Toast POS vs Lightspeed Restaurant Comparison

We love how easy toast is to use in our restaurant. Its easy to navigate.

I least like that in the catering/events that a client cannot pay a deposit with a credit card.

Hi Tammy! Carrisa here with Toast. Thank you for leaving us a review and sharing your experience using Toast. If you haven't already, we encourage you to join us at community.toasttab.com to connect with other industry leaders.

What we like the most about the software is the constant upgrade, how easy it is to use, the back office is fantastic!! We had Micros before we switched to Toast and it's like we came out of the dark age and into the modern world!

Honestly not much we don't like.....maybe that SOMETIMES it lags. We don't experience that too often but it does happen from time to time.

I was hired to help customize, train, and implement this new software at a friends restaurant. I have worked with a few different POS systems and this was by far the most user friendly. Easy to customize their menus and check preferences. Easy to update if we figured out how we originally entered in an item needed to be changed. Cloud based so when not on sight I was able to fix remotely when not at the restaurant. Also the handheld option is great for taking orders and splitting checks on the fly. Also were able to implement gift cards with the new system.

No real cons. The only downside was the initial few days after switching for the staff to get used to it.

Hi Rachel, Mora from Toast here. We're thrilled to hear that you've found Toast simple to teach and easy to update. Thanks for the review!

Easy to teach and edit POS that is specific to the restaurant industry.

I would have liked to seen it have an employee schedule system integrated into the POS. Not just a simple time clock.

Hi Jennifer- Jasmine from Toast here. I'm happy to hear you find our POS system reliable and user friendly! We do have integrated employee scheduling partners. For more information on our existing labor scheduling partners, visit pos.toasttab.com/integrations or reach out to your Restaurant Success Manager/Toast Support.

Robust and Versatile POS for full service restaurant. Perfect for full service restaurant. it does have some minor hiccups. Probably the best POS on the market. Integrates well w/ Open Table. Good support w/ little wait time most time.

Toast offers many useful integration except One major NO NO Add-on is Toast Payroll - it's a disaster. totally user unfriendly. clumsy, many non-sense system questions that cause confusion, lack of even the simplest and most basic yet required reporting. Even it's nice to have the time cards get carried over automatically, you would be better off using 3rd party time management and payroll app.

Hi Charles, we appreciate your review. We'll be sure to pass along your feedback to our team. - Carrisa

Intuitive functionality. Design. Reporting.

Cost is a bit higher than others.

The intergration and support is great. The terminal are a great feature

gets pricey with addons. Wish the hand held were least of had longer support.

Toast is great for restaurants. I have used this and thoroughly enjoyed it. The handheld feature is the best.

Toast does not accept Apple pay. While this is not a big deal, it is something that is new with the times.

The suite of features in the software make it easy to integrate into almost any restaurant environment. They have an excellent team to get you started and help you design your system to your specs. Email marketing and loyalty program have been great for us.

I am not very happy with the fact that we were forced to take on Toast as our payment processor! This is costing us way more in fees than my original "Interchange Plus" processing that I had through my bank. This is a little disconcerting and could add up to some major dollars in expense!

L working with many payroll systems over the years, this system is by far the best! The amount of features and levels are extensive. As I go through Toast, I learn more everyday the capabilities available.

I would like to see a more set procedure for private events and private dinning for the restaurant.

The interface is easily customize-able on the fly which is a necessity in a fast paced restaurant.

Would prefer if there was an option to have "speed screens" or better functionality specifically for bartenders.

Fast, easy to use, mobile friendly, great support when needed, one of the best for restaurants I've seen.

Sometimes to synch the mobile with the brain would take sometime and that was a bit annoying

Hi Lucas, Thanks for leaving us a review! We appreciate you taking the time to share your feedback. If you haven't already, we encourage you to join our Toast Community at community.toasttab.com to connect with other Toast restauranteurs. Hope to see you there.

On line, up to date on a real time basis of all that is happening in the restaurant.

Some ordering information is hard to customize on a day to day basis. Have ad some outages that cause havoc in operations and cash collection.

I do not like it and if I owned my own restaurant I will not use TOAST nor recommend it.

It is not easy to use nor to maneuver - just not a end user friendly

Hi Marina, thanks for the review. We appreciate your feedback and always looking for ways to make improvements.

Ease of inserting new items. The ability to modify on the fly. The ability to customize it to the restaurant

Not being able to pull an order back to the active screen if it was accidentally fulfilled before the order was up.

The ability to customize what our restaurant seating chart looks like is my favorite part. There are no guessing table numbers!

As of now, I have no cons about Toast POS. Toast has served its purpose and continues to be a great software for my needs.

Thanks for the great review, Danielle!

I loved a lot of the features of this software but my favorite was the user interface. It was so sleek and modern and very straightforward to use. Lots of great features to make transactions go smooth.

I was frustrated that it is more suited for just restaurant use as I really wanted it to work for my business.

Ease of use is the biggest pro for Toast. From initial training through menu editing and reporting, everything is very intuitive and easy to understand. I can hand a new server a tablet and they can input an order without any help, right from day 1.

Right now it is not pizza based. It works, and works well in our restaurant, but things like changing the size of a pizza are not possible right now. I hear it is in the works though.

The cost is unbeatable for a start up restaurant. Their support team does a great job when you call for help.

After working for a major chain I would like to see more functionality from the system.

It's ease of use and how simple it is to customize it to our restaurant. Also, great customer support if help is needed.

I wish the clock in/clock out functions were easier to integrate to our payroll company. Also, I wish the exporting spreadsheet for payroll was more customizable.

TOAST is a solid point of sale system available for a very reasonable price. Adding, editing and removing menu items can be done quickly and remotely. Printer routing and other back of house set up is a breeze. Customer service staff is well trained and very reliable.

Not really designed for large scale/ high volume operations. KDS screens have some issues.

Toast POS work fine with my restaurant and the price is reasonable, I think it easy to use when you use it a lot

there is no continuous support, and the user interface is old, and it requires training at the beginning. i think they can do a lot more on user interface and user experience design

Hi Hassan, Jasmine here from Toast. I’m happy to see that our POS is working well for your restaurant and is easy to use. We do offer support - you can call (617) 682-0225, or log on to Toast Central to chat with them live if you’re having trouble getting through on the phone. Regarding the interface, we are continuously improving our user experience to fit the needs of all of our customers and appreciate your feedback.

The hardware and quick editing make this an efficient method for restaurant server and mod use. The screens are easy to edit as well.

The customer support is TERRIBLE. We were even given wrong information from the trainer before we started using the software. We are often on hold for extended periods with no response and the majority of our help tickets go unanswered. All of our credit card machines have malfunctioned in the three months that we have had the program. The tablets are also not spill proof and have glass screens making it incredibly restaurant unfriendly. The reporting is thorough but has consistent flaws and bugs. Editing checks in difficult and many basic management tools require multiple steps.

It's simple and straight-forward. You make a change, hit Publish and see your changes instantly on the tablets. I love how easy it is to colorize menus. Servers make fewer mistakes because I color buttons to match the food/drinks. Customer orders red wine --> Hit the RED button.

I really have no trouble with the software. Sometimes support can be a bit slow on advanced issues.

I like the way the screen looks - it’s visually appealing. I’ve only used it briefly at a restaurant as a hostess, but it worked just fine.

I don’t have any complaints about this software.

Quick response from back office support, good help in setting up parameters and order options, easy to program remotely

only basic functionality unless you upgrade, probably needs further testing and use to explore all of the options

Cheap. You can use your own payment getaway, your own devices and it is pretty easy to setup. Good user interface so it is easy to train someone.

Lack of integration and API. Needs improvement for some features. I doubt that it is designed for large environment.

This product, although still new, is getting better and better! The support team is always willing to help answer any questions and get anything you need done and as priority. The interface is easy to use, it is just different from other pos systems so there is a learning curve. So many cool updates just came out and I can't wait to use it when my seasonal restaurant is open again! Really great product and I love that you can suspend your service charges with them during the off season!

I wish there was a 2 POS payment option. my restaurant is small but one POS isn't enough! I think I will upgrade to the 3 ipad package but it would be nice to have a 2 ipad option!

It is critical as a POS system and useful for posting all needed journal entries.

Can be difficult to learn to use and impliment.

Most affordable option for POS on the market that is compatible with revenue Quebec and MEV machines.

Occasionally updates take a few minutes, otherwise we have very few issues in the last 4 years since we started using Lightspeed

Great POS system with a very user friendly app! Simply made it easy to look after my business :)

Not sure what to say. All is just good. That is all

Lightspeed is sleek, very professional look and feel. Although it does take a number of buttons to run through a transaction, it's definitely an upgrade to what he had prior. The loyalty program integration is amazing, as customers earn points on the spot without any manual entry.

Although not directly related to POS, their payment processing dose not allow partial refunds which causes us headaches at times.

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The user friendly back end and POS display are exceptional! Very easy to use, and very easy to keep updated!

Some reporting could be more details - a few items are tough to track!

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We liked the ease of use with this POS as well as the exceptional support that was provided throughout the setup.

Some of the reports that I was used to using were an extra charge in lightspeed, but otherwise no complaints.