The Friday-night POS test
How to find friction in ordering, kitchen handoff, close-out, and recovery before customers find it for you.
Read the field noteThe Pass · by FloPOS
Notes for people who run the shift.
No trend soup. No ten-paragraph answer to a one-line question. Just useful thinking about service flow, restaurant technology, data ownership, and what holds up when the queue reaches the door.
Start here
Three decisions hiding inside every POS decision.
Does it make service easier? Can you trust it on a bad day? Will you still control it when the business changes? These pieces answer one question at a time.
What actually matters in restaurant tech in 2026
AI is getting the headlines. Reliability, connected workflows, and useful back-office signals are doing the real work.
Read the field noteOpen source is control, not a security shortcut
A practical look at code visibility, local data, patching, backups, and the work required to scale responsibly.
Read the field noteThe full library
Every guide, comparison, and field note in one place.
The site has more than the four featured field notes. Use these collections to find practical answers by job, decision, restaurant type, or country.
Restaurant operations
Guides for the work behind the counter.
Restaurant POS software
The main hub for billing, menus, KDS, offline use, country pages, and alternatives.
Read the guideChoose a free restaurant POS
Costs, hardware, setup, training, and the limits of “free.”
Read the guideOpen source restaurant POS
Code access, licensing, maintenance, security, hardware, and responsibility.
Read the guidePlan a self-hosted setup
Devices, backups, ownership, and recovery in plain language.
Read the guideOffline restaurant POS
Local service continuity, payment limits, printer behavior, backups, and recovery.
Read the guideBuild a kitchen display workflow
Ticket states, routing, and the handoff between counter and kitchen.
Read the guideProtect restaurant POS data
Access, updates, backups, and sensible operational security.
Read the guideMake inventory signals useful
What POS data can reveal, and what still needs a stock process.
Read the guideRestaurant billing software
Dine-in, takeaway, taxes, payments, discounts, and receipts.
Read the guideRestaurant reporting software
Sales, items, tenders, staff activity, and operational decisions.
Read the guideRestaurant menu management
Categories, products, modifiers, variants, prices, and routing.
Read the guideRestaurant order management
Dine-in, takeaway, delivery, tables, KOT, and kitchen communication.
Read the guideOpen-source POS software
Code access, licensing, maintenance, security, and responsibility.
Read the guideRestaurant POS security
Access control, device safety, updates, backups, and incident planning.
Read the guideOffline POS systems
Separate local ordering, card authorization, printing, sync, and recovery.
Read the guideRestaurant POS migration checklist
Move menus, modifiers, printers, payments, staff, and data without discovering the gaps during service.
Read the guidePOS for a small cafe
Choose around counter speed, external payments, printers, scanners, offline use, and recoverable local data.
Read the guideOffline POS claim checklist
Questions and tests for orders, payments, printers, backups, migration, and export.
Read the guideOffline POS failure test plan
A restaurant test plan for local orders, external terminals, printers, sync, backups, and device recovery.
Read the guideRestaurant card processing fees
Interchange, processor markup, software, hardware, and the reconciliation work behind the headline rate.
Read the guidePOS without payment lock-in
Manual payment mapping, separate terminals, refunds, and daily reconciliation.
Read the guideGoogle Drive POS backups
What to back up, who owns access, and how to prove a restore works.
Read the guideManual restaurant tax setup
Inclusive tax, item rates, service charges, rounding, receipts, and change control.
Read the guideAll-in-one POS cost
Subscriptions, modules, hardware, processing markup, support, integrations, and exit costs.
Read the guideMulti-location inventory
Shared catalogs, location stock, transfers, recipe deduction, permissions, conflicts, and reporting.
Read the guidePhone orders to kitchen tickets
Customer lookup, modifiers, promised time, payment status, kitchen routing, edits, and pickup.
Read the guidePOS support during a rush
Severity, incident details, screenshots, workarounds, ownership, and post-shift review.
Read the guideCompare carefully
Use comparisons to find the operating tradeoff.
These pages are intentionally practical: commercial products may offer managed services and mature integrations, while FloCafe may suit teams that value source access and local control.
Toast alternative
Compare Toast against FloCafe for restaurants that want source access and local control.
Read comparisonLoyverse alternative
Compare mobile-first freemium POS with a free MIT-licensed restaurant POS.
Read comparisonFloreant alternative
Compare open-source restaurant POS projects, stacks, and maintenance signals.
Read comparisonuniCenta alternative
Compare broad POS roots with restaurant-first workflows and local ownership.
Read comparisonFloCafe vs Toast
Compare managed payments, support, integrations, cost, and local control.
Read comparisonFloCafe vs Square
A practical comparison for restaurants evaluating cloud and open-source options.
Read comparisonFloCafe vs Loyverse
Compare local ownership, commercial services, setup, and restaurant workflows.
Read comparisonFloCafe vs Odoo POS
Compare restaurant focus, extensibility, implementation, and operating responsibility.
Read comparisonFloCafe vs Floreant POS
Compare two open-source restaurant POS approaches and their tradeoffs.
Read comparisonFloCafe vs uniCenta
Compare deployment, restaurant workflows, support, and hardware validation.
Read comparisonRestaurant types
Start with the shape of your service.
POS for cafes
Fast counter service, menus, modifiers, receipts, and local control.
Read industry guidePOS for coffee shops
Drinks, addons, repeat orders, printers, and rush-hour speed.
Read industry guidePOS for bakeries
Product availability, quick checkout, receipts, and production handoff.
Read industry guidePOS for pizza restaurants
Modifiers, toppings, takeaway flow, kitchen routing, and delivery handoff.
Read industry guidePOS for food trucks
Compact hardware, fast ordering, connectivity planning, and mobile service.
Read industry guidePOS for cloud kitchens
Order flow, kitchen display, delivery coordination, and reporting.
Read industry guidePOS for fast food
High-volume counter operations, kitchen communication, and simple training.
Read industry guidePOS for fine dining
Tables, courses, modifiers, staff workflow, and careful service handoff.
Read industry guidePOS for restaurants
A broad starting point for billing, menu, kitchen, staff, and reporting decisions.
Read industry guideLocal questions
Country guides for the checks that change by market.
These pages are starting points, not claims of automatic tax or legal compliance. Verify local requirements before live billing.
Country directory
Browse every supported market, grouped by English-speaking, Spanish-speaking, and other country guides.
Browse the directoryEnglish-speaking countries
Compare the local checks for the USA, UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland, Africa, the Caribbean, and more.
Browse English guidesSpanish-speaking countries
Find country pages for Argentina, Chile, Mexico, Paraguay, and Uruguay, with local tax and workflow checks.
Browse Spanish guidesNo sales call. No card.
Put FloPOS through a real service test
Install it, load a real menu, and run a full service before you trust it with a Friday night.