ShopKeep POS Review For 2025
ShopKeep POS Plans & Pricing
ShopKeep Comparison
Expert Review
Pros
Cons
ShopKeep POS's Offerings
ShopKeep by Lightspeed doesn’t publicly list its pricing plans anymore, and there’s no breakdown of “Basic,” “Essential,” or “Advanced” tiers like there may have been in the past. Instead, pricing is now quote-based — you’ll need to contact the company directly to get a custom plan that fits your business.
ShopKeep offers the core features across all plans: point-of-sale tools, inventory tracking, staff management, reporting, and integrated payments with a flat processing rate of 2.6% + 10¢ per transaction. All plans include 24/7 customer support via phone, email, and chat, which is a strong value add.
One thing to note: there’s no free plan, so if you’re just looking to try it out, your best bet is to request a demo. It would be helpful if Lightspeed published more pricing details upfront — especially for small business owners trying to compare options quickly — but the custom approach might work better for businesses with specific needs.
Customer Support
ShopKeep by Lightspeed offers 24/7 customer support, giving businesses access to help whenever they need it, whether by phone, email, or live chat.
Additional customer support:
Community Forum
ShopKeep by Lightspeed doesn’t offer an official community forum. However, you can find user discussions on platforms like Reddit and review sites like Trustpilot.
Blog
While there’s no dedicated ShopKeep blog anymore, Lightspeed provides articles and guides for small businesses on their main website.
Features & Functionality
Best For
Retail stores
ShopKeep by Lightspeed is ideal for retail stores thanks to its easy inventory management, simple checkout process, and real-time sales tracking. It helps small shops stay organized without overwhelming them with unnecessary features.
Coffee shops
Coffee shops benefit from ShopKeep’s fast transaction speeds and simple menu setup. It’s easy to update inventory, manage employee shifts, and keep lines moving, even during busy mornings.
Quick service
For quick service restaurants, ShopKeep provides a fast, intuitive POS that speeds up orders and simplifies inventory tracking. The system keeps operations efficient, which is critical for high-volume, fast-paced businesses.
Restaurants
Small full-service restaurants can use ShopKeep to manage tables, track menu items, monitor sales, and manage staff schedules. It’s built to handle everyday restaurant needs without the complexity of larger systems.
Food trucks
Food trucks are a great fit because ShopKeep runs reliably on iPads and works in offline mode. This flexibility is essential for mobile businesses that may not always have a stable internet connection.
General Features
Tax management
One thing I appreciated while testing ShopKeep is how easy it makes handling different tax rates. You can set a default tax and create special tax groups for specific items with just a few taps. It’s straightforward and saves a lot of hassle if you sell items across multiple tax categories.
Customer management
ShopKeep gives you basic but useful customer management tools. You can save customer profiles, track past purchases, and offer gift cards. It also makes it easy to email or print receipts, which helps if you want to build loyalty or run promotions down the line.
Inventory management
Inventory tracking in ShopKeep is simple but effective. You can set reorder points, track stock levels in real time, and even manage product variations through a matrix system. One thing that stood out was the ability to manage raw materials and assemblies — great for businesses that sell items with multiple components, like bakeries or small manufacturers.
Back office tools
ShopKeep’s back office is clean and easy to navigate. From one dashboard, you can track sales, manage staff hours, and handle customer profiles without feeling buried in settings. It’s clearly built with smaller operations in mind — fast to learn and easy to manage day to day.
Reporting
The reporting features are practical and get the job done. I could quickly pull up metrics like sales by item, sales by employee, discounts applied, and overall revenue. It’s not heavy-duty business intelligence, but for most small businesses, it gives you everything you actually need without overcomplicating things.
Accounting integration
ShopKeep integrates directly with QuickBooks, which makes syncing your sales and financials pretty painless. If you’re already using QuickBooks for accounting, it’s a real time-saver.
Loyalty and marketing
ShopKeep also offers built-in loyalty features to reward repeat customers. While it doesn’t advertise email marketing tools like MailChimp anymore, the loyalty options are simple to set up and good enough to keep regulars engaged.
Hardware & Software
Hardware requirements
You don’t have to buy hardware directly from ShopKeep by Lightspeed, but the system is built to run best on iPads. You can use your own compatible iPad or purchase a bundle that includes extras like a secure iPad stand.
ShopKeep works with iPads and iPad Minis running a current version of iOS (Lightspeed recommends keeping devices updated for best performance). The POS software is optimized for smooth operation on Apple devices only — Android tablets are no longer supported.
For managing your business away from the register, the Lightspeed Pocket app lets you track sales, inventory, and staff data right from your smartphone.
Performance:
When testing ShopKeep by Lightspeed, I found the system to be smooth and responsive across day-to-day tasks. The cloud-based setup runs well on iPads, with fast transaction speeds and minimal lag when processing sales or managing inventory. Browsing through menus and accessing customer profiles felt intuitive, and generating basic sales reports took only a few seconds.
One of the standout features was offline mode. Even when Wi-Fi was spotty, ShopKeep allowed transactions to continue without disruption — a huge plus for retail stores and service businesses that can’t afford downtime. Setting up hardware like receipt printers and card readers was generally straightforward, although initial pairing could be a bit slow if the Wi-Fi connection wasn’t strong.
That said, I did notice that while ShopKeep handles the essentials extremely well, it’s not built for deep-dive analytics or heavy customization. Businesses that need advanced reporting across multiple locations or very detailed inventory segmentation might find the built-in tools a little basic.
Functionality breakdown:
- Sales processing: Fast, smooth transactions with minimal lag
- Inventory management: Easy to update and track inventory items
- Customer management: Simple tools for customer profiles and tracking
- Reporting: Quick access to basic sales, tax, and inventory reports
- Offline mode: Reliable offline transactions when internet drops
- Hardware integration: Easy setup with iPad, receipt printers, and card readers
- User interface: Clean, intuitive navigation built for speed and simplicity
- Advanced features: Limited deeper analytics and customization options
Overall, ShopKeep by Lightspeed offers reliable, easy-to-use performance for small businesses that want fast transactions, simple setup, and steady day-to-day operation without a lot of hassle.
Ease Of Use:
ShopKeep by Lightspeed is still one of the easier POS systems to use. The iPad app is clean, fast, and doesn’t take long to learn, even if you’re not super tech-savvy. Most of the features you’ll use daily — like ringing up sales, managing inventory, or checking reports — are easy to find without digging through menus. Setup is straightforward too; you can get a store up and running pretty quickly without a lot of back-and-forth. Overall, it’s a smooth system that’s built for everyday business, not tech headaches.
Uniqueness:
ShopKeep by Lightspeed stands out with its cloud-based POS system, easy inventory management, integrated payment processing, and simple tools built for small retail stores, service businesses, and restaurants.
Verdict:
ShopKeep by Lightspeed remains a solid, affordable POS choice for small businesses. It’s built for retail shops, service providers, and smaller full-service restaurants, and it delivers on what it promises. If you need an easy-to-use system with strong inventory tools, customer management, and real-time reporting, ShopKeep is definitely worth considering. For small restaurant owners especially, it offers many of the features you’d expect from bigger systems, without the bigger price tag.
User Review
Write a Review- I like that we can transfer inventory between locations as expand and add additional POS systems. Customer support is really helpful, they always give simple and easy to follow instructions.
- The layout for items is good, but I feel it can be improved.
- Great customer support. Didn't have any trouble getting through to them. Solution is very intuitive.
- Sometimes goes down with slower internet speeds.
- I like the mobile app. I can see all my sales and transactions for the day in real-time.
- We had problems with the equipment at first, but the issue was quickly resolved.
- The hardware is pretty good, the POS is user friendly, and customer support was exceptional.
- They charge fees that seem to increase over time.
- I’m disappointed with the regular tech support team,
