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A Comprehensive Review of
Lightspeed
In-Depth Analysis
Lightspeed POS Review
Boasting strong inventory management features and a great loyalty program builder, Lightspeed is a leading cloud-based point-of-sale (POS) system. Lightspeed started out as a retail POS in 2013, established by, DaxDasilva in Montreal, Quebec. Over the years, it has grown into one of the most noteworthy POS providers in the world, offering point-of-sale software for restaurants and golf alongside a host of other platforms and tools.
As of now, Lightspeed boasts more than 51,000 customers spread across over 100 countries, excelling especially in the retail segment. An ideal choice for relatively established small businesses that require specialized 3rd-party software integrations and eCommerce compatibility, it brings a lot to the table.
While Lightspeed recommends that businesses purchase its POS hardware, the hardware is relatively affordable. Overall, this POS provider is a great choice with its strong suite of offerings aimed at superb compatibility and seamless integrations.
What is Lightspeed?
Lightspeed is a cloud-based point-of-sale system best known for its top-notch retail item inventory management. Designed for both product and service-based businesses, Lightspeed offers convenient and highly customizable POS solutions. Depending on their requirements and preferences, businesses can choose from a range of plans at different prices.
Lightspeed isn’t the cheapest POS solution out there and can be a little too expensive for smaller businesses. However, the suite of services offered by this POS provider makes it worth the cost for established businesses looking for a tailored POS system that can be integrated with a variety of third-party software.
The following points should summarize this POS provider’s key strengths:
- A comprehensive range of features, along with related services such as credit card processing.
- Suitable for a wide variety of businesses.
- 14-day free trial, with no credit card required.
- 24/7 tech support and personal account managers with all plans.
- Various add-ons, including tools for loyalty and customer management, eCommerce support with accounting software integration, and more.
What Type of Businesses Is Lightspeed Ideal For?
Available in four tiers, Lightspeed Retail POS is an all-in-one sales system designed to cater to online businesses as well as brick-and-mortar ones. Lightspeed is well-suited to a variety of businesses across the blended B2B/B2C, rental item, service-based, and subscription sales-based categories. However, it’s ideally meant for established businesses that require tailored POS solutions with a range of strong features, rather than small and new businesses.
One of the factors that set Lightspeed apart from other POS providers is that in addition to retail businesses and restaurants, it also offers a dedicated POS system for golf courses. Those running golf courses would find this POS system to be an ideal solution that covers every aspect of the business.
To sum up, Lightspeed POS is an ideal solution for the following businesses:
- Business models: Blended B2B/B2C, service-oriented, rental-item based, and subscription-based
- Business type: Retail, restaurants, golf courses, and other niche businesses
- Scale: Midsized and well-established small businesses
- Requirements: Businesses seeking powerful inventory management, register customization, B2B customer management, and other niche features.
Key Features That Make Lightspeed POS Stand Out
Lightspeed boasts a strong suite of features, offering comprehensive POS solutions. These include:
1. Inventory Management
Lightspeed’s exceptional inventory management capabilities are one of the key reasons why it’s one of the best POS systems out there. The stock control and multi-store management features allow users to manage and transfer stocks between different locations effortlessly. Other key inventory management features offered by Lightspeed include:
- Quick-add products
- Purchase ordering and invoicing
- B2B price book builder
- Order fulfillment
- Product bundling/breakdown
Besides these, Lightspeed also covers niche inventory management features such as consignment management, which makes it a great consignment software.
2. Register Features
Users can customize the Lightspeed POS interface by adding custom hotkeys, significantly speeding up the payment process for customers and employees. Compatible with all types of payments, Lightspeed POS also accepts gift certificates and gift cards by scanning bar codes.
The registers can also be integrated with Lightspeed Loyalty. This loyalty management tool enables businesses to reward customers both at physical locations and online through a points-based rewards system. Lightspeed POS registers also allow users to:
- Place items on hold or layaway
- Schedule services
- Apply discounts
- Create quotes
- Print or email custom receipts
- Preorder products
The seamless invoicing features offered by Lightspeed, along with its rental item management features, have helped it become a popular choice among service-oriented businesses.
3. Software Integrations
Lightspeed POS supports a diverse range of software integrations, making for a hassle-free POS experience. Retail businesses can integrate their Lightspeed POS systems with popular software and tools like Woocommerce, Homebase, QuickBooks, Mailchimp, and more. In addition to the popular integrations, Lightspeed also integrates with various niche software such as:
- Senitron RFID inventory tagging software
- Solink video surveillance software
- Hubtiger repair and rental integration
- Booxi private shopping appointment scheduling/personal shopping app
Lightspeed also offers a subscription manager add-on known as Lightspeed Subscriptions, which makes it an excellent grocery store POS system.
4. Customer Service
One of the areas where Lightspeed stands out from other POS providers is its excellent customer service across all plan tiers. This includes:
- Free onboarding sessions
- 24/7 Support via both chat and phone
- Webinars and guides
- Dedicated account managers
It’s common for businesses choosing higher-end pricing tiers to enjoy great customer service, with significantly better access to support than those choosing cheaper plans. With Lightspeed POS, however, even the businesses that go for the cheapest plan can enjoy quick and efficient customer support.
5. Online Sales Features
Lightspeed boasts a strong suite of features dedicated to online sales, with two versions of Lightspeed eCommerce to choose from – E series and C series. Businesses that choose the X-Series of Lightspeed Retailgain access to the former, while R-Series subscribers of Lightspeed Retail get the C-Series for Lightspeed eCommerce.
Between the two, the E-series can be tried out using the 14-day free trial offered by Lightspeed. Using Lightspeed eCommerce E-series, businesses can sell products on eCommerce platforms like Amazon and eBay and social media apps such as Facebook and TikTok. For a one-time fee, it also enables businesses to sell through their own custom mobile shopping apps on Android/Apple platforms. Furthermore, businesses can even choose from several provided site builder templates to build a one-page online store.
The E-series is well-suited to various online businesses, allowing them to offer local delivery, shipping, and in-store pickup options. However, businesses using Lightspeed eCommerce C-Series get to enjoy a number of additional features such as:
- Multicurrency and multilingual settings
- Displayed options for customer support
- A multi-page store builder with more well-rounded templates than E-series, including B2B templates
- Account registration for customers, along with a purchase and returns tracker.
- Wishlists and comparison of saved products for customers.
- A host of marketing tools
Considering the comprehensive range of features and tools offered by Lightspeed to facilitate hassle-free online sales, it’s no wonder that the POS system is popular among eCommerce businesses.
6. Admin Management
Lightspeed also packs a decent collection of admin management features, allowing business owners and managers to customize the roles and permissions of their employees. The intuitively designed Lightspeed Retail dashboard makes it easy to view account activity and purchases by customers. It even helps usersgenerate sales activity and product performance reports.
The admin management features also cover a plethora of loyalty program customizations, including:
- Setting the validity period of a loyalty program
- Customizing the loyalty points earnings for specific products
- Introducing a signup bonus for a loyalty program
- Emails with loyalty forms to be sent to new customers
- Determine the percentage of the retail value that loyalty members can earn for each sale (both online and in-store)
Thanks to the highly customizable loyalty program a business can build using Lightspeed, it’s possible to grant more loyalty points and discounts tospecific groups of customers. Together with the subscription builder feature, this makes Lightspeed a preferred choice for bookstores and other businesses that would like to offer their customers certain membership benefits.
Is Lightspeed POS Easy to Use?
Despite its vast suite of tools, features, and other related software, Lightspeed POS doesn’t leave much scope for complaint when it comes to ease of use. Setting up the system might appear a little complicated, but the system is ultimately quite simple and easy to use. Here’s a quick step-by-step guide on how to use Lightspeed POS.
Once a business purchases the POS system, Lightspeed provides it with complimentary live sessions for free onboarding and Q&A with a company representative. Furthermore, specialists at Lightspeed would then give the users a walkthrough of the software and guide them through all the steps. Users still have the option to sign up for a personalized follow-up session if they require additional guidance.
Lightspeed POS Pricing
As mentioned earlier, Lightspeed is not the cheapest POS provider out there, especially for small businesses. However, the company does offer a range of pricing tiers to choose from, with separate plans for retail businesses and restaurants.
Lightspeed Retail POS Plans
Depending on the size and scale, retail businesses can pick from four different pricing tiers:
Plan tier
Billed Annually
Billed Monthly
Lean
USD 119/month |
- USD 139/month
Standard
USD 169/month
- USD 199/month
Advanced
USD 249/month
- USD 319/month
Enterprise
Custom quote
- Custom quote
Lean (Covers the Essential Business Needs)
The Lean plan is ideal for single or multi-location businesses that primarily seek a customizable POS interface and powerful inventory management capabilities. In addition to the POS system, the plan also includes Lightspeed business, customer group management, customer accounts, layby sales,gift card sales, service sales, inventory manager, store credit, and order quotes.
Standard (Meant for Omnichannel Businesses)
Omnichannel businesses that are looking for strong accounting and eCommerce features would want to go for the Standard tier. In addition to everything covered by the Lean plan, this tier includes an eCommerce store builder and sales capabilities for social media and online marketplaces. The Standard plan also supports the integration of accounting software.
Advanced (Best for Building a Strong Loyalty Program)
With an even bigger suite of tools, this pricing tier is meant for businesses looking for more comprehensive solutions. Besides the perks offered by the Standard plan, this tier comes with a customizable loyalty program builder ideal for running complex loyalty programs. Advanced reporting features covered by this plan help businesses order purchases based on demand forecasts and past performances of different items.
Enterprise (The highest tier, meant for large businesses)
Large businesses and high-volume merchants have the option to request a custom quote based on their requirements, under the Enterprise tier. This plan comes with several additional perks such as customized onboarding, dedicated customer success managers, PremiumWorkflowsAPI access, custom user roles, and more.
Lightspeed Restaurant POS Plans
Like retail businesses, restaurants can choose from 3 different fixed pricing tiers and an enterprise-level custom plan too.
Plan tier
Monthly pricing
Starter
- USD 69/month
Essential
- USD 189/month
Premium
- USD 399/month
Enterprise
- Custom quote
Starter Plan (Simplified Daily Operations)
Priced at USD 69 a month, the Starter plan should suffice for small restaurants looking to simplify their daily operations. Despite being the starting tier, it comes with a host of offerings including:
- Customizable POS
- Menu manager
- Advanced insights
- Floor plans
- Single-view reconciliation
- CRM and loyalty
- Pre-auth bar mode
- Take-out and delivery support
Considering the pricing and the range of features covered, the Starter plan undoubtedly offers great value for money.
Essential (Improved Customer Experience)
Restaurants that are looking for a feature-rich POS solution to exceed their guests’ expectations might want to go for the second tier – Essential. In addition to all the features and perks covered in the starting tier, this plan also supports online and contactless ordering. These two ordering features are available as add-ons with the starter plan.
The plan also allows restaurants to offer patrons the option to order online and pay at the table. Additionally, features such as advanced inventory management, multi-location management, and a Lightspeed live app help streamline operations further.
Advanced (Improved Inter-Department Coordination)
Larger restaurants and chains with multiple major departments would benefit from the Advanced plan, which is tailored to improve coordination between departments. This plan grants raw API access and allows restaurants to create as many revenue and cost centers as required in their point-of-sale. Restaurants that choose one of the cheaper tiers can still pick multiple revenue center support as an optimal add-on.
Enterprise (Maximum Customization)
Large-scale F&B businesses that seek maximum customization in their POS system can choose the Enterprise tier. Just like its retail counterpart, the Enterprise plan for Lightspeed Restaurant POS allows businesses to request a custom quote. This tier comes with a personalized package of hardware and software, helping suit a restaurant’s requirements better. Businesses choosing the Enterprise plan also enjoy unlimited launch and consultation services, a dedicated support team, and a dedicatedcustomer success manager.
Lightspeed Golf Pricing
Lightspeed’s acquisition of Chronogolf in 2019 significantly enriched the company’s offerings, making it one of the leading POS providers for companies in the golf industry. However, unlike its retail and restaurant POS systems, Lightspeed Golf POS does not have multiple pricing tiers– or a fixed price at all, for that matter.
Instead, businesses can request a quote for a POS solution personalized for their facilities. This also opens up the scope for flexible payment options and frees up businesses from being stuck in long-term contracts. However, even the most basic Lightspeed Golf POS solution would always include the following:
- Online Booking
- Tee-Sheet
- Free Live Support
- Dynamic Pricing
- Promotional Engine
- Players Database
- Business Intelligence Lite
- Event management
- Monthly Updates
- SMS Marketing
Payment Processing Fees and Additional Register Charges
Thanks to Lightspeed’s in-house payment processor Lightspeed Payments, businesses do not have to use a third-party payment processor with the POS system. Lightspeed Payments is currently available in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia. For US and Canada-based merchants, it is mandatory to use the company’s in-house payment processor.
The good news, however, is that Lightspeed Payments is quite upfront and affordable when it comes to transaction fees. Businesses are charged $0.10 + 2.6% of the transaction value for each swiped, inserted, or tapped payment. For manual entries, there’s an additional charge of $0.20. Businesses that also use Lightspeed’s eCommerce integration would have to pay $10 + 2.9% per transaction.
Be it for retail businesses or restaurants, all the pricing tiers offered by Lightspeed include only 1 register by default. However, businesses can choose to get additional registers for an extra charge. Each additional register costs $29 per month for retail plans and $34 per month for restaurant plans.
Lightspeed POS Hardware Cost
Lightspeed offers quote-based pricing for its desktop and iPad hardware kits. However, the POS provider does list individual hardware products on its online store at the following prices:
- Chipper 2X BT card reader: $99
- iPad stand or swivel stand: $199
- iPad: $329
- Receipt printer: $399
- WisePOS E countertop reader: $299
- Lightspeed Lite Server: $429
- Cash drawer: $129
- Barcode scanner: $199
- Label printer: $124
While Lightspeed POS is relatively pricey in general, the hardware is cheaper compared to some of the other popular point of sale providers.
Lightspeed POS Reviews
While Lightspeed is easily one of the best POS providers out there, it’s not ideal for every business. Like every other point-of-sale solution out there, Lightspeed POS has both upsides and downsides. Let’s take a look at online reviews to get an idea of Lightspeed’s strengths and weak points. While there are common complaints on certain aspects, Lightspeed POS has garnered a lot of positive userreviews on popular review websites, with an average score of 4 out of 5 stars.
- Software Advice: 4/5 stars (938 reviews)
- G2: 4/5 stars (286 reviews)
- GetApp: 4.1/5 stars (937 reviews)
Positive Reviews
Users speaking positively of Lightspeed POS pointed out several benefits of choosing this point-of-salesystem, with the most common ones being:
- Quick setup:Thanks to the personalized setup process and live onboarding sessions, reviewers found it easy to get started. Training employees on even some of the relatively complicated aspects of Lightspeed POS is made easy by the onboarding process and walkthrough.
- Feature-rich: A lot of reviewers appreciate the strong set of diverse features offered by Lightspeed POS. The powerful inventory management and POS customization features have garnered special praise.
- Integrations: Lightspeed’s compatibility with the wide range of software integrations makes it extremely versatile, drawing praise from the reviewers.
Negative Reviews
However, Lightspeed POS isn’t entirely without drawbacks. Some of the common issues flagged by reviewers include:
- Glitches: Some users have reported system outages, adding that Lightspeed doesn’t resolve them quickly enough.
- Delayed customer support: While Lightspeed offers a promising suite of customer support solutions, several reviewers have reported slow response times. Lightspeed representatives are slow to respond even regarding crucial problems such as unexpected charges or outages, they claimed.
- Learning curve: Although Lightspeed’s comprehensive onboarding process makes things easier, the feature-rich POS system still comes with a relatively steep learning curve. Some reviewers report finding the system too complicated to manage.
Final Verdict on Lightspeed POS
To sum it up, midsized service providers, retailers, and businesses focused on membership or subscription-based sales would find Lightspeed to be an ideal POS solution. This point-of-sale system is also a great choice for niche businesses, such as jewelers, golf courses, and hotels. Dropshippers would find the top-notch inventory management capabilities to be a game changer, as would other businesses with complex inventories.
Small businesses can benefit from using Lightspeed too, as long as they are established well to make the most of its offerings. However, it’s worth keeping in mind that Lightspeed can quickly turn out to be an expensive investment. For large businesses that process thousands of dollars in transactions each month, Lightspeed’s payment processing structure isn’t cost-effective.
The good news, however, is that Lightspeed offers a 14-day free trial – with no business information or credit card required. This allows businesses to easily try out the POS system for free before deciding whether to purchase it or look for an alternative.
FAQs
1. Is Lightspeed a payment processor?
Lightspeed is a POS provider – one of the best out there for midsized businesses. However, the POS system comes integrated with a built-in payment processor called Lightspeed Payments.
2. Does Lightspeed Retail work offline?
Lightspeed Retail requires a stable internet connection to work properly. However, it’s possible to use it offline if the user is already logged in to the account and on the POS sales screen before losing connection. Though users can’t look up customers or products while offline, they can still accept payments and later re-sync them once the POS is connected again.
3. What types of receipts are available?
Lightspeed POS offers printed receipts, as well as digital receipts that are emailed to customers or texted to their phone numbers. Employees can also use the system, to print gift receipts at the register.