Free POS software lets you complete customer transactions and manage other business processes like inventory management. For this buyer’s guide, we looked at the most popular systems and rising stars and decided to review Square, Loyverse, and Imonggo. These solutions covered the free POS software range for small businesses in terms of ease of use, inventory management, employee management and customer management. Read on for our comparison and review of these three options, as well as our top recommendations.
Best Free POS Software for Small Business: Square
We recommend Square because it is the most feature-rich free POS software you can choose that also offers integrated and affordable card processing. It’s super easy to get started, there are a ton of reasonably priced add on services like employee scheduling, loyalty programs, and other marketing tools. Plus the self service knowledge base is world class.
Summary Table: Square vs. Loyverse vs. Imonggo
| What's free | POS software including basic inventory mgt and some advanced features like visual data reporting for unlimited users | POS software including basic inventory and employee mgt for unlimited users | POS software including basic inventory and employee mgt for 1-user, 1-store, up to a maximum of 1,000 products and 1,000 transactions per month. |
| Credit card processing costs Learn More | A flat rate of 2.75% for all swiped transactions, 3.5% + $0.15 for keyed transactions, and 2.9% + $0.30 for online transactions. | Set-up to process credit card payments via Vantiv - a third party merchant services provider. Rates vary based on transactions volume. | Set-up to process credit card payments via Authorize.net - a third party merchant services provider. Rates vary based on transactions volume. |
| Ease of use Learn More | Very intuitive | Very intuitive | Very intuitive |
| OS | iOS and Android | iOS and Android | iOS and Android |
| Mobile | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Key features Learn More | Inventory mgt: Basic Employee mgt: $5 per employee per month. Customer mgt: Basic Reporting: Advanced | Inventory mgt: Advanced Employee mgt: Free Customer mgt: Advanced Reporting: Advanced | Inventory mgt: Advanced Employee mgt: Free Customer mgt: Advanced Reporting: Advanced |
| Above & beyond features Learn More | Affordable add-ons e.g. Square Payroll: $29/mth, email marketing: $15/mth, | A points based customer loyalty program and awesome free customer service | Imonggo is a good all round solution, but nothing stands out as above and beyond. |
| Integration with Accounting Software Learn More | Commerce Sync, QuickBooks, Xero, Kashoo Accounting, Zoho Books, OneUp, Online, Shogo, and TaxJar. | No accounting software integrations currently available. | No accounting software integrations currently available. |
| Customer support Learn More | Community forum, email support, video tutorials and blog. World-class self-serve knowledge base. Improving reputation. | Responsive live chat, responsive email support, video tutorials and blog Excellent reputation | Community forum, email support and blog. Good reputation |
Square
LoyverseBest Free POS Software: Square
We recommend Square because it’s so easy to get started and the add-on services and hardware are reasonably priced. Plus the self-service knowledge base is truly world class and the card processing costs are acceptable for a small business processing less than $17,500 in card sales per month. This free POS software deal is exceptional for many small merchants, especially new ones without an established processing history.
Like all the free POS software solutions we reviewed, Square is very intuitive. Where it really sets itself apart is that it’s packed with useful features and lets you set things up just the way you want to. You can set-up tips and discounts, record cash and check transactions and handle split tenders, You can also process full and partial refunds, customize receipts and send via email or SMS, and much more.
However, Square makes its money by becoming your dedicated credit card processing solution at slightly above the most competitive rates. If your card sales are less than $17,500 per month then the benefit of Square’s easy setup and free software will outweigh the extra cost of card processing. Beyond $17,500 per month, the extra cost may start to outweigh the benefits. At this point it can make sense to move to a paid software provider integrated with a merchant account offering more competitive rates.
It’s not all good news though, unlike Loyverse, Square does not have an unblemished track record in terms of customer service. This is because it tends to accept almost all new merchants and then has a habit of putting what it considers to be high-risk accounts on hold. It is worth reading Square’s T&Cs and list of excluded high risk enterprises before proceeding.
Having said this, the vast majority of Square’s customers love the free software, predictable processing rates, affordable service and well-designed reasonable hardware add-ons.
Best Up and Coming Free POS Software: Loyverse
Unlike Square who charge for add-ons and Imonggo who charge for more than one user, Loyverse is completely free without any restrictions whatsoever.
What’s more, Loyverse provides much more than a basic solution. For instance, its payment processing, inventory management (including ingredient tracking), employee management, customer management (including customer loyalty) are as powerful as the features provided by many paid POS software solutions.
What is even more exceptional is that Loyverse is a very complete, bug free and user-friendly platform with exceptional customer service. This is probably why its loyal customers tend to consistently provide 5/5 customer reviews.
Another strength of Loyverse is that the platform is still improving and adding new features. In the past, Loyverse merchants were not able to connect their POS to a credit card terminal, but Loyverse recently announced that it now integrates with Vantiv, one of the largest merchant payment processing services. This now allows US merchants to process card payments with Loyverse.
So far so good, so what’s the catch? The only real downside with Loyverse is that it does not integrate with accounting software yet. However, if you are transacting low volume card sales out of one location it’s becoming a genuine rival to Square. Loyverse is very easy-to-use and designed for small business. Plus is comes with a wealth of useful features and even lets you establish a hard-hitting customer loyalty program with your own mobile loyalty app.
The Other Option: Imonggo
Simplicity is the driving force behind Imonggo. Wherever possible Imonggo streamlines and simplifies its free POS software functions to the basics whilst trying not to sacrifice the power of its feature set. As a result, it delivers a useful free POS software solution that covers what you would expect to find and is easy for small businesses to adopt.
However, Square is just as easy to use and is also easy to integrate with payment processing, which Imonggo is not. Loyverse is also very easy to use and is also free for unlimited users, which Imonggo is not.
In-Depth Review: Square vs. Loyverse vs. Imonggo
Credit Card Processing Costs
While free POS software comes without any charge, what you will always pay for is credit card processing. Some systems like Square provide free software, and make their money by charging slightly above the most competitive card processing rates. Other systems allow you to integrate with third party merchant account processors to access a more competitive rate.
Ease of Use
It’s important to ensure that the free POS software you choose to adopt is easy to use, even if it is free. To assess this, we looked at how easy it is to:
- Set-up and start processing payments
- Create and manage your inventory
- Set up employees with permissions
- View and export sales reports
Let’s see how our three options compared.
Key Features
To determine the best free POS software for small business, I have analyzed the key features that are likely to inform your decision. We have covered:
- Inventory management
- Employee management
- Customer relationship management (CRM)
- Analytics and reporting
Let’s see how each of our options compared.
Inventory Management
A good free POS system includes inventory management, which provides up to date information on what you have in stock, what’s en route, and what is selling fast. You’ll also have all the information you need to spot theft, cut losing products, expand winning product lines, and drive an increase in your sales and profits.
Employee Management
If you have more than one person receiving customer payments, you will want to be able to set them up with their own unique login so that you can analyze how each employee performs. For example, this will allow you to report sales performance by employee and also to track any payment / stock discrepancies back to the employee responsible for completing the transaction.
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
All free POS software allows you to create a customer database. Some are very basic and just allow you to store name, contact details and birthday. Others are much more useful allowing you to store information about a range of other things like buying preferences, frequency of visits and average spend per visit. This database then allows you to segment your customers in different ways, for example to implement marketing promotions.
Analytics & Reporting
One of the benefits of using free POS software is that you start to collect lots of data about how your business is performing. For example; your customers’ buying preferences, the sales performance of each employee and the impact of sales on your stock levels. If this data is visually presented and made easy for you to access then it can help you to manage your business in real-time and improve your profitability.
Above & Beyond
In this section we highlight any unique features that small business owners are likely to find useful, plus any features that are much more advanced than we expected. Square Register and Loyverse both go above and beyond for different reasons.
Integrations with Accounting Software
For anything other than a low customer transaction business, it would be advisable to integrate your accounting package with your free POS software like QuickBooks or Xero. This will save you having to export reports and then manually upload them to your accounting software package. Being integrated in this way means that you can also benefit from all of the additional reporting features of your accounting package in real time.
Customer Service & Support
It’s important to understand the level of customer support and service you will receive from free POS software before committing to an application. Customer service can take many forms; realtime chat, email helpline, telephone support, how to videos, blog and knowledge database to name a few.
All Free POS Software Options
To create the list of 7 free POS software options shared in the table below, we reviewed 24 options and discarded 17 because they are not sufficiently reliable yet for you to rely upon at the heart of your business.
| Option | Good as a… |
|---|---|
| Square | The best solution for startup and early stage retailers. |
| Loyverse | Mobile only solution for both retail and restaurant businesses. |
| Imonggo | Simple and powerful solution for small retail businesses. |
| PayPal Here | A simple solution dedicated to the PayPal payment process. |
| Boxypos | Mobile only solution for bars, cafes and restaurants. |
| eHopper | Mobile solution for both retail and restaurant businesses. |
| Harbortouch | Completely free POS system tied to its own credit card processing service. |
| VendHQ | The best all-in-one POS system for retailers and restaurants |
The Bottom Line
Square was the first and has continued to innovate and constantly deliver new features, which is why it still stands out as the best free POS software integrated to card processing. If your business processes less than $17,500 in card sales per month, Square is still the obvious solution to your needs.
However, if Loyverse make it possible to integrate with accounting software, they will become a very strong alternative to Square. Imonggo provides a good solution that has no obvious weaknesses, but neither does it really stand out.
Alice Cole
Livepos is what we use in my multi location stores. It’s a reliable pos system. Helped a lot in making my business successful and to run smoothly.
Krista Fabregas
That’s a popular POS, but not if you’re looking for a free solution. Thanks for reading and commenting!
Cheers,
Krista
Lauren Jane Mills
I’ve been using livepos in my store and their real-time inventory is the best!
Skyler Brennan
Livepos is my point of sale in my store for a couple of years now. It’s easy to use with great features that are compatible in my store.
Mark Sallows
Hi Sklyer.. thanks for dropping by, and always good to learn about real-life experiences of other POS systems.
Guy
Recently I started using Vecino Cloud.
It was very easy to setup and the service is great.
The best thing is that it’s free!
You should try it.
http://www.vecino.cloud/
Mark Sallows
H1 Guy..
Thanks for sharing your recommendation. Looks like a fresh entrant to the market and one to watch as it starts to grow its customer base and develops options to integrate with credit card processing solutions.
Bw
Mark