6 Best POS System For Food Truck: A 101 Buying Guide

Are you looking for a POS system to manage your food truck operations seamlessly without breaking the bank? If so, you are in for a treat. In this blog post, we have tested and compiled a list of the 6 best POS system for food truck in terms of their respective features and value for money.

Without further ado, let’s dive in!

1. Summary of the best POS system for food truck

Name	Best for	Pricing range	Payment processing fees	Key features
Shopify POS	Omnichannel food trucks that do online selling with Shopify.	POS Lite comes free with all Shopify plans, from $25 – $399/month POS Pro costs $89/month per location	In-person: From 2.4% to 2.7% per transaction Online: From 2.4% to 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction	– Mobile-friendly design – Flexible ordering options – Powerful marketing features – Loyalty programs Stock transfer
Toast POS	High-volume food trucks that need flexible menu management features	Free plan available.  1 standard plan at $69/month Custom plan available.	Free plan: 2.99% + 15¢ per transaction  Paid plans:2.49% + 15¢ per transaction	– Customizable menu management – Offline mode – Food truck-friendly hardware – Integrated online ordering – Robust reporting and analytics
Square POS	Food trucks that want an affordable POS system but don’t want to sacrifice POS features	Free plan available.  2 paid plans, ranging from $69 to $165+/month per location	In-person: 2.6% + 10¢ per transaction Online: 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction	– Self-service QR code – Online ordering – Invoices for events – Email marketing – Flexible menu management
Clover POS	Beginner food trucks prioritizing ease of use	3 pricing plans, ranging from $14.95 to $89.95/month	Lowest plan: 2.6% + 10¢ per transaction  Other plans: 2.3% + 10¢ per transaction	– Intuitive interface – Compact, mobile-friendly hardware – Quick menu customization – Online ordering – Customer engagement tools
Table Needs	Food trucks that prefer a mobile POS system without specialty hardware investment.	3 pricing plans, ranging from $139 to $339/month	2.69% + 10¢ per transaction for all plans	– Device flexibility – Customizable order flow – Scan to Pay-Scan to Order – Built-in Kitchen Display System – Staff management
TouchBistro	Food truck chains that need a great multi-location POS system.	$69/month for a standard POS system.  Add-ons range from $19 to $330/month per add-on.	N/A	– Great menu management – Flexible payment methods – Advanced staff management – Offline mode – Flexible mobile POS configurations

2. What is a food truck POS system and its benefits?

A food truck POS system is POS hardware and software that enable food trucks to accept payments effectively and tackle the common challenges in operating a food truck like limited space or constantly changing locations.

Here are some of the numerous benefits that a functional POS system can bring about for your food truck:

• Mobility and flexibility: Your POS system will function on portable devices such as tablets or smartphones, enabling you to process orders and payments at any location.
• Streamlined order and payment processing: The system will allow you to instantly and accurately process your customer’s payments in various methods instead of manual entry.
• Real-time inventory management: A food truck POS will auto-update your inventory after you successfully process payments. This is quite handy as it will help you plan your stock wisely in a limited space.
• Comprehensive sales reporting: You’ll gain valuable insights into your business performance through detailed reports. These will highlight your best-selling items, busiest hours, and overall trends, enabling you to make informed decisions about your menu, pricing, and business strategy.
• Flexible menu customization: You’ll have the ability to quickly update your menu, adjusting items and prices as needed. This flexibility will allow you to adapt to ingredient availability, local events, and customer preferences with ease.

3. What is the best POS system for food truck: our top picks

3.1. Shopify POS: best for omnichannel food trucks

First, we have Shopify POS– the best POS system for food truck that is doing online selling with the Shopify platform. The system lets you manage your food truck’s stock, take orders, and track sales from different locations with one central dashboard.

What we are particularly impressed by Shopify POS is its seamless integration between the online and offline channel. For instance, with Shopify POS Pro, you can send customers email the items they were interested in but didn’t buy at your food truck or promote your new drinks and snacks. In addition, the POS allows you to handle in-store pickup orders right from your Shopify POS dashboard.

 

🔸 Key features:

• Mobile-friendly design: Shopify POS works well on tablets and smartphones, which is perfect for food trucks with limited space.
• Flexible ordering options: You can offer different ways for customers to order such as pre-orders for pickup or delivery, allowing you to reduce your customers’ wait time significantly
• Powerful marketing features: One of the biggest perks of Shopify POS is that it inherits the extensive marketing features of Shopify. For instance, you can collect your customer’s email and phone when they buy at your food truck and notify them with promos
• Loyalty programs: Shopify POS doesn’t support native loyalty features. But it supports deep integration with popular loyalty solutions, so you can drive repeat sales 
• Stock transfer: If you manage multiple food trucks at once, Shopify POS will let you request transfers from other food trucks and keep track of your transfer status with ease

🔸 Pricing:

Shopify POS comes in two versions: Shopify POS Lite and Shopify POS Pro. To use Shopify POS Lite, you need to be on one of Shopify’s pricing plans, which starts from $25 to $399 per month:

• Basic: $25/month, with a 2.7% transaction fee for in-person credit card payments.
• Shopify: $65/month, with a 2.6% transaction fee for in-person credit card payments
• Advanced Shopify: $399/month, with 2.4% transaction fee for in-person credit card payments

To have more advanced POS features for your food truck, you can upgrade to Shopify POS Pro, which comes with a monthly subscription fee of $89/location.

3.2. Toast POS: best for high-volume food truck

Up next, we have Toast POS, the best mobile POS system for food trucks that regularly have to handle high order volume. Toast’s POS software is designed exclusively for restaurants and food service businesses. This means you get tools optimized for menu management, order tracking, and kitchen operations, all crucial for busy food trucks.

 

🔸 Key features:

• Customizable menu management: You can easily update and customize your menu in real-time. This includes adding or removing items, adjusting pricing, and modifying descriptions. You can also set up multiple menus for different times of day or special events
• Offline mode: While an internet connection is required for full functionality, Toast’s secure offline mode ensures you can continue taking orders and payments even if your connection drops. This is crucial for mobile operations that often work in areas with unreliable internet
• Food truck-friendly hardware: Toast offers compact, durable hardware options that won’t cramp your limited space. Their handheld POS terminals allow you to take orders and process payments anywhere around your truck
• Integrated online ordering: For an additional fee, you can add online ordering capabilities. This allows customers to place orders in advance, helping you manage high volumes more efficiently and potentially increasing your overall sales
• Robust reporting and analytics: Toast provides powerful reporting tools that offer insights into your sales trends, popular menu items, and busiest hours. This data can help you optimize your menu, staffing, and operations for high-volume periods

🔸 Pricing:

Toast POS offers three main pricing plans for food trucks:

• Starter Kit: This is Toast’s free plan for small food trucks or those who want to test out the water. However, note that it comes with a bit higher transaction fee of 2.99% + 15¢ per transaction.
• Point of Sale: At $69/month with a 2.49% + 15¢ transaction, you get advanced POS features, reporting, and analytics to help you manage your food trucks more effectively.
• Build Your Own: This customizable option lets you select the custom hardware and software features based on your needs. The transaction fee for the custom plan is similar to Point of Sale plan, which is 2.49% + 15¢ per transaction.

3.3. Square POS: best free food truck POS

If you don’t want the cost of a POS system to cut too deep into your food truck’s profit margin, Square POS should definitely be your go-to choice. We believe Square POS is the best free food truck POS system because even on its free plan, Square POS still doesn’t charge a higher transaction fees like most other POS systems.

Like Shopify POS, Square POS is packed with great omnichannel capabilities like online ordering or Square email marketing, etc. The POS also comes with self-service QR codes to speed up your customer checkout process. 

 

🔸 Key features:

• Self-service QR code: With Square POS, you can feature a QR code so your customers can scan and order food themselves, saving you time
• Online ordering: You can enable your customers to order online and pick up at your food truck later, reducing their wait time remarkably
• Invoices for events: With Square Invoices, you can manage corporate events or weddings and keep all your payments in one central place.
• Email marketing: Thanks to Square email marketing, you can email your customers to inform them of your promo, happy hours, or where your food truck will be serving from today, tomorrow, etc.
• Flexible menu management: Square POS allows you to create item variations and modifiers so your customers can order the exact dish with the level of sweetness, spiciness, etc., they want.

🔸 Pricing:

Square POS has three main pricing plans:

• Free: Square POS’s free forever plan is most suitable for small food trucks that are starting out and only need the basics of daily service in one location
• Plus: Starting from $69 per location/month, Square Plus is perfect for growing food trucks that have up to five locations and take orders via various channels.
• Premium: Starting from $165 per location/month, Square’s highest plan is ideal for food trucks with over five locations or established restaurants that are planning to expand.

For payment processing, the POS charges 2.6% + 10¢ per transaction for in-person payments and 2.9% + 30¢ per transaction for online payments.

3.4. Clover POS: best for food trucks prioritizing ease of use

If you’ve been searching for a beginner-friendly POS system that’s easy to set up, Clover is the name we highly suggest for your food truck. Clover offers a comprehensive solution that combines intuitive software with compact, durable hardware designed to thrive in the fast-paced environment of a food truck. 

To name a few, the system offers a range of compact devices that are perfect for the limited space in a food truck, including the handheld Clover Flex and the space-saving Clover Mini.

 

🔸 Key features:

• Intuitive interface: Clover’s software has a clean, straightforward layout that’s easy to learn and use, reducing training time and minimizing errors during busy service periods.
• Compact, mobile-friendly hardware: The Clover Flex is a handheld device that allows you to take orders and process payments anywhere around your truck, significantly speeding up your service during rush periods
• Quick menu customization: You can easily update and customize your menu in real-time through Clover’s user-friendly interface, perfect for food trucks that frequently change their offerings or want to quickly add daily specials
• Online ordering: Clover offers online ordering capabilities that allow your customers to place orders for pickup or delivery. This self-service feature is easy to set up and fully integrated into Clover, even on compact devices
• Customer engagement tools: Clover offers easy-to-use features for sending promotional emails and managing loyalty programs, helping you build and maintain a base of repeat customers.

🔸 Pricing:

Clover POS offers three main pricing plans for its food truck POS system:

• Essentials: at $14.95/month with a transaction fee of 2.6% + 10¢, the Essentials plan gives you basic POS features like items and inventory management, order management, and detailed reports.
• Counter Service: at $59.95/month with a transaction fee of 2.3% + 10¢, the Counter Service plans offers more advanced POS features like order types, online ordering, and item labels.
• Table Service: at $89.95/month with a transaction fee of 2.3% + 10¢, the Table Service provides food trucks with the most premium POS functionalities like table mapping, bill splitting, and tab management.

3.5. Table Needs: best food truck POS system for mobile devices

This list would be incomplete without Table Needs, the best food truck POS system for mobile devices. Table Needs stands out with its cloud-based system that runs on standard iOS and Android devices, eliminating the need for specialized hardware. This allows you to use your existing smartphones or tablets, reducing initial costs and scaling your food truck operations more easily as needed.

 

🔸 Key features:

• Device flexibility: The robust mobile POS system runs on most standard iOS and Android devices, allowing you to use your own equipment or lease from Table Needs. 
• Customizable order flow: The system allows you to tailor the order process to your specific needs, which can be particularly useful as your menu and operations evolve with your growing business
• Scan to Pay-Scan to Order: Your customers can scan the QR code on your food truck to access your menu, place their order, and automatically get a text when their order is ready
• Built-in Kitchen Display System: The Table Needs comes with a free KDL, allowing you to instantly send POS orders to your kitchen staff with no human errors
• Staff management: Table Needs partners with Homebase to give you all the tools you need to manage your food truck team, including staff onboarding, payroll, time clock management, etc.

🔸 Pricing:

Table Needs offers three flexible POS system pricing plans:

• Snack Sized: $139/mo, which includes a hardware lease up to $2,500 value.
• Balanced Lunch: $239/mo, which includes a hardware lease up to $5,000 value.
• Full Entree: $339/mo, which includes a hardware lease of up to $10,000 value.

All plans include operations, finances, training, and support. The credit card processing fees are 2.69% + 10¢ for card-present transactions and 2.9% + 30¢ for card-not-present transactions.

3.6. TouchBistro: best for food truck chains

Last but not least, TouchBistro would make perfect sense for businesses that manage multiple food trucks. With TouchBistro, you can quickly update your offerings based on ingredient availability or location-specific demands, and keep a close eye on your stock levels across multiple trucks.

 

🔸 Key features:

• Great menu management: You can easily build a menu by adding or cloning items, sync it with other menus and schedule the introduction of specials based on time of day and season.
• Flexible payment methods: TouchBistro POS offers direct integrations with top payment processing providers such as Square and Worldpay. Plus, the POS system also accepts various payments, ranging from cash, credit and debit cards to digital wallets like Apple Pay, and Google Pay.
• Advanced staff management: With TouchBistro, you can assign specific staff in your food truck certain roles and responsibilities 
• Offline mode: Once your point-of-sale system is installed, your devices will work with one another seamlessly to process sales with no internet needed
• Flexible mobile POS configurations:  You can easily set up multi-station configurations for your mobile POS, including display screens for both your kitchen staff and your customers

🔸 Pricing:

TouchBistro’s base POS system costs you $69/month and you can extend your POS system’s functionality with add-ons. Here are the pricing of some add-ons TouchBistro offers:

• Kitchen Display System: $19/month
• Online Ordering: $50/month
• Loyalty: $99/month
• Gift cards: $25/month

4. How to choose the best POS system for your food truck?

Here are some proven-effective tips to keep in mind to choose the best POS system for your food truck business:

• Look for POS systems with strong mobility features, including cellular and Wi-Fi capabilities, to ensure you can process payments anywhere your truck operates
• Ensure the POS offers flexible menu management capabilities so you can easily modify your offerings or sell in combo
• Consider POS systems that offer customizable features to tailor the system to your specific food truck needs
• Do careful research on the POS system’s cost. How much does it charge for the software licensing fee? Does the POS system lease hardware? How much are payment processing fees?

5. Conclusion

That’s it! We’ve just walked you through a list of the best POS system for food truck of all time. eComStart hopes our list will help you choose a system suitable for your specific demand and budget.
If you’d love to look at other POS systems, enjoy your reading with our article on the 7 best POS system for small business. Don’t forget to dive in eComStart.io for all the handy resources to run a profitable eCommerce web store.

6. FAQs