- Plan the restaurant POS around the floor and kitchen workflow first; payments and reports follow from it.
- Modifiers, courses and kitchen routing cause most day-to-day friction, so test them with real menus and real staff.
- Split bills, tips, voids and cash-up need clear permissions and an audit trail, or end-of-day numbers will not match.
- Buy when a standard POS fits your service style; build or extend when you run several sites, unusual menus or your own ordering channels.
What features should a restaurant POS have?
A restaurant POS needs a table and order flow that matches your service style, modifiers and courses that send the right tickets to the right kitchen station, flexible split bills and tips, staff roles with an audit trail, a clean end-of-day cash-up, and integrations with online ordering and accounting. Start from how food and money move through your restaurant on a busy night. The best system is the one your servers and cooks can use under pressure without thinking about it.
Use this list whether you are comparing off-the-shelf systems or planning a custom POS.
What does front of house need?
- A table map that mirrors your floor, with table status (seated, ordered, mains out, bill printed) visible at a glance.
- Covers and seats, so orders can be assigned to seat numbers and split later without guesswork.
- Courses and firing: starters sent straight away, mains held until the server fires them.
- Fast ordering: favourites, search, and screens laid out the way your menu is, so a server can take a table's order in seconds.
- Counter and takeaway modes if you also serve customers at a counter or by phone.
Why do modifiers and kitchen routing matter so much?
Most kitchen mistakes start in the POS. Plan these carefully with your chef:
- Modifiers, such as cooking temperature, sides, extras and removals, with forced choices so a steak can never be sent without a temperature.
- Allergen notes that stand out on every ticket and screen.
- Station routing: drinks to the bar, grill items to the grill, desserts to pastry, each with its own printer or kitchen display.
- Ticket layout that cooks can read from a distance, grouped by course and seat.
- Kitchen displays if you want ticket timers, recalls and bump screens instead of paper.
How should bills, splits and tips work?
- Splitting by seat, by item, evenly or by amount, and moving items between bills.
- Payments: card terminals from your payment provider, cash, gift cards and vouchers, and partial payments on one bill.
- Tips and service charges configured to your policy, with clear reporting for payroll.
- Pay at table on handheld terminals or by QR code, if it suits your service.
- Offline behaviour: orders and kitchen tickets keep flowing on the local network if the internet drops, with clear rules for card payments.
Tax, tip and service charge rules vary by country and state. Let your accountant define them, then configure the POS to follow them exactly.
What controls do managers need over staff?
- Roles and permissions: who can void items, give discounts, refund, open the cash drawer or change prices.
- Clock in and out, shifts and break tracking, exported to payroll.
- An audit trail of every void, discount, refund and price override, with who did it and when.
- Manager approval on a second login for sensitive actions.
What should end-of-day cash-up include?
Cash-up is where a weak POS shows. Plan for a shift and end-of-day report that lists sales by payment type, tips, voids, discounts and refunds, a cash count against expected cash, card totals matched against the payment provider, and a record of who closed the day. Variances should be easy to trace back to individual transactions, not only to a total.
How should the menu be managed?
- One place to edit items, prices, modifiers and photos, with changes reaching every device.
- Marking items as sold out mid-service, so servers stop selling them.
- Menus by time of day, such as breakfast, lunch, dinner and happy hour.
- For groups, one menu with prices and availability per location.
Which integrations matter?
List every system the POS must talk to: online ordering and your own website, delivery platforms, accounting, payroll, loyalty, reservations and stock management. Each integration either saves re-typing or creates a new place for numbers to disagree, so ask for a clear source of truth for menus, prices and stock. If you sell online as well, our guide to custom POS systems explains when shared inventory justifies building.
What hardware should you plan for?
Terminals or tablets for servers, receipt and kitchen printers, kitchen display screens, cash drawers, card terminals supported by your payment provider, and reliable local Wi-Fi. Test the hardware in the real kitchen before launch; heat, grease and distance from the router all matter. If staff will take orders on phones or tablets, our mobile app development covers handheld ordering apps.
Should you build or buy a restaurant POS?
Buy a standard system when your service style is common and its features cover your menu, kitchen and reporting. Consider building or extending when you run several brands or sites with their own rules, sell through your own ordering apps, need deep links to a central kitchen or stock system, or pay for several tools that each solve part of the problem. A middle path is to keep a standard POS for payments and build custom software around it through its API.
Frequently asked questions
Do restaurants need a kitchen display or are printers enough?
Both work. Printers are cheap, familiar and keep working in hot, greasy kitchens. Kitchen display screens make it easier to track ticket times, recall orders and mark items ready, and they reduce lost paper tickets. Many restaurants start with printers and add screens at the busiest stations later.
Can a restaurant POS work when the internet goes down?
It should. A restaurant cannot stop taking orders because the connection drops, so the POS needs to keep sending tickets to the kitchen over the local network and store orders and payments until it reconnects. Check how card payments behave offline with your payment provider, because they carry extra risk.
How should tips be handled in the POS?
Decide the tip policy first, then configure the POS to match: tips on card payments, cash tips recorded at cash-up, service charges if you use them, and how tips are shared between staff. Tip and service charge rules differ by country and state, so confirm them with your accountant before setting up payroll exports.
Should one POS run several restaurant locations?
Yes, if the brand shares a menu and wants combined reporting. A multi-site POS keeps one menu with location prices and availability, central reporting and staff who can work at more than one site, while each location still keeps working on its own if its connection fails.
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