Lightspeed Restaurant vs. PayPal Zettle

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Lightspeed Restaurant
Score 9.9 out of 10
N/A
The Lightspeed Restaurant POS, from Lightspeed in Montreal, is a restaurant POS and management system designed to enable users to sync the user's menu with major food delivery apps, manage all orders and and reach new customers.
$69
per month 2.6% + 10¢
PayPal Zettle
Score 7.6 out of 10
N/A
PayPal Zettle (formerly PayPal Here) is a POS and payment processing system that includes either a mobile card reader or a chip reader (hardware), and is powered by the mobile PayPal Here app. Admins can add up to 1,000 users per account, and the app also includes invoicing, reporting, and inventory management features. The pricing structure for payment processing is: 2.7% per US card swipe. 3.5% + $0.15 to key in cards. 2.9% + $0.30 to invoice. 1% for cross-border transfers.N/A
Pricing
Lightspeed RestaurantPayPal Zettle
Editions & Modules
Lightspeed Restaurant Essentials
$69
per month 2.6% + 10¢
Lightspeed Restaurant Plus
$189
per month 2.6% + 10¢
Lightspeed Restaurant Pro
$399
per month custom per purchase rates
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Lightspeed RestaurantPayPal Zettle
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Lightspeed RestaurantPayPal Zettle
Considered Both Products
Lightspeed Restaurant
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
I have already used two Restaurant POS software but Lightspeed helps me a lot to grow my business. I face some problems when using this but day by day they are constantly developing their services. Their customer support is amazing. If we face any problem the team responds …
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve [POS (formerly Breadcrumb)] offers more functionality than Square, which is the only other restaurant POS I've used. Upserve has intuitive employee time tracking, and helpful labor and sales reporting features. I know my data guy would prefer more detailed data …
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
LAVU is the worst POS system I have ever encountered. It was the most frustrating part of everyone’s shift. They were never available for customer service, Upserve is. Their system would shut down across regions, Upserve does not. Upserve (at the time Breadcrumb) was highly …
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
POS systems are always evolving. Breadcrumb continues to stay on top of the game.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
We chose Upserve POS for the following reasons:
  • Easy to find items on the menu by using the search bar.
  • Ability to modify menu, devices, etc. remotely.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve is on the way to be able to do everything that ALOHA can do. However, the future is with Upserve.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve is smaller, quicker, portable and more user friendly.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve rises above all of it's competition. It's just as robust as a legacy brand like Micros or Restaurant Manager, and simultaneously agile and intuitive like square. It's a perfect balance for modern restaurants.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve is pretty well organized and not hard to adjust to at all.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve is better because of its support team that helps guide you through the implementation process. Upserve is great at managing costs, employee actions, and retail processes.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Upserve is more robust than both of these products. Northstar simply isn't functional, so most anything could outperform it. I would choose Upserve over either of the above products.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
It was better than Micros back in the day.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
I have not compared any other POS systems.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
  • Micros - Very expensive for the initial setup and support afterward, but offers all the features needed for a complex restaurant.
  • Toast - Pretty similar to Breadcrumb, but lacks a development team.
  • Focus - Similar to Micros, but less expensive for the support.
Chose Lightspeed Restaurant
Now as a Toast user, it makes Breadcrumb look like an ancient technology. Toast is way more user friendly and more suitable for a higher volume restaurant. Toast has a more thorough reporting system than Breadcrumb. The display is a lot more vibrant through Toast and people get …
PayPal Zettle
Chose PayPal Zettle
PayPal Zettle is comparable to these solutions in many ways. Toast and Clover were more expensive solutions that involved more time and hardware commitments than our operation needed. PayPal Zettle has very lite admin and reporting capabilities. It needs to improved these …
Chose PayPal Zettle
We love StoreLIVE, it is right up there with PayPal Zettle! Again, though, it is not as much of a well known name to the non-business owner. But WooCommerce is not at all even close to Paypal Zettle! It is complicated and exclusive to WooCommerce on the web and less in store.
Chose PayPal Zettle
The main selection criteria were ease of use and the presence of a plugin for WooCommerce. However, in practice it turned out that an important factor is also the availability of the product for purchase in a small batch and at an affordable price. I chose PayPal Zettle because …
Chose PayPal Zettle
Paypal's rates are slightly higher than my rates with Square or Stripe. While I can accept card payments with the Stripe app it isn't a true POS system.
Chose PayPal Zettle
It doesn't appear on the list but i used clip from mercadopago it is great but i trust more in paypal for their service and agility to solve issues. In clip i had a problem and it take weeks to solve it so i was a little disapointes for that and i decide to look for another …
Chose PayPal Zettle
They are both comparable and honestly could not say one is better than the other. I suggest looking at both options and picking what works best for you!
Chose PayPal Zettle
1) Square has a much more expensive startup cost in purchasing their hardware.
2) Square POS is not tailored for eCommerce
3) Square is not as easy to work with and has terrible customer service.
Chose PayPal Zettle
I actually use both but for the purchases where I'm on the go and at a concert, PayPal Zettle is better for me. Stripe works great for my courses online but again if I'm selling a product or service that is a one time deal and in the moment, it's so much easier for me to simply …
Chose PayPal Zettle
Square has good software and is relatively easy to use. The Square payment screen is more advanced than the basic model that PayPal uses. However, PayPal was a service that I already used-- and the company made it easy to integrate it into our business. Convenience and ease of …
Chose PayPal Zettle
It's been a while now since I've compared the two, but PayPay and Square were relatively similar for what we needed them for. I think the physical PayPal product at the time was a little bit more of what we needed, but I don't remember it being a very large margin between the …
Chose PayPal Zettle
Ultimately we selected PayPal Here because PayPal is such a trusted and well-known name, because of the easy-to-navigate user interface, because the card reader was inexpensive but performs well, and because the organization was already using PayPal to collect donations through …
Chose PayPal Zettle
I received my Square reader faster and it does its job well but, but the reader itself is small and very easy to lose. Unlike PayPal, I had to create a new account that would only be used for that single purpose. PayPal Here is an extension of PayPal so set-up was flawless and …
Chose PayPal Zettle
The PayPal Here app and the PayPal Here card reader are the only solutions we have ever used for manual processing of credit card payments or performing transactions where we physically accept payment via credit cards in person. We have never tried the Square credit card reader …
Chose PayPal Zettle
Square POS is substantially similar to PayPal Here in cost and function, but it doesn't allow us to collect the necessary data for campaign finance reporting and compliance. In past campaigns we would have to process a card donation and then still make donors fill out an …
Chose PayPal Zettle
Compared to Square, PayPal Here is less much less reliable. I have never struggled to take a payment with Square whether I was swiping the card or manually entering the card information. I feel like our customers are more accustomed to seeing the Square card reader as well …
Chose PayPal Zettle
I have used Square. It worked okay most of the time. The card reader went bad a couple times and happened pretty fast. It was not the best for how many cards we needed to swipe on a daily basis.
Chose PayPal Zettle
Paypal here is the mobile app that allows you to take credit cards on the spot. With the card reader you can get lower merchant service fees. I'd recommend picking up a card reader for your phone. It's definately worth it when you're billing thousands of dollars to a client and …
Chose PayPal Zettle
I find that PayPal Here works better as a self-employed or non-profit; it's simple, clean cut, and is a recognised brand throughout places like Etsy and eBay. PayPal Here feels like it's geared more towards the every person, especially artists and artisans. While I do use …
Best Alternatives
Lightspeed RestaurantPayPal Zettle
Small Businesses
Square POS
Square POS
Score 10.0 out of 10
Square POS
Square POS
Score 10.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Shopify
Shopify
Score 9.1 out of 10
Epicor Eagle
Epicor Eagle
Score 7.9 out of 10
Enterprises

No answers on this topic

No answers on this topic

All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Lightspeed RestaurantPayPal Zettle
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(0 ratings)
7.9
(0 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Usability
8.5
(0 ratings)
9.0
(0 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Support Rating
8.9
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(0 ratings)
User Testimonials
Lightspeed RestaurantPayPal Zettle
Likelihood to Recommend
Upserve POS is well suited for any restaurant, bar, or coffee shop. We've utilized this system for full service, quick service, and bar service and it's been perfect for all of it. I can't think of food or beverage service application that Upserve is not well suited to handle
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Despite the time that you have to wait to be able to receive the money for each transaction made through the PayPal Here POS system, I consider that it is a system that has a lot of potential and that, without a doubt, allows companies to obtain a lot of POS system cheaper, no need to pay for a bank POS system that is much more expensive and requires a more complex process to configure and register at the bank branch. I would definitely recommend PayPal Here for any small, medium or large company, it has excellent potential, the reading of the NFC chips is instantaneous and allows each credit or debit card to be recognized immediately and the transaction to be completed in a few seconds. It is a very advanced system, easy to use and very easy to configure, if you are looking for a system that is not so complicated to add a POS to your company, PayPal Here is the best option.
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Pros
  • I love all the backend reporting features of Upserve. It's really robust and helps me manage our restaurant by staying in touch with labor, best selling items, etc.
  • The customer service is great. I had a question and used their chat feature and my question was answered within 5 minutes.
  • I'd highly recommend this product.
Read full review
  • Our customers can check out no matter where we are.
  • It is incredibly easy to use. Training new retail employees and volunteers takes almost no time.
  • When we were shopping around for solutions, Paypal Here was very cost effective.
  • Implementation with our current systems went very smoothly. The Paypal support team was great.
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Cons
  • There are a few minor bugs in the reporting that should be fixed.
  • Check out reports could improve by showing each transaction detail.
  • There is not currently a way to check via the reports how many online orders come through since they are processed as a credit card/cash.
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  • The fees are a little bit high, although all POS and payment systems do charge fees.
  • Sometimes signing in and getting things to connect through our web store can be a challenge. It is great once it is set up but downloading plug ins and setting up initially is a challenge.
  • We have in-store pick up items that customers pay for at pick up and shipped items which customers pay for through the PayPal Zettle portal at checkout. This was very confusing to set up. I wish there was an easier way to mark items as payment upfront and payment later.
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Likelihood to Renew
No answers on this topic
There are no monthly costs, the only expense is the card processing fee which is lower than nearly everyone else out there.
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Usability
Upserve is very intuitive. It utilizes a tab system along the left side of the screen for easy access to menu categories. After choosing the tab you want to view (i.e. Food), all the food items and/or sub categories show up instantly on the screen. once your items are chosen, you are a card swipe away from starting the payment process. Very easy. That said, there are a few minor issues with usability. For example, splitting checks is really quite difficult. You have to create new checks one at a time, then have to go searching for the checks to ring guests up. Really not intuitive on this front. Thankfully, it's not incredibly inhibitive
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The overall usability was good for our organization. We rarely experienced much downtime or errors when using PayPal Zettle for business transactions. Some of our IPhone users had login and security issues a few times. That was the exception to the rule and we have been able to operate consistently for the majority of the time.
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Reliability and Availability
No answers on this topic
Adding skus was down for 1hr one day, otherwise have never experienced an outage.
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Performance
No answers on this topic
Everything is very fast. Adding products, selling products, processing cards, and receiving funds.
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Support Rating
Seriously, if I could give a 12 rating I would. Upserve support is 24/7 and completely free. No extra fees on evenings or weekends and they are fast. You can actually start a chat support straight from your ipad screen. 90% of our support issues have been solved in just a few minutes from the chat screen. That said, I prefer the phone. Calling into Upserve support is just as easy and everyone is always friendly and fast
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Support hasn't been needed in the 2 years of using PayPal but I have received calls from the company in the past asking about my experience with the device that was sent to me and they were pretty helpful with advice. Support is all over the internet if needed but for emergencies, so it is best to contact them during business hours.
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Implementation Rating
No answers on this topic
It went very smoothly.
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Alternatives Considered
Upserve [POS (formerly Breadcrumb)] offers more functionality than Square, which is the only other restaurant POS I've used. Upserve has intuitive employee time tracking, and helpful labor and sales reporting features. I know my data guy would prefer more detailed data reporting abilities (for instance, you can't pull reports that show modifiers - so when we have Happy Hour and want to track how happy hour modifiers are doing compared to normal price, we have to do this manually wtf?). But overall Upserve is better than the other POS systems I've tried.
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Square has good software and is relatively easy to use. The Square payment screen is more advanced than the basic model that PayPal uses. However, PayPal was a service that I already used-- and the company made it easy to integrate it into our business. Convenience and ease of use were key.
Read full review
Scalability
No answers on this topic
Have not run into any limitations as of yet, with 500 SKUs entered and counting.
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Return on Investment
  • Bestsellers and slower items rise to the top in reporting features, making analysis quicker.
  • Dramatically reduced server error
  • Posed a challenge to continue face-to-face contact between servers and cooks; the POS tends to end conversations about special orders, special customer requests or restrictions, and generally conveys the nuances that contribute to excellent service. So we have to make a conscious effort to continue talking to each other.
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  • One positive impact that PayPal here has had on our business is the ability to accept credit card payments which in itself increases our customer basis by 50%.
  • When PayPal fails, we have to pay higher fees to other processors, although I don't have an exact dollar impact.
  • When we struggle to take a payment using PayPal Here it makes our customers uneasy.
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ScreenShots