Revolut POS Alternative: The Best Revolut POS Alternatives for Restaurants
Revolut POS Alternative: The Best Revolut POS Alternatives for Restaurants
Revolut Reader is a cheap card reader. The pricing is simple, plenty of people already bank with Revolut, and for a market stall or a pop-up it does the job.
Restaurants run into its limits fast. Table service, takeaway, orders coming in from more than one channel, a second site - Revolut wasn't built for any of that. Below is what it's missing, and the systems restaurants tend to move to instead.
Why restaurants outgrow Revolut POS
Revolut Reader is a card reader, not a restaurant POS. It takes payments. It doesn't manage orders, tables, menus, kitchen tickets or covers, and a payment terminal with a basic item list won't get you through a busy dinner service.
There's no kitchen integration. A restaurant POS sends orders to the kitchen. Revolut has no kitchen display system and doesn't connect to ticket printers.
If you want customers ordering from your website, your own app or a delivery channel, Revolut has nothing that connects to them.
Open a second site and you're looking at two separate accounts. There's no central view of how each location is doing.
Reporting stops at payments. You can see what was paid, but not sales by item, by cover, by time of day, by server or by channel. That's the data you need when you're deciding what to drop from the menu or how many staff to put on a Friday night.
And there's no loyalty or marketing. If you want people coming back, you'll need something else for that.
Best Revolut POS alternatives for restaurants
1. Flipdish
Flipdish is built for restaurants. Revolut is a payments product with some POS features on top. Flipdish puts a full restaurant POS, integrated payments, online ordering, branded mobile apps, self-service kiosks, AI phone ordering, loyalty and marketing in one system.
Coming from Revolut Reader, you get:
- order management across counter, table and online orders
- kitchen display and ticket printer integration
- card payments with reporting that shows what you sold, not just what you took
- menu management with modifiers and upsells, tracked down to the item
- customer data and loyalty tools
- multi-site management for when you open the next one
Flipdish runs in hundreds of restaurant locations across the UK and Ireland, from single independents to national chains.
2. Square for Restaurants
A step up from Revolut. Square has table management, a menu builder and kitchen ticket printing. It suits smaller independents best. Multi-site and enterprise features are thinner than on platforms built for chains.
3. Lightspeed Restaurant
Cloud-based, with good menu management and reporting. It's designed around table service, so it's a weaker fit for high-volume takeaway or QSR.
4. Epos Now
A UK POS with a hospitality version. It does more for restaurants than Revolut and is used by independents and small groups.
5. Zettle by PayPal
Much the same idea as Revolut Reader: payments first, basic POS features added later. It isn't meant to run a restaurant.
Revolut POS vs Flipdish
| Feature | Revolut Reader | Flipdish |
|---|---|---|
| Card payments | ✓ | ✓ |
| Order management | Basic | ✓ Full |
| Kitchen display / tickets | ✗ | ✓ |
| Online ordering | ✗ | ✓ |
| Branded mobile app | ✗ | ✓ |
| Self-service kiosk | ✗ | ✓ |
| Table management | ✗ | ✓ |
| Multi-site reporting | ✗ | ✓ |
| Loyalty programme | ✗ | ✓ |
| AI phone ordering | ✗ | ✓ |
| UK and Ireland support | ✓ | ✓ |
What Revolut does well
Revolut Reader is easy to set up and easy to understand. If you're brand new, your volume is low and you need to start taking cards next week, it's a reasonable place to start. The flat transaction fee (rather than a percentage) can work out cheaper at very low volumes.
Revolut isn't bad at what it does. It just doesn't do enough for a restaurant with any real complexity.
Making the switch
Moving off Revolut is easier than most POS switches because there's not much to move. Revolut never held your orders, tables or menu structure, so most operators are setting up proper order management for the first time.
Before you switch:
- Work out what you need from a POS - order management, table management, kitchen integration, online channels, reporting.
- Check your card volumes and compare them against the integrated payment pricing from restaurant platforms.
- Pick a quiet week to go live, and train staff before go-live, not during it.
Flipdish moves restaurants off simpler systems all the time and can take you through it.