POS systems compared: what 13 companies charge

We do not convert currencies. A page we could not read is marked could not read, a page that asks for a quote is marked quote only, and the reasons are listed below the table. Pages can show different prices to visitors in different countries. A price with no currency named is shown with the sign the page used; it may be the United States version or the one for the country the page assumed we were in, so check the page you are sent to.

• 2 of the 13 could not be read.
• 3 of the 11 we could read offer a free plan, and 5 offer a time-limited trial.

• Zeller POS: The software is free only if you take card payments through Zeller at 1.4%, and the terminal is a one-off purchase with no rental fee. The page prints two terminal prices, $99 and $199, without saying which is current.
• Shopify (Shopify POS): The page calls POS Pro, at $129 AUD a month per location billed yearly, the upgrade for retail locations, while casual in-person selling at pop-ups and events is included in every plan.
• Hike POS: Hardware is bought separately, one-off in AUD (Register $1,508, CounterTop $1,109, Handheld $625, HikePay Terminal $366, Reader $114).
• Lightspeed Restaurant: Hardware is an extra cost and card payment rates are not on the page. Extra registers (+$39 a month), kitchen screens (+$40 a month each), reservations (+$69) and gift cards (+$39) are monthly add-ons.
• Lightspeed Retail: the page does not say whether the AUD prices are the yearly or monthly rate, and extra locations, extra registers and onboarding services are priced separately with no amounts shown. Lightspeed Payments card-present rate is 1.5% on all three plans.
• Square for Restaurants: Hardware is bought separately, for example Terminal $329, Register $1,099, Handheld $349 and Reader $65.
• Retail Express: These are starting prices per location, each with one register, and extra registers are AU$19 a month each. Add-ons such as an ecommerce outlet, historical data access and a warehouse subscription carry extra fees with no amounts shown.
• Toast: The $0 Starter Kit has no monthly fee; its cost is recovered through card processing and hardware, and the system needs Toast's own hardware. Point of Sale is from $69 a month (the page also shows a payroll bundle at $69 a month plus $9 per employee).
• Bravo Store Systems: Only a starting price is given, with no plan names or limits, and the FAQ says to request a demo to get pricing for your store. The page does not say what the $99 covers or whether hardware is extra.

• Hardware. Terminals, printers and cash drawers are often extra, and some can only be bought from the vendor.
• Payments. Whether you must use the vendor's card processor, and at what rate.
• Whether the price is per register, per location or per user, and what a second till costs.
• Whether sales and stock share one number or sync later and disagree.

These pages did not give us a price we could read. That is a limit of how we read, not a sign that the company hides its prices.

• Counterpoint (NCR Voyix): its pricing page did not give us a price we could read.
• Epos Now: its pricing page did not give us a price we could read.

StockRoom's Sell screen records what went out of the door and takes it off the shelf. It is not a till: it takes no card payments, prints no receipts and does not run a counter. A cafe till with recipes is built and tested in our simulated cafe and is not inside the app yet.

See also: custom software, dashboards and what we charge.