2024 POS Software Trends: Vendors Give A Glimpse of New Features Coming in 2024

GK Software
www.gk-software.com/us/

In 2023: GK launched GK Engage, an AI-powered loyalty program for omnichannel checkout. This solution enables hospitality businesses to deliver highly personalized messaging, offers and rewards at the point of sale, enhancing customer lifetime value and competitive differentiation. GK Engage draws inspiration from two successful GK solutions, MCA, GK’s mobile loyalty program and T+ Loyalty, which have serviced more than one billion transactions per year for over six million users. Now, GK Engage offers loyalty across a comprehensive platform that covers a wide variety of touchpoints, including mobile and in-person.

Most innovative features: Uses AI to establish loyalty tiers, track customer interactions and generate relevant campaigns to nurture long-term relationships between businesses and customers, ultimately maximizing customer lifetime value. The technology’s integration of master data and customer data ensures that all recommendations, promotions and coupons cater to individual customers. Integrates with GK's OmniPOS solution, an offering that spans traditional POS, self-checkout kiosks, mobile and frictionless store technology. GK Engage also integrates with GK GO, GK’s scanless store technology. 

In 2024: Enhancing in-store deployment architecture, bringing the benefits of containerization, microservices and other cloud technologies to the edge.  Expanding its platform adapters, allowing merchants to easily plug in their own interfaces. ( developed a standard adapter for order management systems, adding hooks for fraud prevention.) Integrating Apache Kafka data streaming, so merchants can get real-time access to retail and hospitality data.  This integration will allow all merchants to investigate data monetization projects either on their own or with GK’s assistance. 

GoTab
gotab.com

In 2023: Introduced Pocket POS: Ideal for fast-paced environments offering table service, GoTab’s all-in-one pocket-sized ordering and payment device enables team members to take orders, manage tabs, process payments, and communicate with front- and back-of-house from anywhere in real-time. It’s built to maximize utility and encourage on-demand service for a guest-centric experience, equipped with a feature that transforms the product into a virtual check presenter for easy guest-led payment.

Built for high-volume venues with limited staff, the GoTab Self-Ordering Kiosk enables guests to independently browse, place orders and submit payment through one, easy-to-use interface. Guests can start new orders, customizing and modifying items based on preference, and pay at the kiosk with any accepted method of payment. Once processed, orders are routed to the kitchen and/or their respective merchants for fulfillment, and guests are alerted via text when and where their order is ready for pickup. The GoTab Self-Ordering Kiosk integrates seamlessly with GoTab’s suite of solutions. Advanced its iOS payment capabilities. Small Plate Coursing: Purpose-built for restaurants specializing in small-plate dining, this feature empowers servers to fire courses to the kitchen in automatic intervals and adjust orders in real-time, optimizing back-of-house operations and enabling a more enjoyable guest experience. Percentage Rent Structure: Allows landlords to purchase GoTab’s POS system in order to deliver a turnkey digital setup for restaurant operators looking to rent their space. As part of the deal, tenants remit a percentage of their rent on a weekly basis. 

Most innovative features: Guests never need to download a mobile app.  Easy Tab feature allows guests at full-service establishments to open a tab the traditional way through a server or bartender, and then receive a text code to re-order and pay the final check through their personal mobile device. Insufficient Funds Protection product: When a guest initiates an order with a credit or debit card, GoTab performs an automatic authorization, locking the funds equivalent to the outstanding balance. Each time the guest places a new order, GoTab repeats the authorization. Combating a major problem often not thought about from an operator perspective, the Insufficient Funds Protection product significantly mitigates losses associated with failed charges and insufficient fund occurrences for measurable cost savings. Maintains an open API that enables easy integration. Companies can use their existing hardware if they’d like, which creates huge cost savings for operators.

In 2024: Adding even more integrations and flexible features to improve operations.

HungerRush 

www.hungerrush.com

In 2023: Integrated directly with ItsaCheckmate, a third-party online ordering aggregator to ensure HungerRush 360 POS System is compatible with all major online ordering vendors.

Direct integration with DoorDash & UberEats sends those orders into the POS, no tablets required. Integration with Menufy. Menufy by HungerRush specializes in online ordering for carry-out & delivery by providing restaurants with a website, online ordering, the Menufy marketplace app for consumers and automated marketing.

Most innovative features: OrderAI - HungerRush OrderAI is an artificially intelligent phone bot that automatically captures phone orders and text orders and sends them directly to a restaurant’s POS without the need for human involvement. HungerRush 360 Marketing integrates directly with the HungerRush 360 POS System to provide automatic and personalized email and SMS marketing campaigns based on the consumer's order history and habits. Integrated in-house, curbside, fleet management, and third-party delivery support, including dispatch capabilities. Web-based restaurant management online portal that gives restaurant owners the freedom to manage menus, pricing, staffing, reports, and more from anywhere. 

In 2024: SMS Consumer Delivery Tracking, which will empower customers to track their delivery via SMS automatically. Uber Direct Integration to give our restaurant owners the flexibility they need to manage their delivery operations HungerRush POS. Punchh Loyalty and Olo jntegrations. QR Code Support. 

Consumer Survey that will integrate directly with HungerRush POS. This new survey functionality is automated and customizable and surveys can be sent to the consumer automatically after an order is placed, ensuring the voice of the customer is always captured. It also comes with a restaurant-facing dashboard so owners and operators can track consumer feedback in real time and make improvements faster.

NCR Voyix

www.ncr.com

In 2023: NCR split into two publicly traded companies – one focused exclusively on ATMs and the other targeting digital commerce, NCR Voyix. Bolstered consumer marketing and loyalty solutions with an updated data management, loyalty and marketing platform for restaurants. 

Innovative features: Contactless technology, contactless ordering and payment; digital loyalty and marketing programs; integrated mobile technology.

In 2024: The labor shortage remains a concern for restaurant owners and operators, and increased automation in back-of-house operations would free up staff for more crucial tasks tied to guest experience. 

While NCR Voyix already offers a point-of-sale system that seamlessly integrates front- and back-of-house processes, it is looking to improve this even further to ensure restaurants can seamlessly manage omnichannel experiences in the front-of-house and optimize inventory management in the back-of-house. 

PAR Technology

partech.com

In 2023: PAR integrated MENU’s digital ordering into PAR Brink POS. The system now serves as a centralized source of truth for all digital orders from both first and third-party channels. Introduced Apple Wallet Loyalty, powered by PAR Brink, PAR Punchh, PAR Pay and MENU. This innovation enables restaurants to enroll, earn, redeem rewards and make payments with a simple tap on mobile devices. Apple Wallet Loyalty seamlessly integrates with the Apple Wallet. The introduction of larger order preview panels eliminates the need for manual searches, allowing restaurant staff to view up to eight detailed orders at once on the POS screen. The tablet-optimized drag-and-drop functionality facilitates resequencing of guest orders in drive-thrus. 

Most innovative features: Open API and Partner Ecosystem with 300+ integrations. Restaurants can retain their preferred third-party partners while incorporating new ones. Seamless POS configuration process, allowing restaurants to choose from out-of-the-box templates or design their own custom layouts. Scalable.

In 2024: Exploring advancements to enhance user interfaces, introduce new functionalities, and leverage emerging technologies. The focus will be on improving employee satisfaction, optimizing operational efficiency, and enabling restaurants to provide the best possible guest experience.

Paytronix

www.paytronix.com

In 2023: Introduced Paytronix Online Ordering and makes app personalization faster and cheaper.

Most innovative features: Paytronix Mobile Experience Builder enables brands to publish real-time updates to reach their mobile guests. Brands can hyper-personalize messages, images, and promotions for 1:1 guest engagement.

Coming down the pike:  Paytronix expects that POS software will continue to incorporate new AI technology including generative AI and machine learning. Paytronix incorporates ChatGPT into the feedback module of Paytronix Online Ordering. This ChatGPT enhancement lets operators reply quickly to guest concerns by providing a relevant, pre-written email that front-line managers can edit and send. By responding quickly and directly to guest concerns, brands can keep guests engaged, boost customer lifetime value, and limit negative reviews from appearing on platforms like Google and Yelp.

In 2024: Paytronix will continue to develop these capabilities to further automate the response process, saving store managers even more time – and in some cases, totally automating the entire guest interaction.

Qu

https://www.qubeyond.com
In 2023:  Expanded Qu’s Kitchen Display System to support both Windows and Android devices, in a range of price points, screen sizes, and protective options. Introduced the Qu Production Optimization Board. This is AI-powered, Kitchen Production Optimization, built to scale and made to power local decision making. Powered by Qu’s proprietary AI-powered forecasting architecture that combines historical trends with event, weather, and other local signals, along with in-store and online transactions, it helps kitchen production staff to prepare just in time and just the right amount - to improve speed of service, while reducing spoilage. Next-generation KDS enhancements include touch screen for intuitive gesture-based operation, Spy Screens that enable any Qu KDS to see/spy any other KDS screen. Advanced capabilities within Qu’s AI-powered Notify mobile reporting app, including analytics by kitchen station, and an advanced alerting interface enabling staff to stay up to date. Dynamic Cross-sell and Up-sell, enabling brands to test and optimize promotions. Enhanced support for multi-lane drive-through configurations, improving order accuracy and overall DT throughput. Dynamic QR code generation on receipts, enabling precision tracking, testing, and optimization. 

Most innovative features: Built from the ground up, Qu is designed to meet the changing and complex nature of large, multi-store, enterprise QSR and fast-casual restaurant chains.  Unified operator tools and technologies, grounded in micro-services architecture and single menu management system. Multi-brand and co-brand management through one unified backend and data experience. Unified data aggregation and normalization across all ordering channels. Native KDS that syncs seamlessly with POS and digital orders for faster, more accurate fulfillment times.  Commerce cloud – Qu’s in-store and above-store cloud features ensure 100% redundancy and uptime. Ability to integrate directly with third-party delivery and any other partner seamlessly. Agile development and release methodology - we deliver new features and fixes every 2-3 weeks. 

In 2024: The AI-powered architecture and services that power the Qu Production Optimization Board are built from the ground up to support a broad range of forecasting and production challenges, and Qu will introduce a number of new features and functions powered by this architecture in 2024.  

Restroworks
www.restroworks.com

In 2023: Continued to focus deeply on our strategic pillars of people, customers, and products. We have invested significantly in growing our presence globally this year in markets like the US, Latin America, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. New developments in infrastructure and compliance, now established to provide a scalable cloud platform for enterprise restaurant chains. Certified by SOC 2, GDPR, ISO 27001, and ISO 27017, to provide the required security and risk management standards for large enterprise chains. Launched Posist Academy, a learning platform for our customers and their frontline staff, equipping them with the knowledge to become more efficient in their daily tasks.

New advancements in the Reporting, Front of House, and Back of House stack:

• A new Enterprise Analytics Dashboard that offers data-driven insights. Features include interactive nested graphs, real-time restaurant stats viewing, and contextual date ranges. It provides a unified interface to unlock trends, streamline operations and harness real-time insights.
• Table Layout: A CAD map approach creates superior table layouts for the POS billing system. The user-friendly interface enables easy customization and table resizing with drag-and-drop functionality.
• Course-wise Ordering: Added to the Front of House stack, this feature enables waitstaff to take course-based orders, ensuring a seamless and organized dining experience. 

Most innovative features: End-to-end inventory management. Modern cloud POS technology interconnects with other technologies used in restaurants, such as online ordering platforms, guest-facing technology, and kitchen display systems (KDS). This integration allows for recording stock counts, sharing real-time analytics, and auto-updating item prices, thereby streamlining tracking and decision-making. More than 400 integrations in its marketplace.  

Revel Systems
www.revelsystems.com

In 2023: Revel rolled out an innovative and unique order management system that integrates the POS, kitchens, and third-party providers to create a unified order management view that serves as a single source of truth for all channels — drive thru, online, catering, delivery, counter, kiosk, tableside, etc. From this view, restaurant employees can easily act on these orders to enhance speed of service and order accuracy. Employees can also categorize on and off-premises orders with an order management queue and can easily identify and filter orders based on order channel, status, and more. A fully integrated order management system solves the number-one challenge for operators: how to successfully manage multiple order channels and still deliver the same levels of great service to their customers. It also allows them to optimize these channels for profitability.

Most innovative features: Order management system. KDS has a broad set of capabilities. Revel also provides kiosks, customer display screens, order management boards, sophisticated enterprise management. Open API infrastructure.

In 2024: Expanding its open API framework for loyalty solution providers in order to further accelerate implementation of any loyalty integration a merchant selects. This means that restaurants can continue to use their preferred loyalty solution of choice with no loss of functionality and eliminates potential roadblocks during the implementation process. Releasing a state-of-the-art device to allow pay at the table.  

Silverware POS Inc.
www.silverwarepos.com

In 2023: Silverware continued to enhance its guest-experience platform (GuestX) for Restaurants, Hotels, & Multi-Revenue facilities. This platform satisfies a multitude of use cases within hospitality environments allowing guests to seamlessly view the menu, place orders, and pay through their mobile phone from any outlet inside or outside of a physical location. Guests can view bills, split, and pay from their personal mobile devices by credit card, Apple Pay, and for hotel guests post directly to their room. The platform is fully customizable to match restaurants’ branding; ensuring a consistent experience for guests and supports in-seat dining, in-room dining, online ordering and more. Developed an enhanced cloud management solution (Admin Center) that allows enterprise chains and independently operated restaurants to manage their menus and operations from any device. 

Most innovative features: Silverware’s GuestX platform helps restaurants & hotels add revenue streams while realizing larger margins. From a simple, white-labeled online ordering solution, through to QR ordering and payments, this platform is helping reduce labor costs and increase guest experience. 

In 2024: Silverware will introduce its own payment platform, powered by Fullsteam. This will allow us to bring a more cost-effective and intuitive solution to the hospitality industry. Silverware’s point-of-sale solution installed on a payment device will offer service staff the ability to take orders + payments swiftly and efficiently on the latest device technology.

SpotOn
www.spoton.com

In 2023: SpotOn unveiled Restaurant Point-of-Sale, which was designed in collaboration with restaurateurs, with multiple configurations (15.6-, 10- and 6.5-inch POS units). QR enhancements, including Start a Tab, giving restaurants the ability to start a tab for QR order and pay to reduce unpaid walkouts; added the ability to notify staff of payment upon the printing of a receipt indicating that a table has checked out via QR. With QR Customer Reviews after every transaction, guests will be prompted to provide feedback. Tripled the size of its integrations team to ensure seamless solutions  and to negotiate the best possible rates for its clients. 

Most innovative features: SpotOn Teamwork is a comprehensive labor management product that touts robust payroll integrations to serve restaurants of all sizes. It can be used as a standalone product. Seat & Send allows guests to jump-start their orders while waiting for their table. After joining a restaurant's waitlist or reservation roster, Seat and Send allows guests to pre-order food or drinks, which will then be fired to the kitchen immediately after the guest is seated.

In 2024: Given the ongoing labor market challenges, SpotOn will continue to be focused on innovation that drives efficiency. IT will continue evolving its QR order and pay product to make it as easy as possible for guests. Enhanced integrations between SpotOn Order and Google will enable restaurants to accept takeout & delivery online orders through Google, in addition to through their restaurant website.  Will continue to build integrations with best-in-class third party technology providers. 

As independent restaurants face competition from large brands, it’s increasingly important to keep their guests engaged. SpotOn will bring to market easy-to-use marketing tools that empower operators to stay top of mind and win loyal business - without needing a dedicated marketing person. The marketing tools will have a tight integration with SpotOn’s point-of-sale and reservations to create a more comprehensive guest profile.
 

Square
squareup.com

In 2023: Square’s upmarket food and beverage business grew GPV 47% year-over-year. And with upmarket businesses’ more complex operations, Square sellers are investing in paid tiers of Square’s restaurants platform, with a 38% increase in paying subscribers year-over-year. Square for Restaurants continues to invest heavily in new product offerings, equipping restaurants to easily manage their operations. Launched Square for Franchises, a new, integrated solution that helps franchise businesses operate more efficiently, identify new revenue streams, and prepare for future scale. Franchisors can efficiently manage multiple locations using the Square for Franchises dashboard, which provides a comprehensive view of store performance and precise control over unique menu options, as well as gift card and loyalty program orchestration. Introduced Square KDS on Android which integrates directly with Square Restaurant POS, keeping the front- and back-of-house in sync. Kitchen staff get a better view of incoming tickets on large, durable, and configurable screens, allowing them to see more orders, more clearly. Restaurants can tailor Square KDS to their kitchen’s workflow by routing tickets based on dining option – dine-in, takeout, etc. – or kitchen category, allowing for a more streamlined experience that gets meals out quickly and where they need to go. Launched 50+ new integrations with key partners including OpenTable, Paytronix, and Flash Order. 47% GPV growth YOY as of Q2 2023. 

Most innovative features: Numerous generative AI features that food and beverage sellers can use to automate operations, speed up workflows, and regain time. These tools are directly integrated into Square. With Menu Generator, restaurants can create a full menu in just a few minutes with just a few clicks, giving them valuable momentum and time-savings when launching operations on Square. With automated kitchen categories, Square KDS can auto-assign menu items to kitchen categories and station screens to create smooth workflows for back-of-house staff. Restaurant managers can keep menus and operations up to date by editing and saving catalogs with just a few clicks.

Restaurants are also able to take advantage of tools to help with content creation like personalized email copy, a website copy generator, suggested replies through Square Messages, and personalized team-wide announcements through Square Team Communication. Ultimately, these gen AI tools will help restaurants automate operations and keep orders flowing.

Tabit 
Tabit.cloud

In 2023: Extended feature set to support the enterprise and multi-unit operators in the areas of menu & catalog management, including: enhanced pricing management, tax management, and promotions management. Launched Kiosk solution that allows restaurant to extend self-serve capabilities to their customers. Continued to expand integration efforts to include partners that specialize in specific restaurant technology touch points, such as: QSR Automations (KDS), Paytronix (Gift Cards & Loyalty), as well as additional Back Office/Inventory Management solutions. Extended payments integrations offerings while remaining payment agnostic, allowing restaurant customers to select their payment process of choice. Launched new online ordering solution that allows restaurants to promote higher order averages and guest experience by enhanced UI/UX and more sales tools and branding capabilities. Released many new features including Management of House Account and event deposits, Revenue Center reporting, Item Kitchen Timing in KDS, Clock-in/Scheduling Governance, Alcohol Serving Governance, and more.

Most innovative features: A 360-degree approach, allowing restaurants to streamline their operations across multiple areas of aspects of the business and consumer touchpoints. Mobile POS offering.

In 2024: Expand loyalty offerings to include more robust rewards and benefit programs, including marketing to consumers. Grow enterprise functionality. Extend integrations partnerships, to include key solutions in the restaurant technology space, such as UberEats Ordering Marketplace. Enhance online ordering solution to include more sophisticated order throttling algorithms to streamline kitchen capacity. 

Toshiba Global Commerce Solutions

https://commerce.toshiba.com/

In 2023: Gained recognition for its ELERA Commerce Platform, which elevates experiences across channels, touchpoints, and apps to create enjoyable, seamless, engaging customer experiences. Focuses on the strength of its partner network to meet the segment's needs. Has more than 1,000 business partners operating in over 70 countries. Among some of the innovations in software Toshiba has worked to bring to market with partners include: Loyalty & Promotions solutions, capable of running as a stand-alone microservice, gives customers of any size or segment the power to deploy a variety of offers for personalized, cohesive customer experiences. Unified commerce solutions enabling BAPIS (Buy Anywhere Pickup In Store) strategies. New integration into tax provider empowers customers to select their provider. Gift Card Cash Out Support enables consumers to cash out nominal balances on gift cards after purchase. Toshiba Global Commerce Solutions partnered with PopID, a biometric fintech company, to integrate PopPay into Toshiba's front-end POS and self-service solutions running its ELERA Commerce Platform. 

Most innovative features:  The Toshiba TCx 810 Family of All-in-One POS are built to withstand harsh restaurant environments, maintain high uptime, and integrate with many of the new digital applications that guests expect. The software innovations include: loyalty & promotions solutions, capable of running as a stand-alone microservice, gives customers of any size or segment the power to deploy a variety of offers for personalized, cohesive customer experiences across touchpoints. Unified commerce solutions enabling Buy Anywhere Pickup In Store (BAPIS) strategies. New integration into tax provider empowers customers to select their provider. Gift Card Cash Out Support enables consumers to cash out nominal remaining balances on gift cards after purchase. Works with strategic Independent Software Vendor (ISV) partners including CBS NorthStar. Together, we provide grocerant retailers strategies that help them drive efficiency, speed, and order accuracy -- improving their Total Cost of Ownership and growing their businesses. In turn, faster checkouts with minimized technical support costs through total solutions that build better customer experiences.

TouchBistro
www.touchbistro.com

In 2023: Introduced enhanced multi-location menu functionality, staff optimization and reporting functionality in the cloud. Introduced TouchBistro KDS and TouchBistro Profit Management. Continues to optimize online ordering product to meet the needs of growing businesses including the ability to add their own custom, branding, ability to check out as a guest to improve cart abandonment, and throttle orders to control kitchen volume and more. 

Most innovative features: TouchBistro’s guest engagement suite is a comprehensive set of technology, built to enhance the customer experience at every touch point – from marketing promotions, reservations, gift cards and loyalty to online ordering. These guest engagement tools work together and across multiple locations, enabling diners to seamlessly collect points, redeem rewards, and more, whether they’re ordering in-venue or online. Multi-location reporting helps operators monitor performance across all of their locations without needing to manually consolidate data. They can view real-time data for any of their venues from anywhere.  TouchBistro Profit Management is a robust system that integrates seamlessly with TouchBistro POS to help operators gain control of their inventory, manage recipes, costs, invoices, accounting, and more, to streamline their operations while maximizing profitability. 

Tray
tray.com

In 2023: TRAY focused on three key improvements while delivering over 300 new features including Automatic Full Offline Support. This platform ability enables operators to continue operation of their locations regardless of internet status. In the event of a system outage, the TRAY hybrid network capabilities seamlessly take over and operate the restaurant on its hybrid peer-to-peer network. All orders are circulated amongst all devices in the store giving local staff full ability to serve guests. When the network connectivity is restored the system automatically recovers and a robust synchronization engine ensures all transactions are processed efficiently. The system can be configured to enable a local-user activation or can fail over and back seamlessly without any user intervention. 

Formalized its program of leveraging a full single tenant platform in order to isolate key enterprise restaurant brand’s data and platforms while operating in a shared infrastructure. The TRAY platform can be deployed in multi- and single-tenant environments. Released TRAY OS, which extends the TRAY native-cloud Android software to any x86-powered device.  

Most innovative features: TRAY offers enterprise-grade cloud-based POS software that integrates with an operator’s existing hardware equipment – both legacy and new hardware. Cloud-based and hardware independent. Quick implementation is low lift and allows restaurants to continue serving guests without interruption. Staff training on TRAY takes 30 minutes typically, which can be enormously helpful in an industry with high turnover. Staff also find the ordering process to be intuitive thanks to a simple user interface that shows menu pictures, modification options, bill splitting tools and more to cut down on time spent with the POS so they can spend more time serving guests and turning tables. Fully functional in offline mode should there be any connectivity issues or downtime. 

In 2024:  TRAY works with a number of solution providers that complement its POS system. TRAY is eager to collaborate more closely with many of them on the “chain of possession” and third-party ordering – more specifically leveraging collaborative technology to make the digital and off-premise ordering process better for all. Looking at how to leverage AI and machine learning in food preparation and order accuracy.  

Union
getunion.com 

In 2023: Released a next-gen point-of-sale product that allows servers and bartenders to use iPhones to take guests orders and process payments tableside, completely eliminating the need to use clunky handheld hardware and exchange physical credit cards. 

Most innovative features: Union’s latest POS on iPhone product offers operators a next-gen POS handheld that does not require hardware and can be easily activated in a matter of hours with a basic menu and operation setup. This product gives operators an easy-to-use and low-cost tool to take orders table-side while also helping operators move away from a server-constrained service model and towards a frictionless guest-led experience - where guests can view the menu, order and pay from the convenience of their own device. Union’s iPhone POS solution can run alongside Union’s classic POS with terminals or in tandem with other POS solutions to offer operators extra support during their busy times. 

In 2024: Union is focused on enhancing its guest loyalty program that will enable its venue partners to make their guest experience even richer and more rewarding.

Coming down the pike: Union sees mobile card-free digital payments continuing to be demanded by consumers who don't want to carry additional items with them. Enabling operators to accept these digital payments in ways that are burden-free for the consumer will continue to become a priority for POS companies. AI opportunities and how POS software enables their operators to tap into and use the data in a positive way will also continue to be a trend and focus of POS companies.