Written by Dan Barraclough Reviewed by Ruairi Shirlow Updated on 29 September 2021 On this page What Are Square’s Features and Benefits? Square POS for Retail Review Square POS for Restaurants Review How Much Does a Square POS System Cost? Is Square Right for my Business? What do Square’s Customer Reviews say? How We Reviewed Square POS Expert Verdict Expand The Square POS system is known for its low price point, but is it right for your business? Pros Software is free to use with no setup or monthly fees Ideal for start-ups and small businesses Retail and restaurant-tailored packages Cons Relatively high credit card transaction fees Higher fees incurred for large businesses Founded in 2009, Square has become a sturdy building block for many retail and restaurant businesses. Should your business join that crowd? Well, we guarantee that we’ll help you decide today.In this review, we’ll take a look at each corner of Square’s POS system, examining its features, benefits, pricing, and different packages. You can trust our advice, too – we’ve got a decade’s worth of experience researching and recommending the best POS systems for businesses like yours.Spoiler alert: We like Square. We’d recommend it to start-ups and small businesses looking for an affordable way to get their foot in the payment-taking door. For more detail, just keep reading… What Are Square’s Features and Benefits?What makes the Square POS system so popular? It all comes down to its range of features and benefits, which we explain below…✓ Zero setup or monthly feesYou don’t need to pay any setup or monthly fees to use Square’s POS system. Instead, you simply pay per transaction – typically 2.6% plus 10 cents per tap, insert, or swipe. We’ll discuss the pricing in more detail later, but you can already see how paying zero monthly fees could give you greater flexibility and fewer overheads to help to get your profits up and running.✓ Operates in offline modeThe ability to take payments in offline mode – i.e. without an internet connection – is ideal for businesses that need to operate in areas with poor coverage, such as amusement parks, festivals, or remote areas of Canada. Offline mode also allows you to keep your business ticking along if you suffer an unexpected internet failure in your building.✓ Integrates with third-party appsThe Square POS system has plenty of built-in features, but you can install third-party apps to bolster your business even further. Some of the most popular apps include website builders Wix and GoDaddy, and accountancy software Xero. But be warned – installing multiple apps can see your monthly costs rise quickly.✓ Accepts a wide range of paymentsSquare wouldn’t be one of our top rated retail POS systems if it didn’t accept a variety of payment methods. With your Square POS system, you can accept Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Google Pay, Apple Pay, rewards cards, and e-gift cards. You can also send custom invoices straight from your POS system on your smartphone, via the Square app, direct to your customers’ email inbox. Save by Comparing POS Quotes Do you already use a POS system? Yes No Square POS for Retail Review The retail-optimized version of Square enables you to manage your inventory, sell instore and online, and communicate with your customers to encourage repeat purchases. Whether you’re after a full system with all the hardware like iPad stands, or a simplified system with just a mini card reader for your pop-up shop, Square should have something for you. Top featuresRing up your salesCreate customer filesReceive purchase ordersScan in new inventoryPrint barcodesExtract margin reportsCreate staff accounts to see who’s selling what ▶ Read more: Square vs Zettle Square POS for Retail Review Square’s Restaurant POS enables you to take control of, and seamlessly integrate, your restaurant’s front and back of house. The system is loaded with features designed to make daily restaurant life a little easier, including the ability to take orders at the table, check stock, and manage staff hours. Top featuresInsert your table layout, then manage your covers on the goInput all your menus into the systemKeep the kitchen in sync with order changesTrack sales, covers and your customersFind out which dishes are popular How Much Does a Square POS System Cost?The pricing for Square’s Retail and Restaurant packages are the same, but you’ll get access to the industry-specific features we mention in the previous section, depending on which you choose. Both packages are available in three different pricing tiers:PlanCostTransaction feesFree$02.6% + 10¢ (in person)2.9% + 30¢ (online)Plus$60/month/location2.5% + 10¢ (in person)2.9% + 30¢ (online)PremiumCustom if you process more than $250k per yearCustom when you contact Square’s sales teamSquare Hardware CostsSquare Register – $799Square Stand (2nd gen) and Reader – $169 (iPad not included) Save by Comparing POS Quotes Do you already use a POS system? Yes No Is Square Right for my Business?Welcome to our Square-specific Q&A. Here, we’ll lay out some common questions or scenarios and answer them as fairly and accurately as possible – all to help you decide whether Square’s POS system shapes up for your business.“My pop-up store frequently moves around Canada”Square offers compact hardware that can be easily moved around, and set up anywhere around the country. It also works in offline mode, meaning you can take payments from your pop-up store even if there’s poor (or non-existent) internet coverage.“Does Square have low processing fees?”The main downside to Square’s POS system is that it imposes relatively high transaction and processing fees. However, there aren’t any extra overheads to worry about, such as monthly or setup costs, which makes your accountancy tasks a little easier.“I’ve just opened a local coffee shop”We Canadians love coffee, and we at Expert Market rate Square as one of the best POS systems for coffee shops. With no monthly or setup fees, you can get your coffee store up and running more quickly, and the Square POS system itself offers features like advanced analytics to help you track staff hours. It also offers CRM (customer relationship management) features to help you communicate with your coffee-loving customers. What do Square’s Customer Reviews say?We searched online for the latest customer reviews, giving you a customer’s insight into how Square’s POS system performs in real life. The reviews are mainly positive, though some customers describe how Square’s features could be more customizable:“Square POS has been a great asset. It’s allowed us to take card payments – not only in person when we run an estate sale, but also over the phone for clients who wish to pay their invoices with a card versus a check. The option of a text or email receipt is also very helpful for those who want proof of purchase when we don’t have a printer onsite.”Athena, Square POS customer“Switching from a POS company that requires a lot of training, I don’t have a lot of bad things to say about Square’s POS, other than the existing equipment they told us we could reuse hasn’t necessarily been easy to reuse. Also, you are not able to get as granular in customizing some features as other softwares.”Jacob, Square POS customer“Very easy to use and Square is good about depositing money into my bank account. It is easy to train someone in how to use it and it is very portable. It is also easy to use online.”Kenneth, Square POS customer How We Reviewed Square POSThe Expert Market team tested and assessed 20 different POS systems to bring you this list. We spend 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 businesses, broken down into up to 12 subcategories, in order to get 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.The score of each of these areas was combined to create an overall score for each of the different types of POS systems. Expert VerdictNow that we’ve rounded off our Square POS system review, it’s time for a recap. Square’s affordable, user-friendly, and offers plenty of features to help you run your retail or restaurant business.The transaction fees are relatively high, and you’ll need to consider the extra costs that come with installing third-party apps, but we still strongly recommend Square for start-ups and small businesses.If you’d like to get in touch with Canada’s leading POS companies and receive bespoke quotes, we can help you bridge the gap. Simply use our free comparison tool (it only takes a minute), and we’ll match you with the right POS companies, who’ll be in touch to offer you more information and no-obligation quotes. Written by: Dan Barraclough Dan’s a Senior Writer at Expert Market, specialising in digital marketing, web design, and photocopiers, amongst other topics. Reviewed by: Ruairi Shirlow Business Services Researcher Ruairi uses his 3+ years of research experience to uncover insights which can help Expert Market provide the best business solutions for their users. He has done this by meeting with business owners to find out what is important to them and what challenges they face on a daily basis. Ruairi specialises in tools that can be used to grow your business and has done research for a wide range of categories on Expert Market, such as EPOS, Website Builders, and Merchant Accounts.