-size retail/service-based business and need more POS features
Clover Counter Service Restaurant $44.95/month or $54.90/month If you have a quick-serve restaurant, cafeteria, or mobile food service business
Clover Table Service Restaurant $74.95/month, $84.90/month, or $94.85/month If you have a full-service restaurant or bar

Clover offers several different software subscription plans, but grocery store owners should opt for the $44.95/month-$54.90/month Clover Register plan to get all the POS functionalities they need.

Note: The above prices are on Clover software you purchase on Clover.com when you pay for your hardware upfront. If you lease your Clover hardware, your monthly plan will be much higher. Your monthly pricing may differ if you sign up with a third-party hardware provider.

Read our Clover pricing guide to understand more about how Clover POS software, hardware, and payment processing services affect your monthly billing.

Clover Grocery Store POS Features

Clover POS Features Availability
Multi-Store Support
Contactless Payments Depends on hardware choice
Multi-Channel Selling
Gift Cards
Customer Loyalty
Marketing Tools
Online Ordering Depends on software plan
Inventory Management
Reporting
Menu Management
Delivery Management
EBT Acceptance Add-on app
Employee Management
Text Messaging

Clover’s most unique feature is its large app market filled with retail and grocery-specific apps. Grocery store owners will want to get Clover apps for EBT payments, ID verification to sell regulated items, employee scheduling and time clocks, cash tracking, and more advanced inventory management.

You may also consider a self-checkout app, tobacco rebate program app, weight-based sale app, and variable barcode sales app.

Clover grocery store POS system

Clover grocery store POS system free EBT payment app.

Clover also offers a free built-in loyalty program that essentially works as your custom-branded mobile app without the price tag that comes with creating and maintaining one.

Within your Clover dashboard, you can decide how customers earn loyalty points. You can run a special sale where customers get extra points for specific items, which is great when you have too much stock or want to drum up more business. You can also choose whether customers redeem points as a percentage discount, dollar discount, or on specific items/item types.

It’s also possible to announce sales to subscribed loyalty customers, which is a great way to draw customers back into the store or your online store.

Customers who order groceries from your app can set up their order preferences, easily reorder items from previous purchases, and set up a linked payment method, so they can autopay at checkout. Customers get reminders about redeeming loyalty points on their app and at the register.

Clover POS systems for grocery store

Clover grocery store POS loyalty points redemption at checkout.

Hardware Cost

You may purchase Clover hardware directly from the POS provider or a reseller. Devices purchased from Clover range from $49 (Clover Go card reader) to $1,799 (Clover Station Duo).

Additional POS device software subscriptions cost an extra $9.95/device/month if your devices are all in one location.

However, if, for example, you place two Clover Station Duos with a $44.95/month Register software plan in two locations, you’ll pay $44.95/month for each device. If you had both registers in one location, you’d only pay $44.95/month for the first register’s software and $9.95/month for the second register’s software.

Read our guide on the best Clover resellers to decide where (and how) to get a good deal on Clover hardware.

Payment Processing

Clover hardware and merchant services are connected, which means that you also have to sign a merchant agreement with whatever Clover reseller you get your Clover hardware from. That merchant agreement will have unique payment processing fees.

If you stick with Clover for your hardware, you are stuck using Fiserv for payment processing and will pay the following fees:

  • Card-Present Transactions: 2.3%-2.6% + $0.10 per transaction
  • Card-Not-Present Transactions: 3.5% + $0.10 per transaction

Card-not-present transactions include manually keyed-in card transactions, phone orders, online orders, invoice payments, and every form of payment except for cash, check, or swipe/tap/chip card payment.

Contract Requirements/Warnings

Fiserv does not have the best reputation as a merchant service provider, and Clover seems to only offer 36-month and 48-month contracts with hefty early termination fees and poor customer service. Take these things into consideration before dedicating yourself to getting your hardware and merchant services from Clover.

Also, make sure to avoid Clover scams when purchasing your hardware, or your business could suffer financially (and your sanity may suffer as you switch to a new merchant services provider).

Get Started With Clover POS

Read our in-depth review

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4. Revel: Best For Grocery & Cafe Services

Revel POS Systems


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Pricing

$99/month

Contract

Three-year commitment for lowest rate

Equipment Cost

$20-$1,500

Pros

  • Retail and restaurant POS software in one plan
  • EBT, regulated items, and weight-based sales
  • Several cash drawer management functions
  • Excellent perishable and retail inventory management

Cons

  • Three-year minimum commitment
  • Expensive for smaller businesses
  • Early termination fee

Revel POS for grocery store

Why We Chose Revel POS System For Grocery Stores

We love that Revel offers customizable features of both retail and restaurant POS systems wrapped up in one POS subscription. Revel is worth the price tag for full-service grocery stores. Other less expensive POS systems require you to pick either retail or restaurant software, whereas Revel blends features from both industries into one master dashboard.

On the grocery side, Revel offers a detailed inventory management system, employee management tools, and an in-depth cashier user interface setup. You can customize your store’s receipts, include an eCommerce website, and even sell grocery item subscriptions or wholesale to businesses such as restaurants or offices.

On the café side, Revel has ingredient-level item management, combos and meal deals, and online menus. Your café customers and employees will appreciate the self-serve kiosks and online ordering system that allow them to get out of the store faster. Your kitchen staff will appreciate Revel’s kitchen display systems, which help them manage orders from several ordering sources and ensure orders are correct every time.

Revel Grocery Store POS System Pricing

Revel POS Systems Plans Price  When To Use
Revel plan $99/month with three-year commitment Use if you are committed to the product and have a need for high-end features.

This pricing applies if you sign up for a three-year contract and a minimum of two terminals. If you want to know about other pricing terms, you must contact a Revel Systems representative for a quote.

There is also a one-time $674 implementation fee, which includes software and hardware consultations, training, and payment setup for merchants.

Revel Grocery Store POS Features

Revel POS Systems Features Availability
Multi-Store Support
Contactless Payments
Multi-Channel Selling
Gift Cards
Customer Loyalty
Marketing Tools
Online Ordering
Inventory Management
Reporting
Menu Management
Delivery Management
EBT Acceptance
Employee Management
Text Messaging

Revel’s most unique function is its foodservice capabilities, which include the ability to:

  • Create menus with forced and optional modifiers, plus timed special combos and meal deals to draw in customers
  • Track raw ingredients, remove items when ingredients become unavailable, and generate food cost reports, which all help you control costs in the long run
  • Add self-serve kiosks, which is excellent when you’re short-staffed at the register or customers only want to order food
  • Use digital kitchen display systems to manage orders from different sources (in-store, online, third-party ordering platform, drive-through window, etc.)
  • Integrate digital menu boards that show your current menu and will automatically update based on your Revel menu changes

Revel grocery store POS system

Revel grocery store POS system branded self-serve kiosk.

Revel has just about every cashier function you could need, including EBT sales (via third-party integration), offline payments mode, age verification requirements so that you can legally sell tobacco and alcohol, plus sales by weight. You can set a till alert to know when it’s time for a safe drop, create manager refund approval requirements, and employee performance reports to monitor your employees’ activity at the register.

Revel is also one of the best inventory management POS systems because of its fast purchase ordering, receiving, and stock monitoring capabilities, which helps larger grocery stores and supermarkets manage a lot of moving stock at once.

Managers can easily generate purchase orders with preferred vendor settings, while stockers can mark orders as partially or fully received. They can also use Revel’s barcode generator/scanner phone app to scan in items and perform manual stock takes.

You’ll get reports on all inventory activity and item discrepancies, and you can tag the reason behind discrepancies (theft, returns, damages, etc.). This, in addition to perishable inventory management, will really help grocers cut down on lost profits.

Revel POS system for grocery

Revel grocery POS system partial purchase order receiving.

Last, we have to say that Revel allows you to sell just about anything, from ready-to-cook meal subscriptions to bulk orders to regulated substances.

Note: Revel can technically handle fuel sales and wet stock management, but if you want to focus primarily on selling gas, read our post on the best gas station POS systems.

Hardware Cost

Revel Systems sells iPads, iPad stands, and self-serve kiosks. Revel is compatible with several payment devices, barcode scanners, cash drawers, printers, and scales.

Revel proprietary hardware is quote-based. You may source compatible hardware on your own, but you must get permission from Revel in writing to do this. The company does this to ensure that you’re purchasing Revel-compatible hardware.

Payment Processing

Revel has its own in-house payment processor, Revel Advantage. You will have to get a custom quote for your payment processing rate.

You can also call for a free payment processing rate review, and the company may meet or beat your current payment processing rates.

You can use other third-party payment processors, such as Moneris and Adyen, but Revel will charge an additional fee if you decide against Revel Advantage.

Contract Requirements/Warnings

To get the best deal, you must sign up for a three-year contract, sign on for at least two terminals, and use Revel Advantage, the company’s in-house payment processor. You are billed annually.

If you terminate your Revel subscription early, you’ll pay double the amount remaining on the contract or $15,000, whichever is higher.

Translation: Really consider whether Revel is right for your business before committing. Make good use of your product demo, ask Revel representatives lots of questions, and shop around for the best hardware and payment processing deals before signing any contracts.

Get Started With Revel POS Systems

Read our in-depth review

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5. POS Nation: Best For Selling Age-Restricted Items

POS Nation


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Pros

  • Tobacco, alcohol, vape, and lottery sales features
  • Perishable inventory management
  • Shrinkage reduction features
  • Automated purchase ordering

Cons

  • Must use POS Nation hardware
  • Customer support and cloud backup cost extra

POS Nation grocery store POS system

Why We Chose POS Nation POS System For Grocery Stores

We appreciate that POS Nation understands that many grocery stores don’t just sell food. Grocery stores may offer a range of products and services, including selling regulated substances. With integrated ID verification scanners, regulated inventory tracking, and reporting on tobacco, alcohol, and lottery sales, POS Nation has all the functionality you need to offer a wide variety of age-restricted items.

This POS provider recognizes the potentially high turnover rates and shrinkage associated with grocery stores and has built loss-prevention measures into the software.

POS Nation also ranks highly on our list of best POS systems for convenience stores because of the software’s regulated substance sales and employee management functions.

POS Nation Grocery Store POS System Pricing

  • Flex Monthly: $149/month/POS system; pay monthly for your POS hardware and software
  • Freedom: $999/POS system; one-time fee for POS register kit bundle and pay monthly for POS software

POS Nation Grocery Store POS Features

POS Nation offers these regulated sales-specific features:

  • Forced ID scanning and manual age entry
  • Tobacco inventory tracking (by cases, case breaks, individual packs)
  • Alcohol inventory tracking (by cases, individual items, groupings, and case breaks)
  • Lottery ticket purchases, payouts, and reports from registers with no need for a separate lottery sales machine
  • Vape kitting

POS Nation POS system for grocery stores

POS Nation cigarette item specifications in the admin dashboard.

Grocery stores that sell regulated items are often more susceptible to theft, which is why POS Nation includes loss prevention tools, such as forced cash drawer counts, blind till balancing, and item shrinkage monitoring to tell whether employees are just making mistakes or stealing from your business.

POS Nation also uniquely offers perishable inventory management, automated purchase order generation based on inventory thresholds, and inventory movement reports, so you’ll have an ideal number of items on the shelf. These features are often a paid add-on with other grocery store POS systems.

Hardware Cost

The Flex Monthly plan includes the hardware price in your monthly subscription. If you cancel your subscription, you return the hardware.

When you sign up, you’ll receive a convenience store POS bundle, which includes a touch PC, receipt printer, cash drawer, scanner, and a chip card reader. Extra bundles cost $999 each.

You can get a free online quote for your entire hardware setup on POS Nation’s website. All you have to do is choose your subscription plan, add any extras, such as a label printer scale (a great feature for delis) or customer display screens, and enter your email/phone number.

Payment Processing

POS Nation advertises a payment processing rate between 2% and 2.5% (dependent on your sales volumes).

You must contact a representative for a quote and to open a merchant account.

Contract Requirements/Warnings

You can’t return a one-time purchase, so start on the month-to-month subscription before dedicating yourself to POS Nation for the entirety of your career.

Get Started With POS Nation

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6. IT Retail: Best For Supermarkets

IT Retail


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Pros

  • Built with grocery store workers in mind
  • EBT/eWIC certified POS (no third-party app required)
  • Hardware built to last
  • Free training and 24/7 customer support

Cons

  • Pricing not transparent

IT Retail POS system for grocery store

Why We Chose IT Retail POS System For Grocery Stores

We love that IT Retail is designed specifically for fast-paced, multidepartment supermarkets. This POS is highly customizable and intuitive, especially if you have experience as a cashier, a cash office manager, or have worked inventory.

IT Retail takes into account every facet of running a large grocery store, from how quickly you need to get customers checked out to weeding out any underlying issues, such as theft, excessive shrinkage, and plain old scanning mistakes.

Decision-makers can also use data from IT Retail to guide their decisions on what products to sell, who to promote, and what marketing efforts are worth pursuing.

IT Retail Grocery Store POS System Pricing

IT Retail advertises three base plans:

  • Flex Monthly: $199/month/POS system; pay monthly for your POS hardware and software
  • Freedom Standard: $1,499/POS system; pay a one-time fee for basic POS hardware and pay monthly for POS software
  • Freedom Premium: $1,999/POS system; pay a one-time fee for larger POS hardware with a dual customer-facing display and pay monthly for POS software

IT Retail asks all grocery store business owners to request a quote, so you’ll most likely end up paying a custom amount depending on what kind of POS hardware you need, how many checkout lanes you plan on having, whether you want to offer online ordering or self-checkout lanes, etc.

IT Retail Grocery Store POS Features

IT Retail is a self-contained software designed specifically for larger grocery stores with lots of products, sections, and employees.

Larger grocery stores tend to have several departments and certain rules or inventory needs associated with those departments. IT Retail makes it easy to manage all your departments and the properties of products within those departments.

For example, any item from a beer and wine section will require ID verification at checkout. You can specify this requirement in the department editor in your IT Retail admin dashboard.

IT Retail POS for supermarket.

You can also create custom product templates for item types, which is great for employees receiving new products and cashiers entering new products at checkout.

IT Retail’s employee management and theft prevention features include:

  • Transaction monitor automatically flags suspicious transactions, and you can see who completed those transactions
  • Manager approval is required for price overrides
  • Till status manager and rules such as a required cash drop over a certain amount of money
  • Custom employee roles with permissions such as “require manager override for voids over a certain amount of money”
  • Employee reports that tell you everything from how fast cashiers ring out orders to how many voids and returns they make
  • Custom shrinkage reports with employees associated with that department or product receiving to monitor instances of mistakes or theft

IT Retail is an EBT and eWIC-certified POS system, so you don’t have to pay for an app or third-party integration to take these common grocery store payment types as you do with most other POS systems on this list. You can also accept checks and flag certain customers as “do not accept checks” if their checks bounce.

Hardware Cost

IT Retail sells strong, “rugged” hardware that is made to last, especially in busy multilane supermarkets. You can contact the company for a quote on registers, card readers, self-checkout stations, scanners, customer display screens, and receipt printers.

Registers have a built-in scale to make checkout fast and easy.

Payment Processing

IT Retail provides an in-house payment processing solution with fixed-rate and interchange-plus pricing models. The company advertises that it can offer lower rates than competitors, so get a few quotes before approaching IT Retail about payment processing.

Contract Requirements/Warnings

IT Retail does not provide much information about subscription plans and merchant service agreements on its website. Make sure to read the fine print on your contract before signing up for IT Retail.

Get Started With IT Retail

Jump back to comparison chart

Why We Don't Recommend These POS Systems For Grocery Stores

Stripe

Stripe is a great eCommerce payment processing service but not a complete point of sale app. This software is geared toward developers, as you need some coding to get Stripe running, and Stripe offers a lot of developer tools.

Grocery store owners most likely do not have the time or patience to learn how to implement Stripe, nor is it worth it to dedicate that level of effort to a payment processor that is not a fully developed POS system.

Which Grocery Store POS System Is Right For Your Business?

The best POS for grocery store owners varies depending on your store’s size, product and service offerings, budget, and how simple or comprehensive you need your system to be. You will also want to ensure that the cost of a POS system fits your budget. Need a mobile POS system? There are some great options out there.

Small grocers should consider Square for Retail and Shift4Shop to build an online web presence with third-party delivery service integrations.

If selling made-to-order food is a large part of your sales strategy, Revel Systems is an excellent hybrid retail-restaurant POS system. But if you have a specialty store or co-op focused more on retail, Lightspeed Retail has the inventory and membership features to take your store to the next level.

If tobacco, alcohol, lottery, and vape sales are huge at your store, POS Nation has you covered, while the best POS for supermarkets is IT Retail.

You’ll probably find that none of these options is a perfect match right out of the box, so make sure you’re thinking about customization while trying out new software.

Finally, always read your merchant agreement before signing on with any POS provider.

FAQs: Grocery Store POS Systems

What is the best grocery store POS system?

The best grocery store POS system depends on what you sell, what advanced features your grocery store needs, and what your budget is.

Square for Retail offers a free plan, while Lightspeed Retail and Revel Systems are pricier but can handle more complex inventory and employee management features.

POS Nation is built for selling regulated items, while IT Retail is built for managing supermarkets and supermarket chains.

How much does a grocery store POS system cost?

A grocery store system costs $0 to start out with and increases depending on the number of locations, registers, and add-on services you have.

For example, Square for Retail starts at $0. Revel Systems, on the other hand, starts at $99/month/register. POS providers such as IT Retail require you to get a custom quote.

What is the best POS system for a small grocery store?

The best POS system for a small grocery store is Square or Clover. Both are equipped with enough inventory management features to handle small to midsize inventory, can be used to accept EBT/WIC orders, and can even offer online shopping for curbside pickup or delivery.

Plus, each POS system offers a customer loyalty program, so you can grow your small customer base into a large one.

Is there free POS software for grocery stores?

Square offers free POS software for grocery stores. It is an excellent POS system for small grocery stores.

What POS system should a supermarket use?

Supermarkets use POS systems such as Revel Systems or IT Retail since these POS systems have the customization, employee management, and inventory management capabilities that supermarkets need to manage one or multiple stores.

Methodology: How We Chose The Best POS Systems For Grocery Stores

To find the best grocery store POS systems, we at Merchant Maverick reviewed over 15 industry-leading and newer POS systems based on pricing, hardware costs, user-friendliness, inventory management capabilities, and niche grocery store POS features/add-ons such as regulated item sales and food café management.

We read the fine print of POS provider contracts to find which POS software features cost extra, how long standard POS software contracts are for each provider, whether providers offer POS hardware warranties, and whether providers charge an early termination fee. We also found recent unincentivized reviews from actual grocery store owners on review platforms, including G2, Software Advice, and Capterra, and used these reviews as a ranking factor when rating POS systems from grocery stores.

Read more about how we rate POS software at Merchant Maverick.

In Summary: Choose The Best Grocery Store POS System

  1. Lightspeed Retail POS:
    • Best for specialty stores and co-ops focused on retail item sales.
    • Excellent inventory/vendor management, membership and subscription sales, wholesale accounts
    • $89+/month ($69+/month with annual billing)
  2. Square For Retail:
    • Best for small grocers looking for a free all-in-one POS system
    • Free POS software, free online store builder, and excellent mobile sales option
    • $0-$60/month/location
  3. Clover POS:
    • Best for training employees quickly
    • Easy to train cashiers and stockers, has lots of POS hardware options, and a built-in loyalty program
    • $44.95+/month
  4. Revel POS Systems:
    • Best for midsize and larger grocery stores that also offer food services
    • Retail and restaurant POS in one software plan, built-in purchase ordering/receiving, EBT, and regulated item sales
    • $198+/month
  5. POS Nation:
    • Best for grocery stores that also sell regulated items
    • Lottery sales and payouts from POS system, alcohol/cigarette-specific inventory management, and loss prevention features
    • $149+/month
  6. IT Retail:
    • Best for supermarket and supermarket chain businesses
    • Custom department/section settings, employee theft monitoring, EBT/eWIC certified POS
    • $199+/month
Nicolette Kier

Nicolette Kier

Expert Analyst & Reviewer
As a small business owner, contributing writer Nicolette Kier has been sharing her knowledge on all things related to freelancing and eCommerce since 2019. She earned a BS in Physics and a BA in Creative Writing from the University of Pittsburgh.
Nicolette Kier
View Nicolette Kier's professional experience on LinkedIn.

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The vendors that appear on this list were chosen by subject matter experts on the basis of product quality, wide usage and availability, and positive reputation.

Merchant Maverick’s ratings are editorial in nature, and are not aggregated from user reviews. Each staff reviewer at Merchant Maverick is a subject matter expert with experience researching, testing, and evaluating small business software and services. The rating of this company or service is based on the author’s expert opinion and analysis of the product, and assessed and seconded by another subject matter expert on staff before publication. Merchant Maverick’s ratings are not influenced by affiliate partnerships.

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