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Toast pricing teardown

https://pos.toasttab.com/pricing

Toast's pricing page serves dual audiences (restaurants and retailers) with a hybrid model mixing a $0 entry tier, flat-rate monthly plans, and custom 'Build Your Own' tiers — but the six-tier structure (including duplicated plan names across segments) creates significant cognitive load and obscures the upgrade path. The page leans heavily on demo/quote CTAs rather than self-serve conversion, and the lack of annual billing options or transparent feature differentiation between tiers weakens its ability to drive unassisted decisions.

Tier structure

Starter Kit

$0/mo (Restaurant)

Point of Sale

$69/mo (Restaurant)

Build Your Own

Custom (Restaurant)

POS + Payroll Bundle

$69/mo + $9/employee/mo (Restaurant, new customers)

Point of Sale

$90/mo (Retail)

Build Your Own

Custom (Retail)

Value metric

flat-rate per tier (software subscription) plus per-employee add-on for payroll; hardware billed separately

How limits scale

Locations 1 (Starter Kit) → Custom (POS) → Custom (Build Your Own)
Terminals Up to 2 (Starter Kit) → Custom (POS) → Custom (Build Your Own)
Hardware 1 terminal included (Starter Kit) → Choose your own (POS) → Choose your own (Build Your Own)
Payroll Not included (Starter Kit) → Not included (POS $69) → $9/employee/mo (Bundle) → Add-on (Build Your Own)

Escalation logic

The restaurant segment escalates from a free Starter Kit (1 location, up to 2 terminals) to a $69/mo Point of Sale tier, then to a custom-priced Build Your Own for full-platform access. The retail segment skips the free tier and starts at $90/mo Point of Sale, with its own Build Your Own custom tier. A promotional payroll bundle at $69/mo sits awkwardly as a fourth restaurant option rather than a clean upsell.

Psychological anchors

  • Free entry anchor — Starter Kit at $0/mo lowers the psychological barrier to entry and makes the $69/mo tier feel like a modest step up.
  • Strikethrough/discount pricing — The payroll bundle shows an original price of $90 crossed out with a $69 promotional price, creating urgency and perceived savings for new restaurants.
  • Custom pricing as high anchor — 'Build Your Own' with 'Get a Quote' CTA implies an enterprise-level ceiling without revealing a price, anchoring perception that the flat-rate tiers are accessible by comparison.
  • Charm pricing — $69/mo uses a $9-ending price rather than a round number, consistent with psychological charm pricing conventions.
  • Per-employee expansion revenue — The $9/employee/mo payroll add-on creates a usage-based expansion lever that grows with the customer's headcount.
  • Trust/authority signals — Page references 'leading review platforms consistently rank Toast among the top solutions' and displays 24/7/365 support as a differentiator.

What this page is optimizing for

The page is primarily optimized for enterprise lead generation and demo capture — nearly every CTA is 'Get a Demo' or 'Get a Quote' rather than a self-serve signup, and the most feature-rich tiers hide behind custom pricing. The $0 Starter Kit 'Shop Now' CTA is the only path to unassisted conversion, suggesting Toast uses the free tier to capture hardware revenue while routing serious buyers into a sales conversation.

Red flags

  • Six tiers across two segments with duplicated plan names ('Point of Sale', 'Build Your Own') creates confusion about which plans apply to which buyer — the page requires careful reading to distinguish restaurant vs. retail options.
  • No annual billing option is visible anywhere on the page, eliminating a standard 17-20% discount lever that could improve conversion and reduce churn.
  • The 'Build Your Own' tier has no feature list or price range, making it impossible for a prospect to self-qualify without contacting sales.
  • The payroll bundle is positioned as a separate promotional tier rather than a clean upsell within the existing plan structure, cluttering the tier hierarchy.
  • Feature comparison table uses vague inclusion indicators ('Available with add-on; additional fees may apply') without specifying what those fees are, creating pricing opacity.
  • Hardware costs are entirely decoupled from software pricing with no indicative ranges shown, making total cost of ownership impossible to estimate without a sales call.
  • The Starter Kit's 'up to 2 terminals' limit is buried in fine print rather than prominently displayed as a key upgrade trigger.
  • Retail pricing starts at $90/mo vs. restaurant at $69/mo with no explanation of the price difference, which may confuse hybrid restaurant-retail operators.

Best-practices scorecard

What works · 1

  • FAQ or objection handling — A dedicated FAQ section addresses upfront costs, hardware compatibility, payment processing, support, offline mode, and flexible payment options.

Half measures · 5

  • Visible prices — Entry and mid tiers show prices, but 'Build Your Own' tiers (the most feature-complete options) hide behind 'Custom Pricing / Get a Quote.'
  • Value metric matches usage — Flat-rate software tiers make sense for restaurant operators, but the per-employee payroll add-on is the only usage-based element, and hardware costs are fully opaque.
  • Tier differences are scannable — A feature comparison table exists but uses dense, text-heavy rows with inconsistent inclusion indicators that require significant effort to parse.
  • Trust signals present — Review platform rankings and 24/7 support are mentioned, but no specific review scores, customer counts, or named logos are cited on the pricing page.
  • Clear CTAs per tier — Each tier has a CTA ('Shop Now', 'Get a Demo', 'Get a Quote'), but the dominance of demo/quote CTAs over self-serve signup creates friction for buyers ready to convert independently.

What's missing · 2

  • Clear recommended tier — No plan is visually or textually marked as 'most popular' or 'recommended'; the page treats all tiers with equal weight.
  • Annual discount offered — No annual billing toggle or annual discount is mentioned anywhere on the page.