Square for Restaurants Pricing 2026: Free vs Plus vs Premium

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Square for Restaurants has redefined what restaurants can get for free. The $0/month base plan includes features that cost $100–$200/month on competing platforms. But “free” isn’t the whole story — the paid Plus and Premium tiers unlock table management, advanced KDS, and operations tools that serious restaurants need. This guide breaks down exactly what you get at each tier, what each add-on costs, and how Square’s total cost compares to Toast at a $500K GMV restaurant.

Square for Restaurants: Plan Overview 2026

Square for Restaurants Free Plan: What’s Actually Included

The free plan is genuinely impressive for what you’d expect to pay. Here’s what’s included at $0/month:

• ✅ Unlimited items and modifiers
• ✅ Basic floor plan (up to 3 floor plans)
• ✅ Online ordering via Square Online (commission-free, no monthly fee for basic)
• ✅ Order management — table names, open tickets
• ✅ Basic reporting (daily summaries, top items)
• ✅ Employee management (clock-in/out, basic permissions)
• ✅ Digital receipts
• ✅ Offline mode
• ✅ Square Reader included (hardware additional)

The free plan is legitimately useful for food trucks, pop-up restaurants, cafes under $300K/year, and simple counter-service operations that don’t need table turns or complex floor management.

Free Plan Limitations

• ❌ No advanced floor plan management (seating capacity optimization)
• ❌ No course management (first course, apps, entrées, dessert coursing)
• ❌ Basic reporting only (no labor reports, no sales-by-employee detail)
• ❌ No live sales monitoring from back office
• ❌ No multi-location management

Square for Restaurants Plus Plan — $60/location/month

The Plus plan is where Square for Restaurants becomes a serious tool for full-service restaurants. The $60/month upgrade unlocks features that competing systems charge $150–$300/month for.

What Plus Adds Over Free

• Advanced floor plans: Multiple customizable floor plans, section assignment, server sections, visual table status (available, occupied, closing)
• Course management: Fire courses to kitchen separately — send apps immediately, hold entrées until guest is ready
• Advanced reporting: Labor cost reports, sales-by-hour, server performance reports, void/discount analysis
• Multi-location dashboard: Manage multiple restaurant locations from one login
• Auto-gratuity: Automatic gratuity on large parties — configurable by party size and percentage
• Seat management: Assign orders to specific seats for clean split-check management

Plus Plan: Additional Terminal Pricing

The Plus plan includes 1 terminal at the $60/location base fee. Additional terminals are $40/month each (vs. $60/month on the free plan). For a restaurant with 3 terminals (bar, host, server), that’s $60 + $40 + $40 = $140/month total.

Square for Restaurants Premium Plan — Custom Pricing

Premium is Square’s enterprise restaurant offering for groups with multiple locations, franchise operations, or restaurants requiring custom integrations. Pricing is negotiated with Square’s sales team.

Premium includes everything in Plus plus:

• Dedicated account management
• Custom API access and integrations
• Enterprise reporting across unlimited locations
• Custom processing rate negotiation
• Priority support with SLA commitments

Square Restaurant Add-Ons: Pricing

Square for Restaurants Hardware Pricing

Square vs Toast: 12-Month Cost at $500K GMV Restaurant

Full-service restaurant: $500K GMV/year, 15 employees, 3 terminals, 1 KDS, loyalty and payroll active.

Square saves approximately $1,850/year at $500K GMV vs. Toast Essentials. The gap is driven primarily by flat-rate loyalty ($540 vs $1,250) and free online ordering vs. Toast’s $900/year charge.

When Square for Restaurants Wins vs Toast

Choose Square if:

• You want to minimize monthly software costs — the free plan is genuinely powerful
• Online ordering is core to your business (it’s free on Square)
• You process less than $1M/year — flat-rate loyalty is significantly cheaper
• You’re an independent restaurant that values simplicity and self-service setup
• You need to be operational quickly without a complex onboarding process

Choose Toast if:

• You’re a multi-location chain where Toast’s restaurant-specific reporting adds operational value
• Your team is heavy in the front-of-house and needs tableside ordering via Toast handheld
• You need Toast’s dedicated restaurant support team
• Your volume exceeds $2M/year where negotiated processing rates may favor Toast

Get Square for Restaurants Pricing for Your Location

Square’s Plus plan at $60/month is one of the best values in restaurant POS — but the right system depends on your specific operation size, features, and volume. Get free quotes and compare your options.

Related Reading: For a complete comparison, see our guide to the Toast POS Review 2026: Is It the Best Restaurant POS?.