Home / Blog / When a restaurant outgrows the Square restaurant POS
Square is a good first POS for a cafe or a food truck. It is time to move when your riders work from WhatsApp, the card bill grows with every sale, a third site opens, or stock must be counted per add-on.
Anzul Aqeel · Founder & Director, Anunzio International FZC · 7 October 2026 · updated 16 October 2026
A restaurant has outgrown the Square restaurant POS when its own riders deliver from a WhatsApp group, when card fees start to hurt, when it opens a third site, or when stock has to be counted per add-on. Square is a good first POS for a counter. Here are four signs it is time to move, and what to look for next.
Square is a good first POS, and reviewers rate it the best free one for small counters. Fit Small Business scores the Square for Restaurants POS 3.83 of 5 and names it the best free restaurant POS, best for cafes, bakeries, food trucks, bars and quick-service counters. A Square cafe POS, a Square POS for bars and a Square POS system for food truck service are the same app, because the counter is where Square works best. The Square POS app on an iPad takes a card in seconds, and so does the Square Terminal for restaurants that want a card reader with its own screen. The free plan has no monthly fee, and a new owner can be selling the day the card reader arrives.
The money comes from processing. One review lists the Free plan at 2.6% + 15 cents in person and 3.3% + 30 cents online, with the paid Plus and Premium plans per location bringing the in-person rate down to 2.5% and 2.4%. Square takes card payments in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, Japan, France and Spain, and nowhere else. This article is for the restaurant that started on Square and is now asking what to use next.
The guides agree on the timing. Katalyst, a POS maker that sells a Square alternative, says operators who chose Square for its simplicity commonly outgrow it within 18 to 24 months, and puts the turning point at roughly $1.5M in annual volume or three locations. Here are four signs, three from reviews of Square and one from our own work with riders.
Your riders read their orders on WhatsApp. Square Online offers in-house delivery by your own staff, managed from the POS, or a DoorDash courier dispatched through Square where that network runs. What it does not do is send each order to your riders' WhatsApp group with the building, the unit number and a map pin. If that group is how your riders work, you have outgrown it.
The card bill grows with you. Square takes a percentage of every card sale, as the rates above show. Katalyst says restaurants with many card sales routinely save 15 to 20% by moving to interchange-plus pricing, a plan where the bank's fee and the processor's fee are shown separately. Where customers pay cash, or on your own bank's card machine at the door, a processing percentage on every sale is a cost you may not need at all.
You have three sites. Katalyst calls Square's multi-location reporting functional but light at three or more locations. GetMenu is not a chain's answer either. Each branch is its own account with its own menu and WhatsApp groups. GetMenu groups them on request, so one owner login sees every branch's sales side by side. If deeper head-office reporting is your sign, look at a system built for chains.
Stock goes beyond whole dishes. Square restaurant inventory counts items and their sizes, and one review notes that Square Recipes does not support batch prep and that modifiers do not reduce ingredient stock. If an add-on or a flavour needs its own count, so the last portion sells out on the page, at the tables and at the counter, you have outgrown Square's stock.
One thing is not a sign: how deep your choices go. Square's help centre says modifier sets nest up to 3 levels deep, with up to 5 child sets per modifier, with required and maximum picks. Three levels is plenty for most kitchens. GetMenu does not nest choices, so if your menu needs nested choices, Square does that better than GetMenu.
Use a courier network if you have no riders and your city has one. Use your own riders if they already work from a WhatsApp group. Your own riders also suit a city where buildings have names rather than numbers, and where the customer pays the rider in cash or on the card machine.
GetMenu is built for the second case. The customer picks their building from your list, types the unit number and can share a map pin. The moment the order is placed, your riders' WhatsApp group gets the dispatch: the building and unit number picked at checkout, the pin, the phone, and whether to collect cash or bring the card machine. The customer is told which rider is coming, and the rider closes the order with a single tap on the link in the dispatch. Phone orders typed in at the counter are sent to riders the same way, and the cashier can send a rider from the POS on WhatsApp. Customers can also choose collection and pick the order up themselves. GetMenu does not book outside couriers.
This table compares Square and GetMenu for a restaurant with its own riders and online orders. Square's column uses its own help centre, press pages and the reviews cited in this article; GetMenu's is how it works today. For the full product comparison, see Square POS and GetMenu compared.
| Square restaurant software | GetMenu | |
|---|---|---|
| Countries | United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, Japan, France, Spain | Any country; the restaurant picks its own currency at signup |
| Counter hardware | The Square POS app on iPad, Square Register and Square Terminal | The POS app on iPad, iPhone and Android you own, paired with a six-character code; ESC/POS and Star printers; any spare tablet as the kitchen screen |
| Card payments | Square processing on every card, with per-plan rates | Your own bank's card machine or cash, at the counter and on delivery; no online payment and no processing by GetMenu |
| Online ordering | Square Online | Your own ordering page at its own address, included in every plan, no commission |
| Delivery | In-house delivery by your own staff, or partner couriers dispatched through Square Online where the network runs | A WhatsApp dispatch to your own riders with building, unit, pin and phone, and a one-tap Delivered link |
| Choices | Modifier sets nested up to 3 levels, 5 child sets per modifier | Choice groups per dish, not nested, each required or optional, with a maximum number of picks and a price per choice |
| Stock | Counts per item and size; recipes with the limits one review notes | One stock list for the counter and the online menu, per dish and per choice, sold out at zero everywhere; recipes and suppliers for food cost |
| Several sites | Multi-location on one account | One account per branch; GetMenu groups them on request, and one owner login sees their sales side by side |
| Price shape | A free plan or a paid plan per location, plus processing on every card | A flat monthly plan in your currency with a 15-day trial and no card; the POS is a yearly add-on with no trial of its own |
Look for four things: payments you control, devices you already own, dispatch on WhatsApp, and one place for your menu and stock. Payments you control means cash and your own card machine, with the system recording which, and no percentage to anyone. Devices you already own means the iPad that ran Square runs the next system too. Dispatch on WhatsApp means the building and the pin are in your riders' message. One place for menu and stock means a sold-out dish shows as sold out on the page, at the tables and at the counter.
GetMenu's answers are those four. The GetMenu POS with online ordering runs on iPad, iPhone and Android, pairs with a six-character code from your dashboard and gives each staff member a four-digit PIN. It prints receipts and kitchen tickets on USB (on the LAN), network, Bluetooth and built-in printers, using ESC/POS or a Star printer, and the cash drawer opens through the receipt printer. Online and WhatsApp orders show on the POS screen beside counter sales. Counter, web and WhatsApp orders all print on the same kitchen ticket at each station. Every choice is printed in bold on the kitchen ticket, and the customer's note prints on it too, with an allergy note in bold red above the dishes. Every online order also sends a ticket to the managers' group.
Stock is one list for the counter and the online menu. Upload the whole menu from a spreadsheet instead of typing it, with choice groups in the same file. Counts fall as orders come in from the page, the tables and the counter. When you mark a dish None left on the POS, it comes off the other POS devices and the online menu too.
On the Growth and Pro plans, a guest at a table scans a QR code and orders with no address, because the table is the address. On every monthly plan, the customer can download the PDF invoice without logging in. On Pro, regulars grow into tiers with their own discounts, and the loyalty card keeps updating itself in Apple Wallet or Google Wallet. The plans are flat monthly prices on the pricing page, with a 15-day trial and no card. The POS is a yearly add-on with no trial of its own.
Export your item library from the Square dashboard as a spreadsheet and clean it: names, prices, categories and the choices in one line per dish. Start the GetMenu trial, which covers the plan with the online menu and the WhatsApp order messages. Upload the file and add photos to the twenty dishes that sell most. Link your WhatsApp number by scanning a QR code, pick the managers' and riders' groups, and import your building list with a fee per building. Then add the POS, a yearly add-on with no trial of its own, and pair the same iPad with the six-character code. ESC/POS and Star receipt printers keep working. Run a quiet service with both systems open for a week, let every staff member ring up ten sales on their own PIN, and cancel the old plan only after a full Friday has gone through.
Anzul Aqeel, the founder of GetMenu, spent four years reselling POS software before building his own. "Square is built for the counter. Once most of your orders come in on WhatsApp and the web, and your own riders take them out, you need a system built for that too."
For a cafe, a bakery, a food truck or a quick-service counter, yes, and reviewers rate it the best free restaurant POS for exactly those. It takes cards in seconds on an iPad or a Square Terminal with no monthly fee on the free plan. The fit weakens when your riders work from a WhatsApp group, when stock must be counted per add-on, and when processing fees start to matter.
Katalyst, which sells a Square alternative, puts it at 18 to 24 months for operators who chose Square for its simplicity, or around three locations. The practical signs are riders who are your own staff working from WhatsApp, a card bill you could avoid where customers pay cash or on your own machine, a third site, and stock that has to be counted per add-on or flavour. One sign is enough if it is costing you orders.
Yes, two ways. Square Online offers in-house delivery by your own staff, managed from the POS, or a partner courier such as DoorDash dispatched through Square where that network operates. It does not send the order to your riders' WhatsApp group. GetMenu does: your riders' group gets the building, unit, pin and phone the moment the order is placed. GetMenu books no outside couriers.
For a small counter with card payments, yes: there is no monthly fee and the cost is the processing rate on each sale, which is simple to understand. It stops being worth it when the processing percentage outgrows a flat plan, or when the counter is no longer where your sales come from. Work out a normal month both ways before you decide, and include the delivery orders.
Yes. An iPad on iOS 16 or later runs the GetMenu POS app, paired with a six-character code from your dashboard, and Android tablets and phones join it as extra counters, a kitchen screen or waiters' devices. Receipt and kitchen printers that use ESC/POS, and Star printers, keep printing, and the cash drawer opens through the receipt printer. The Square reader itself stays with Square.
Not as nested sets. Each dish carries choice groups, and each group can be required or optional, carry a maximum number of picks and give every choice its own price, with the server enforcing all of it on every order. For most menus that is the whole need. Choices with their own stock count are the part Square's modifiers do not do, and the part a sold-out add-on or flavour needs.
Square takes card payments in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia, Japan, France and Spain, according to Square's own help centre. Outside those, a restaurant cannot sign up, so the comparison is between systems sold in its own country and billed in its own currency. GetMenu runs in any country, bills in the restaurant's currency, and sends orders to riders on WhatsApp.
One system, four jobs: the counter, the tables, the kitchen and the online orders, with no commission on any of them. What a UK restaurant should ask of its EPOS, in UK terms, and what it should cost.
Toast is not sold in most countries. Here is what a restaurant elsewhere should check in any system it can buy: card payments, devices and how orders reach riders.
