Clover vs Square for Restaurants Comparison: Everything You Need to Know Before Choosing

Clover is a point-of-sale and payments platform from Fiserv, one of the largest payment processing companies in the United States. It addresses the needs of small and mid-sized businesses that want a modern system to take payments, manage sales and run day-to-day operations without piecing together a separate cash register, card terminal and software. Clover’s approach is to combine purpose-built hardware with cloud-based software and integrated payment processing, so that merchants can accept card, contactless and mobile payments, track inventory and sales, and manage staff and customers from a single system. An app marketplace allows businesses to extend the core functionality to suit their industry and grow the system over time as their needs change. Clover hardware includes countertop systems such as Clover Station and Clover Mini, handheld devices such as Clover Flex, and compact readers like Clover Go for mobile payments. Software features cover item and inventory management, order and table management for restaurants, online ordering, employee management with time tracking and permissions, customer profiles, loyalty and marketing tools, gift cards and detailed sales reporting accessible through a web dashboard and mobile app. Industry-specific configurations are available for restaurants, retail, and professional and personal services, including appointment booking. The Clover App Market offers integrations for accounting, payroll, e-commerce, delivery and analytics, including QuickBooks and other widely used tools, and developers can build custom applications through Clover’s APIs. Clover is typically sold directly or through banks and payment resellers, which can affect pricing and contract terms. Its customers include restaurants, cafés, bars, retail stores, salons and service businesses of various sizes. Its integrated hardware and payments model suits merchants seeking a turnkey system. Pricing is not published in this listing and typically depends on the hardware, software plan and processing agreement; there is no free trial and no free version.