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Our top POS system for takeaways is Lightspeed, closely followed by TouchBistro and Square.
In order for your takeaway business to deliver success, you’ll need to serve customers quickly while producing delicious food and drinks… but you already knew that. It’s the best takeaway POS systems that can really help take your business to the next level.
You don’t need to scroll around online because we’ve done all the research for you. We’ve selected the six best takeaway POS systems in Canada, based on factors such as pricing, ease of use, features, and more. Please note all prices are in USD unless otherwise stated.
Here’s a quick overview of our top picks:
| TouchBistro | Nobly POS | Hike | ||
| Price $119-$329/month | Price From $93/month | Price $0-$85/month | Price Bespoke | Price $49/month |
| Best For Driving repeat business and loyalty | Best For Easiest hospitality POS system to operate | Best For Best for scaling and growing your business | Best For Customer support | Best For Processing orders quickly |
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Lightspeed
Lightspeed’s POS enables you to open tabs and create combos for your most popular items, to help speed up the queue at the bar. It also comes with a self-order menu option and tableside ordering features for your seated customers.
Its reporting features could be stronger – there's no previous year comparison on the dashboard, for example – but that’s about all we didn’t like about Lightspeed.
Lightspeed's Direct Order Mode is perfect in a takeaway, so you can take orders and payments quickly and efficiently. It's intuitive interface makes it simple to use, even for those who are not super tech-savvy. Delivery and contactless online ordering can be integrated into the system, diversifying your revenue and expanding your takeaways reach.
There is a 14-day free trial period, and the software pricing starts at $69 per month, which is about the average for the best POS systems.
Very easy to use and ideal for busy bars or restaurants
Powerful and scalable solution
No live chat support
| Package | Price |
|---|---|
| Lean | $69 |
| Standard | $119 |
| Advanced | $199 |
TouchBistro
Treat your customers how you would your food – that’s one of the many recipes for success in the food industry. TouchBistro knows this.
TouchBistro comes integrated with CRM (customer relationship management) software to help you promote exclusive offers and one-time deals to help your customers feel special and, most importantly, satisfied.
TouchBistro offers table management tools so your staff can provide your customers with a seamless service. The system is fast and intuitive making it suitable for providing quick and quality service.
TouchBistro scores highly in our research for help and support, so you can be sure that you won't be left hanging if you run into any snags.
You can add on features such as marketing although this comes at an extra cost. If you plan to expand in the future, this POS system will allow you to scale as your business grows.
Fantastic for fostering customer loyalty
Excellent staff and inventory management
Offers a free trial period
Pricing plan is based on the number of users, making it more expensive for larger businesses
Only compatible with iPads and Apple computers
Square
Looking to get your finances in better shape? Then we’d recommend trying Square and its free software. Square is one of the best small business point of sale due to its affordability.
You do pay a percentage per transaction (at least 2.6%), one-off fees for your hardware, and monthly fees for add-ons such as Square Loyalty ($25 per month), but you can’t really argue with the initial cost.
As far as takeaway POS features go, we particularly like Square’s customisable menus, per-item sales tracking, and reporting tools.
Square scores highly in our research and offers tons of great features for your takeaway. It's Square for Restaurants POS system starts at $60 per month but it isn't necessary to opt for the paid version for a takeaway. You can still access tons of great POS features, take orders and process payments with the free version.
Some Square for Restaurants features include adding advanced discounts and bulk additions to menus.
The hardware that comes alongside the software such as a card reader and stand are affordable so you don't have to fork out thousands just to set up a POS system. Square is cloud-based and will run on any iPad or iPhone that has a Lightning port and runs iOS 10.0.2 or later.
Free to install
24/7 customer support
Brilliant analytics tools
2.75% charge for non-card transactions
| Package | Price |
|---|---|
| Free | $0 |
| Restaurants | $60/month |
Nobly POS
With award-winning support to its name, Nobly was an easy choice for our top six takeaway POS suppliers. But that’s not the only reason why it made the cut.
Nobly POS and its Nobly Ordering app come with zero monthly or setup costs, charging 3% plus 20 cents per order instead.
We also found the Nobly Ordering dashboard was packed full of features (it might seem overwhelming at first if you’re a tech beginner, though), enabling you to track revenue, new customer details, and your overall performance.
Nobly includes full inventory management tools so you can easily track inventory levels, ensuring you never run out. Stock checks and inventory updates can happen with just a few clicks. The system produces sales reports so you can make accurate decisions about your takeaway.
Nobly integrates with accounting and management tools to consolidate your processes. Integrations include Quick books, Xero and Deputy.
Award-winning customer support
Loyalty and gift card schemes available
Very affordable
Dashboard might be too sophisticated for tech beginners
Hike
Catering specifically to online takeaway businesses, Hike believes it can help you hike up your sales using its simple-to-use, feature-heavy POS software. After our research, we don’t disagree.
With Hike, you can accept all the leading payment processors including PayPal, Tyro, and iZettle, plus accept gift cards and loyalty point payments. We found the interface really intuitive, with your real-time sales figures available within a few taps of the screen.
Hike works on any iPad, PC and Mac making it versatile software and ensuring you and your staff aren't limited to behind the counter, chunky hardware. The software also works offline so you can continue serving even if the internet goes down.
Hike integrates with tons of apps such as Xero, QuickBooks, and Mailchimp.
Very customisable
Ideal for pop-up takeaway stalls with long queues
Excellent reporting and analytics
Customer support options could be better
The Benefits of Takeaway POS Systems
The takeaway industry is taking over. Hungry consumers are turning to their food delivery apps now more than ever before, and dropping the high street chain sandwich for independent takeaway stalls.
Investing in the right takeaway or the best restaurant POS system, or upgrading your existing one, can help your business exploit that growth and maximise profits. Here are just some of the ways a POS system can help your takeaway business:
✔ Quickly process orders to keep customers happy and maximise sales
✔ Boost efficiency by sending orders immediately to the kitchen
✔ Reach new customers by integrating with delivery apps such as Deliveroo and UberEats
✔ Create customer loyalty schemes to encourage repeat purchases
✔ View real-time reports to help you make quick improvements
✔ Access inventory management reports to help you restock efficiently
▶ Read more: Retail POS systems
Now that you know the best POS system for your business, it’s time to get things cooking. By that, we mean getting an exact price for your new POS system from a trusted supplier.
Think of Expert Market like a takeaway business – except swap the burrito for quick, easy, and free quotes from trusted POS suppliers.
So, simply tell us what you’d like from your next POS system on our menu (it only takes a minute), and we’ll find POS suppliers that best suit your tastes and requirements.
Those suppliers will then be in touch with more juicy information, and no-obligation quotes for you to compare. Remember, you won’t need to spend a dollar until you’re totally happy with what’s on the table.
How We Tested the Best POS Systems for Takeaways
The Expert Market team rigorously assessed and tested 15 different POS systems to bring you this list. In total, we spent around 160 hours researching POS platforms, and over 20 hours testing them.
During that time, we used our learnings to evaluate how each POS system fared in six categories that are important to hospitality businesses, broken down into up to 12 subcategories, in order to award an impartial ranking. Here’s what we looked at:
- POS software: The breadth of features included in the POS software, and how valuable they are to the average business, including inventory management, menu/product creation, customer engagement tools, and table management.
- Hardware/equipment: The variety of equipment available to purchase or rent, with special importance given to key items, such as physical terminals, customer displays, and accessories.
- Ease-of-use: How easy each system is to use, based on feedback from several average users who were assigned basic tasks to complete on each system, such as menu/item creation, accessing reports, or applying a discount.
- Help and support: How effective and reachable the customer support teams are, with bonus points given to POS systems with help centers and training modes.
- Costs: The price of the system, how it compares to competitors, and whether it's good value for money.
- User experience: Whether everyday users know and like the system, whether they’d recommend it, and what they say about it in online reviews.
We gave each POS system a score in each of the above testing and research categories and combined them to produce an overall score, which was used to rank them.
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