European Alternatives to Lightspeed
Looking for a European alternative to Lightspeed? Lightspeed Commerce Inc. is headquartered in Montreal, Canada, and sells point-of-sale software for retail, restaurants and golf courses, with payments, eCommerce and wholesale modules on top. Its US price list shows retail plans from $89 a month and restaurant plans from $69 a month, plus a card-present payment rate of 1.5% on retail plans.
The European tools below cover the same two jobs, retail counters and hospitality floors, from Austria, the UK, the Netherlands, Germany and France, with local fiscal rules such as TSE, RKSV and NF525 handled in the product and several published monthly prices starting under €30.
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10 European Alternatives to Lightspeed
Ready2Order
One Vienna-built till for the shop counter and the dining room
Epos Now
Retail-first cloud till with a long list of third-party connectors
unTill
Dutch hospitality till with a light tier and an enterprise tier
Orderbird
German iPad till for restaurants that have to satisfy the TSE rules
Tiller
Parisian iPad till with kitchen display and SumUp payments built in
SumUp
Berlin card readers and till app for a small counter with no software fee
Gastronovi
Bremen cloud till with reservations, stock and rotas in the licence
Innovorder
Paris platform with kiosks and QR ordering for fast-food and canteen groups
CashPad
French restaurant chain till with real-time multi-site figures
L'Addition
Bordeaux iPad till priced through an online hardware configurator
Key takeaways
- Lightspeed Commerce Inc. is headquartered in Montreal, Canada, and its privacy policy names Lightspeed Netherlands B.V. in Amsterdam as the contact for requests from the EEA and the UK.
- On its US pricing page of 20 October 2026, Lightspeed Retail starts at 89 USD a month and Lightspeed Restaurant at 69 USD a month, each with extra charges for further registers, locations or add-ons.
- Lightspeed's privacy policy states that customer data may be transferred to and stored in the United States, Canada and other countries outside the EEA and the UK.
- Ready2Order from Vienna and Orderbird from Berlin both start at €29 a month and both list TSE fiscal compliance among their features.
- unTill, a Dutch company, publishes three hospitality plans from €21.85 a month excluding VAT and offers a 14-day trial without payment details.
Why people leave Lightspeed
Lightspeed Commerce Inc. is a Montreal company that sells till software to three kinds of business: shops (Lightspeed Retail), restaurants and hotels (Lightspeed Restaurant) and golf courses. Around the till it sells payments, an eCommerce storefront, wholesale ordering through its NuORDER network, a cash-advance programme called Capital, and an AI assistant. For a retailer with stock in several places, that breadth is the reason it gets shortlisted at all.
Buyers in Europe start looking elsewhere for ordinary reasons. The public price list is in US dollars, the base plan is only the start of the bill, and the privacy policy says plainly that personal data may be moved to and stored in the United States, Canada and other countries outside the EEA. The legal contact for the parent is an address in Montreal, with a Dutch company in Amsterdam handling privacy requests from the EEA and the UK.
Nothing in that makes Lightspeed unusable in Europe, and it sells in the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, France and Switzerland through local sites. The question is narrower: whether a Canadian platform fits a business whose till is also a tax instrument under national rules, and whether a European vendor built around those rules costs less or fits better.
- Pricing is published in dollars and grows with every add-on On 20 October 2026 the US retail page listed Basic at 89 USD, Core at 149 USD and Plus at 289 USD a month, with a toggle that promises up to 18% off for annual billing, and each plan includes one register. Extra registers and locations are priced separately. The restaurant page started at 69 USD and reached 399 USD for Premium, with reservations and tasks sold as add-ons. Several European tills publish a single euro figure for a licence.
- Your customer data may leave the EEA Lightspeed's privacy policy, effective 8 July 2026, states that data collected may be transferred to and stored in the United States, Canada or other countries outside the EEA and the UK, and that those countries may not have the same data protection laws. It also lists US affiliates (including Vend, Ecwid and NuORDER) as certified to the Data Privacy Framework. A European vendor removes the question for a business that would rather not answer it.
- Payments depend on where you trade The retail price list shows a card-present rate of 1.5% on all three plans, but Lightspeed's own footnote on the mobile scanner app limits taking payments on it to the US, Canada, the UK, Australia, Ireland and the Netherlands. A shop in Vienna or Lyon has to check what is actually offered locally. European tills that were designed around one country's acquirers and fiscal rules answer that at the first sales call.
- The product range is wider than most venues use Golf tee sheets, wholesale buying from brand catalogues, landed-cost calculation and a cash-advance programme are real features, but a single café or a one-shop retailer pays for a platform built for multi-site chains. A till that does one job at a smaller price, such as a table plan with a kitchen screen, is often the better fit at that size.
What you have to replace, not just match
Moving off Lightspeed Retail means replacing more than a checkout screen. The retail plans bundle inventory with variants and stock across channels, a built-in eCommerce storefront, a wholesale ordering link, loyalty, reporting, a scanner app for counting stock, and optional API access and workflows.
Make a list of which of these your shop uses weekly. The tills below cover the counter and the stock list well; a webshop synchronised to the same stock, or a supplier catalogue feed, usually has to be rebuilt through an integration.
On the restaurant side, Lightspeed sells a menu manager, floor plans, coursing, a kitchen display system, order-anywhere ordering, tableside payment devices, reservations and a mobile reporting app, with several of those billed as add-ons. Count the screens in your dining room and the people who use them, then check each European candidate against that list rather than against its tagline.
Do not forget the legal layer. A till in Germany has to sign transactions with a TSE, one in Austria with RKSV, one in France has to meet NF525. If you currently run a till from outside those countries, ask your accountant how those obligations are met today, because a European till will make the same question impossible to ignore.
The alternatives compared
| Position | Tool | Headquarters | Pricing | Jurisdiction |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #1 | Ready2Order | Vienna, Austria | From €29 per month | EU (Austria) |
| #2 | Epos Now | Newcastle upon Tyne, United Kingdom | From £25 per month | United Kingdom (adequacy decision, outside the EEA) |
| #3 | unTill | Wemeldinge, Netherlands | unTill Air from €21.85/month (Basic), €33.85/month (Standard), €44.85/month (Hospitality Extra), excl. VAT with 15% off annually; unTill Prime on custom pricing | EU (Netherlands) |
| #4 | Orderbird | Berlin, Germany | From €29 per month | EU (Germany) |
| #5 | Tiller | Paris, France | From €59 per month | EU (France) |
| #6 | SumUp | Berlin, Germany | From 1.69% per transaction | EU (Germany) |
| #7 | Gastronovi | Bremen, Germany | From €69/month for the first licence, €59/month for licences 2–5, €49/month from the 6th licence; weekly tariff of €25 also available | EU (Germany) |
| #8 | Innovorder | Paris, France | Starter from €79/month (1 point of sale, NF525-compliant till); Growth from €299/month (2–10 points of sale); custom pricing above 10 sites or for collective catering | EU (France) |
| #9 | CashPad | Paris, France | From €49 per month | EU (France) |
| #10 | L'Addition | Bordeaux, France | Custom pricing via an online configurator (iPad, printer, payment terminal, ordering tablets); no published rate | EU (France) |
How each alternative compares to Lightspeed
Ready2Order
The nearest single replacement for a Lightspeed shop that also serves food or drinks.
Best for: Mixed businesses and small groups in Austria and Germany that sell at a counter and at tables.
Against Lightspeed, Ready2Order is the one tool here that is not forced to choose between retail and restaurant. It lists cloud POS, table management, inventory tracking, online ordering integration and multi-location support in one product from ready2order GmbH in Vienna, which is why a bakery with seats or a concept store with a café can cover both with one subscription.
The price is a single published figure, from €29 a month, where Lightspeed shows a plan ladder in dollars with add-ons above it. The compliance angle is the other difference: the till handles Austrian RKSV and German TSE, which the Lightspeed pages checked do not list as built-in features.
What Ready2Order does better than Lightspeed
- Entry price: €29 a month against 69 USD or 89 USD at Lightspeed
- Fiscal rules for Austria and Germany are part of the product
- One system for café and shop instead of two Lightspeed products
- European company with EU data handling
Where Ready2Order is a step down from Lightspeed
- Less depth in retail inventory than Lightspeed Retail, which targets multi-store merchants
- Smaller footprint outside Austria and Germany
- Hardware is bought on top of the licence
Standout against Lightspeed. It is the only tool here that covers both a shop counter and a dining room under one Austrian licence.
Best for: Shops that depend on accounting, eCommerce and stock integrations and trade in the UK or Ireland.
Epos Now is the better answer when what you value in Lightspeed Retail is the connected stock list. It offers cloud POS, inventory management across locations, staff management and an analytics dashboard, with more than 100 integrations listed, so accounting and webshop links that you rely on today have a decent chance of existing.
Starting at £25 a month it undercuts the 89 USD retail entry plan, but jurisdiction needs a sentence: Epos Now is a UK company, covered by the EU adequacy decision rather than established in the EU. Its feature list also does not mention TSE, RKSV or NF525, so check your country first.
What Epos Now does better than Lightspeed
- Monthly entry price against Lightspeed Retail Basic
- A long integration list for accounting and online sales
- Flexible hardware, so existing equipment can often be kept
- Separate retail and hospitality set-ups
Where Epos Now is a step down from Lightspeed
- UK jurisdiction, not EU establishment
- No stated support for German, Austrian or French fiscal rules
- Lacks Lightspeed's golf, wholesale and capital products
Standout against Lightspeed. More than 100 integrations make it the easiest swap for a shop whose Lightspeed set-up is mostly connectors.
unTill
A Dutch hospitality till with a light tier and a heavier one, like Lightspeed's own ladder.
Best for: Dutch and Belgian venues leaving Lightspeed Restaurant that want published prices and a trial.
unTill mirrors the shape of the Lightspeed Restaurant range: unTill Air is the self-serve cloud till on tablet or phone, unTill Prime is the customised system for larger venues. Air costs €21.85, €33.85 or €44.85 a month excluding VAT, with 15% off on annual billing, and the 14-day trial asks for no payment details.
The Dutch registration of unTill Software Development Group B.V. matters for Benelux buyers, where Lightspeed also sells. Prime is quoted individually, so the top end cannot be compared by price, and the vendor's own pages do not claim TSE, RKSV or NF525 compliance.
What unTill does better than Lightspeed
- Published euro prices for every Air tier
- Trial without payment details, so you test on your own menu
- Dutch contracting entity under EU law
- More than 125 integrations with other hospitality software
Where unTill is a step down from Lightspeed
- Prime pricing is on request only
- Sold through resellers, so support can depend on the partner
- No explicit fiscal-compliance claim for Germany, Austria or France
Standout against Lightspeed. It offers a budget cloud till and an enterprise system under one Dutch name, just as Lightspeed does.
Best for: German restaurants, bars and cafés that run on iPads and need certified transaction signing.
If your Lightspeed Restaurant set-up is mostly floor plans, tables and a payment step, Orderbird covers that on an iPad at €29 a month. orderbird AG in Berlin builds around German gastronomy, so the TSE signature is a built-in feature rather than something you ask a reseller about.
It does not try to be a platform. There is no wholesale network, no golf product and no cash-advance programme, and the integration list is shorter than at a general platform. For a single-site or small multi-site restaurant in Germany, that narrowness is the point.
What Orderbird does better than Lightspeed
- TSE compliance is part of the product
- Entry price against Lightspeed Restaurant Starter at 69 USD
- iPad hardware many staff already know
- German company with German data handling
Where Orderbird is a step down from Lightspeed
- Hospitality only, with no retail inventory
- Smaller integration ecosystem than Lightspeed
- Mainly useful inside Germany
Standout against Lightspeed. TSE signing is built into the till from €29 a month, not offered as a local add-on.
Best for: French restaurants and cafés that want kitchen display and online orders in the same flow.
Tiller is the tool to look at when the part of Lightspeed Restaurant you use most is the kitchen display and the ordering flow. It runs on iPad with table management, a kitchen display system, online ordering integration and multi-location support, from €59 a month.
It belongs to SumUp, so card payments are native to the product, and the company works from Paris. That price is higher than Orderbird or Ready2Order, but below the 189 USD Essential tier at Lightspeed Restaurant, and aimed squarely at French hospitality rather than shops.
What Tiller does better than Lightspeed
- Native card payments through SumUp
- Kitchen display and online orders in one flow
- French company with EU data handling
- Lower monthly price than Lightspeed Restaurant Essential
Where Tiller is a step down from Lightspeed
- Higher entry price than other European hospitality tills
- No retail features at all
- Mostly built for the French market
Standout against Lightspeed. Kitchen display and delivery orders arrive in the same flow as table orders, with SumUp handling the payment.
SumUp
A card reader with a till app for a small counter that does not want a software subscription.
Best for: Market stalls, small shops and mobile sellers who pay per transaction instead of per month.
SumUp answers a different question than Lightspeed does. There is no monthly software plan on the entry level: you buy the reader, take cards from 1.69% per transaction, and use the point of sale app, invoicing and a business account from the same Berlin company.
Compared with Lightspeed Retail, which lists a 1.5% card-present rate on top of a plan from 89 USD a month, SumUp's total cost depends on volume. A small shop with low takings pays less, while a busy counter will find the per-transaction rate adds up.
What SumUp does better than Lightspeed
- No monthly software fee on entry plans
- Fast set-up with inexpensive hardware
- Invoicing and a business account from the same provider
Where SumUp is a step down from Lightspeed
- No table management or kitchen display
- Thin inventory features against Lightspeed Retail
- A higher percentage rate than the 1.5% card-present figure Lightspeed advertises
Standout against Lightspeed. It is the cheapest way to leave a monthly plan behind when your counter takes few cards.
Best for: German restaurants that currently pay for Lightspeed add-ons such as reservations and tasks.
Lightspeed sells reservations and task lists as add-ons, while Gastronovi folds reservations, inventory management, staff scheduling and a kitchen monitor into the till. The first licence is €69 a month, the second to fifth cost €59 each and licences from the sixth are €49 each.
There is also a weekly €25 tariff for seasonal peaks, which has no counterpart in the Lightspeed price list. Gastronovi GmbH has belonged to the Transgourmet Group since 2017, and its own pages do not make an explicit TSE claim, so confirm that point before you rely on it.
What Gastronovi does better than Lightspeed
- Reservations and inventory are part of the core product
- Per-licence prices that fall from the second terminal
- A weekly tariff for seasonal venues
Where Gastronovi is a step down from Lightspeed
- Entry price above Orderbird and Ready2Order
- No explicit TSE statement on its own pages
- No published free trial
Standout against Lightspeed. The weekly €25 tariff suits a beach bar or Christmas market that Lightspeed's monthly plans do not.
Best for: French chains and collective catering sites that want self-order hardware.
Innovorder is closest to the high-volume end of Lightspeed Restaurant. Self-service kiosks, QR-code table ordering, click-and-collect and delivery links are central, and the NF525-compliant till is part of the Starter plan at €79 a month for one point of sale.
The Growth plan costs €299 a month for two to ten points of sale and includes kiosks, loyalty and kitchen display, which is a large step from the entry plan. Above ten sites the price is a quote. A small sit-down restaurant is better served elsewhere.
What Innovorder does better than Lightspeed
- Kiosk and QR ordering built into the product
- Published tiers for one site and for two to ten sites
- NF525 compliance for French operators
Where Innovorder is a step down from Lightspeed
- Built for chains, not a single small restaurant
- Growth tier costs €299 a month
- Custom pricing above ten sites
Standout against Lightspeed. Kiosks and QR ordering are included in the plans rather than sold as separate hardware projects.
Best for: French restaurant groups that need NF525 and one view across several sites.
CashPad targets the multi-site part of Lightspeed Restaurant, where the manager wants real-time analytics across sites instead of next-day reports. From €49 a month, it adds delivery platform integration, kitchen management and NF525 fiscal compliance on an iPad-based interface.
The compliance basis is French, so it is the wrong tool for a German or Austrian venue that needs TSE or RKSV. A single independent restaurant gets more platform than it needs, and the monthly fee sits next to whatever card processing costs you arrange.
What CashPad does better than Lightspeed
- NF525 compliance is part of the product
- Consistent menus and pricing across several sites
- Delivery orders feed into the kitchen flow
Where CashPad is a step down from Lightspeed
- Not for TSE or RKSV countries
- More platform than one restaurant needs
Standout against Lightspeed. A regional manager sees live figures for every site instead of waiting for end-of-day reports.
L'Addition
A Bordeaux iPad till for French cafés and hotels, priced by quote through a configurator.
Best for: French, Swiss, Monaco and Luxembourg venues that want hardware and software quoted together.
L'Addition puts order taking, payment, table reservations and online ordering into a single iPad and iPhone app, made by Adstellam SAS, founded in Bordeaux in 2012. Its coverage reaches France, its overseas territories, Switzerland, Monaco and Luxembourg, which is wider than the other French tills on this page.
There is no published price. An online configurator builds the quote from the iPad, printer, payment terminal and ordering tablets you choose, which suits a buyer who wants one invoice but makes a side-by-side check against Lightspeed's dollar list impossible without a call.
What L'Addition does better than Lightspeed
- Hardware and software priced together in one quote
- Reservations and online ordering in the same app
- French company under EU law
Where L'Addition is a step down from Lightspeed
- No published price for a quick comparison
- Built for cafés, hotels and restaurants, not retail
- Reach stops at a small group of countries
Standout against Lightspeed. Choose the iPad, printer and terminal in a configurator and receive one quote for the whole counter.
What actually breaks when you switch
The first job is data. Ask Lightspeed for exports of products, customers and sales history before you cancel, because the pages checked for this page do not describe a standard export. Test the import on the new till with a copy of the product list, and keep the old account running through one full accounting period so your records and any returns can still be traced.
Then come the connections. Accounting links, the webshop, delivery platforms and payment terminals are what usually break on a till change. Check that your accountant can read the new till's reports, that terminals are compatible with the acquirer you choose, and that staff are trained on the new menu before the first busy weekend, not during it. Contract terms also deserve a read, since the Lightspeed Service Agreement could not be read for this page.
Is Lightspeed an American company?
No. Lightspeed Commerce Inc. gives a Montreal, Quebec address as its head office in its privacy policy, so it is a Canadian company. Its policy also lists American subsidiaries, among them Lightspeed POS USA Inc., Vend, Inc., Ecwid, Inc. and Lightspeed NuORDER Inc., which it describes as certified under the Data Privacy Framework.
For a European buyer the practical point is data location and contract terms, not the passport of the parent. Ask Lightspeed in writing where your sales and customer records are stored, and compare that answer with the one a European vendor gives you.
Can a European till replace Lightspeed Golf or Lightspeed eCommerce?
Not on this page. None of the tools listed here sells a golf tee-sheet product, and for a webshop you would normally pair a till with a separate shop platform rather than expect it inside the till. Epos Now and Ready2Order list online ordering or eCommerce connections as features, but both are connectors, not a full storefront.
A golf club should keep its tee sheet where it is and replace only the shop and restaurant tills. A retailer who relies on the built-in Lightspeed webshop should plan the webshop migration as its own project.
Which one to pick
If you run a shop that sometimes serves food, start with Ready2Order. If stock and integrations matter most, take a look at Epos Now, with the jurisdiction note in mind. For a restaurant, the choice is mostly national: Orderbird or Gastronovi in Germany, Tiller, CashPad, Innovorder or L'Addition in France, and unTill in the Netherlands.
Stay with Lightspeed if you depend on its golf product, the wholesale network, or inventory across many stores, where none of these European tools matches its depth. Choose SumUp instead if your problem is the monthly plan rather than missing features, and you take few cards.
Frequently Asked Questions
For a business that sells both over the counter and from a menu, Ready2Order from Vienna is the closest single replacement, since it covers retail and hospitality with TSE and RKSV compliance from €29 a month. Epos Now from the UK suits shops that need many integrations. For restaurants, unTill, Orderbird, Tiller and Gastronovi each fit a country or a size better than a general platform.
On the US pricing pages checked on 20 October 2026 the prices were in US dollars: Retail Basic 89, Core 149 and Plus 289 a month, and Restaurant Starter 69, Essential 189 and Premium 399. Lightspeed runs separate sites for the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, France and others, and local prices may differ, so ask for a quote in your own currency before comparing with the euro prices on this page.
unTill, Orderbird, Tiller, Gastronovi, Innovorder, CashPad and L'Addition are built around hospitality. Orderbird covers German TSE rules, CashPad and Innovorder meet the French NF525 standard, and unTill is the Dutch option. Tiller and Gastronovi bundle a kitchen display or kitchen monitor. Match the choice to the country you trade in, because the fiscal rules differ.
Lightspeed's privacy policy (effective 8 July 2026) says it may transfer data to and store it in the United States, Canada or other destinations outside the EEA and the UK, and that it relies on the Data Privacy Framework for its US affiliates. The Service Agreement and data processing agreement, which could not be read for this page, are the documents that define your own contract, so read them before you sign.
The Lightspeed pages checked for this page do not describe an export format, so treat this as unverified and ask Lightspeed for a product and customer export before you cancel. Most European tills listed here import product lists from spreadsheets, but confirm that with each vendor, and keep the Lightspeed account active until your first full month on the new till has closed.
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