Choosing the best POS system for small businesses helps to process transactions more quickly and streamline daily operation workflow in real time effectively. Therefore, more and more small business owners use POS to stay competitive in the digital age, simplify store tasks, and deliver better customer experiences.
Statista’s 2022 statistics revealed that the POS system market size can reach 42.5 billion U.S. dollars by 2027. Choosing a best-fit point of sale system can be a daunting and challenging task for retailers as there’re many options in the market. Our experts researched and read customer reviews, and compared, and shortlisted the 6 best POS systems for small businesses based on their simplicity, features, pricing, and rating.
6 selected POS for small business in 2024
- Magestore: Best for small to medium sized businesses, omnichannel selling, and integration
- Square: Best POS software for start-up businesses
- Shopify: Best for eCommerce retailers
- Clover: Best retail POS for brick-and-mortar business
- Toast: Best POS system for restaurant
- Lightspeed Retail: Best for inventory management feature
Key takeaway of 6 best POS for small business
Magestore | Square | Shopify | Clover | Toast | Lightspeed Retail | |
Industries | Retail | Retail | Retail | Retail | Restaurants | Retail |
Pricing plan | Custom pricing on demands with $0 processing fees | Start with 2.6% + 10 cents/transaction | Start with $65/month | Custom pricing, 2.3% + 10 cents per transaction | Start with $69/month | $139/month with basic features |
Free trial | Available live demo & 90-day refund policy | 30 days for paid plans and add-ons | Free within 3 days, 3 next months with $1/month | No free trial | No free trial, free demo with higher plans | Free trial |
eCommerce POS integration | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | No (require third-party) | ✓ | ✓ |
Payment processing | Third-party only | Built-in only | Built-in or third-party | Third-party only | Built-in only | Built-in or third-party |
Customer reviews | 4.5 on Trustpilot
| 4.3 on Trustpilot
| 4.3 on Trustpilot
| 3.9 on Trustpilot
| 3.8 on Trustpilot
| 4.7 on Trustpilot
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The overall score is based on features, ease of use, and affordable price.
1. Magestore POS: Best POS system for omnichannel selling & integration
Magestore was founded in 2009 and has served more than 10,000 retailers globally, offering both Magento POS and a POS system for Shopify. The leading industries using Magestore solution include fashion, sports, outdoor, hobby and toys, home appliances, furniture, food, and beverage.
For small businesses that need a simple POS, Magestore can provide the best-fit solution with all integral features to start selling online and in-store. Compared with SaaS solutions that charge monthly fees, choosing Magestore POS is smarter and cheaper point of sale choice because you can use it for lifetime without any hidden fees such as implementation and transaction.
Magestore POS is also a perfect choice for medium businesses that want to expand online to offline, drive sales, and maintain smooth retail operations with an omnichannel strategy. When you intend to scale up your business in the future, you can request for customizable solution to meet your higher business needs. It extends the power of Magento to your brick-and-mortar stores, streamlines your business, and delivers a better customer experience.
Notable features of this retail Magestore POS include:
- Work well on all browsers
- Interface is responsive to different devices
- Sync data in real time to track performances effectively
- Accept all popular payment methods
- Manage orders of online websites and offline stores right on the POS screen
- Provide store pickup and curbside pickup, give your customers more shopping choices
- Offer offline mode for uninterrupted retail operations with unstable internet
- Sync and run loyalty programs including promotions, rewards points, gift cards, and credits both live and offline
- Visualize real-time POS reports on sales, inventory, and employee performance
- Manage multiple stores and warehouses effortlessly in one place
- Seamlessly integrate with other extensions and software, support you with integration to streamline data smoothly
In addition, Magestore also provides Operation Service to maintain the system and ensure your POS and website are continuously operating stably with the highest performance. As a result, store owners can focus on growing business.
Pros
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Pricing Magestore POS for Magento: |
2. Square: Best POS software for start-up businesses
Square is a payment service company based in California, USA. Entering the POS market is a big step for Square to compete with other financial competitors. Square is top selected overall POS system for small business because of its price point and ease of use with options designed for general-purpose, retail, restaurants, and appointment-based businesses. In addition, each option has a free plan that includes unlimited sales and products on the online store. This is a reason many start up retailers choose Square low cost POS system to develop their stores.
However, it will not a right choice for retailers having further insights about business growth because when you have more sales, more transactions in the future, you will pay more fees for each transaction. When you scale up your store, Free plan’s basic features can’t meet your business needs anymore. As a result, you must choose to upgrade the system with so high fee each month. It is a financial mathematics that not all retailers are wise to think about right on the very first steps.
Here are some outstanding features of Square POS:
- Work great on phones, Android devices, or iPads
- Accept contactless payments
- Have no interruption of payment when your internet is lost
- Connect with Square hardware (cash drawers, receipt printers, and scales)
- Provide curbside pickup
- Come with inventory management and loyalty program for higher pricing package
Pros
| Cons
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Pricing Although Square POS is free, you need to pay a payment processing fee for each transaction (2.6% + 10¢ per tap, swipe, and dip). Consider this because your business will grow up and you must proceed more sales and transactions in the future. |
3. Shopify: Best POS for eCommerce retailers
Shopify is an eCommerce platform company of the same name, based in Ontario, Canada. Shopify POS was released in 2013, helping their retailers run both physical and online retail stores on their Shopify platform. Shopify POS is the perfect choice for small and medium businesses in any industry. It comes with free plan for POS software to sell on the go or at events with limited features. Shopify plans all store sales, inventory, and customer data in one place, making it the best choice for sellers using Shopify as an eCommerce platform. The features this POS offers include:
- Provide in-store or curbside pickup and local delivery for social distance during COVID-19
- Manage inventory across all channels
- Include mobile POS application to help staff flexibly serve customers anywhere in the store
- Provide store performance and reporting via Shopify POS mobile app
Pros
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Pricing The cost that retailers pay depends on the POS and Shopify plans you use.
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4. Clover POS: Best retail POS for brick-and-mortar business
Clover POS is another versatile point of sale for small businesses with basic demands. It has user-friendly design and diverse hardware options to choose from. However, retailers who sell both online and offline need to consider its highers processing fees and connectivity dependencies. Below are all features that the Clover POS with highest pricing plan provides:
- Process payments and manage order
- Offer diverse hardware such as countertop, mobile, and handheld devices for business needs
- Allow inventory tracking and get real-time updates to streamline stock control
- Function as a CRM tool to manage customer information, loyalty programs and purchase history
Pros
| Cons
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Pricing In terms of pricing, there are 3 plans: Starter, standard, and Advanced depending on the service you use. See their pricing plan to know what features are included in the price package.
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5. Toast: Best restaurant POS system
If you are looking for an inexpensive POS for restaurant, Toast is a good choice that you cannot miss out on. It is one of the best restaurant POS software specifically designed for food service and industry-specific hardware. With Toast’s wired-connected terminals, you’ll no longer worry about Wi-fi and internet connection drops. Most importantly, Toast has some of the best customer service with a thorough onboarding and training process that guides you through every setup step, and it doesn’t end there. Even after you’re up and running, Toast customer support is available 24/7/365 via chat, email, or call. Therefore, it becomes the best POS system for most restaurants. Outstanding features of Toast POS include:
- Offer contactless solutions, including mobile ordering and payments, mobile and touch wallets, and QR codes
- Enable table-side ordering and payment with portable, pocket-sized terminals
- Map and manage tables, collect real-time customer feedback
- Send tickets to kitchen screens and order notifications automatically
- Provide detailed menu management with ingredient level tracking, recipe costs, waste and COGS reports, payroll management, sales data, and performance
- Integrate with online ordering and delivery
- Come with automated payroll and recruiting features, including HR paperwork, employee scheduling, in-depth labor reporting
Pros
| Cons
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Pricing Toast POS software fees are $0–340 monthly for one machine, and payment processing fees vary by plan. Quick Start Bundle: $0/month basic POS & hardware setup including one terminal, additional fees for subsequent devices Core: $69/month POS solution with reporting & mobile dinning, and chosen hardware setup Growth: $165/month bundle POS with online ordering and delivery software You’ll need additional subscriptions as the number of POSs in the store increases. |
6. Lightspeed Retail: Best for inventory management feature
Lightspeed is another competitive retail POS system provider based in Canada. The Lightspeed POS app for small business focuses on many retail industries such as groceries, toys, and hobbies with small to medium scale. This is a multi-platform POS system, so it becomes a prior choice for many eCommerce retailers.
However, sometimes merchants will come across with real-time sales and inventory data interruptions because the system is not native with a specifical platform. That is reason why you should consider the factor “native” when choosing a best POS solution for your business. Similarly, you need consider the total fees for a long term because this POS also charge your monthly fee. Lightspeed POS includes the following salient features:
- Manage orders and inventory
- Accept all popular payment methods
- Integrate customer retention features such as membership fees and rewards
- Create and manage store pickup orders
- Provide inventory tracking and vendor management portal right on POS
- Offer 50 built-in retail reports on sales, inventory, and employee performance
Pros
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Pricing There are 5 POS plans priced from $69 per month. If you open more points of sale, you have to pay an additional $29 per month per location. |
What is the best software for small retail business?
Those are the 6 best POS systems for small business that we would like to recommend to you. We understand that it’s never easy to decide which POS is suitable for your business. However, remember, the best POS combines ease of use and an affordable price.
- Square POS and Magestore POS both have POS versions for small business. Their core features are powerful enough so you don’t need optional add-ons to build a retail POS system. If you choose to include inventory management, loyalty programs, and employee management, Magestore POS is your best choice because you will only pay once for lifetime with full features without extra fees. While Square POS is the best choice for start-up business with very basic features, you need to pay transaction fees per month and extra fees for upgrade your POS with many necessary features in the near future.
- Square can’t handle the complex problems of multi-location retailers, high-volume omnichannel sellers, and businesses with large amounts of complex inventory. In that case, you should consider Magestore system, LightSpeed Retail, or Shopify.
- Also, if you want to integrate your POS with other software such as ERP, accounting, payment, and shipment, Magestore might be a good POS choice for you.
- If you are looking for a restaurant POS with many complicated features, consider LightSpeed and Toast POS.
You might be interested in:
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7 Best POS Systems for QuickBooks Integration in 2023
Now that you will have your own selection, connect with our experts to craft your best-fit POS solution today!
Why should you trust Magestore?
This list of best point of sale software for small business is compared and evaluated by the Magestore team who have been working in the POS retail industry for over 15 years. We carefully researched and read all reviews from customers on review sites and eCommerce marketplaces to bring out insightful comparisons between POS systems for small businesses. We understand what challenges merchants are facing and what becomes their concerns when they start selling both online and offline. We also listen to many of our customers’ sharings to understand all demands of a small retail business.
These reviews are based on many factors including features, pricing plan, processing and transaction fees, rating, and customers’ real experiences. Before the article is published, our reliable proofreaders revised and updated properly to help readers make informed decisions.
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