Restaurants · AI tools guide · 2026

10 AI tools for restaurants — what each one does, how you'd use it, and what it costs

No hype, no jargon. Ten real AI (artificial intelligence) tools restaurants are using right now, grouped by the problem they fix: answering the phone and booking tables, the point-of-sale that rings up checks, your website and online orders, scheduling and forecasting behind the line, and keeping your listings and reviews straight. For each one: what it does, how you'd use it in a normal week, the real price where the vendor publishes it, and who it's actually for.

Compare all 10 → How to choose

The short version

  • The phone and the reservation book are where most restaurants lose money quietly. A missed call at 7 PM is a table that booked somewhere else. An AI phone agent (Slang.ai, from $399/month) or Popmenu's AI Answering add-on (from $149/month) catches them, and OpenTable (from $149/month) runs the reservations.
  • Your point-of-sale does more than ring up checks now. Toast (software from $79/month per terminal, processing by quote) and Square for Restaurants (free to start, Plus $49/month per location) bake AI into menus, upsells, voice ordering, and reporting.
  • Own your orders instead of renting them from delivery apps. Owner.com ($249–$499/month) and Popmenu ($179–$499/month) build AI-driven websites and online ordering so direct orders come to you, plus automated email and text.
  • Behind the line, AI takes the guesswork out of labor and prep. 7shifts (free to start) handles scheduling and forecasts your labor; 5-Out (by quote) predicts sales and builds the prep and purchasing lists. Marqii ($90–$180/month per location) keeps your menus and reviews straight on Google and Yelp.
  • Pick one problem, run it 30 days, then add the next. If the tool makes or saves back more than it costs in a month, it's worth a trial. Don't buy five at once.
Don't want to set it up yourself? The Agentic AI Index lists local AI consultants who'll pick the right tools and get them running for you. It's free to use, and we take no cut from the consultants we list.
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At a glance

All 10 tools side by side

Starting prices are the vendor's published entry tier where they publish one. Several enterprise and sales-led tools quote by phone — those say "by quote."

A few of the tools below are affiliate links, so if you sign up through one we may earn a small commission. It costs you nothing extra and never changes your price, and we only list tools we'd recommend either way. Full disclosure.

ToolCategoryBest forStarting priceSetup time
Toast Restaurant POS + AI All-in-one for full and quick service From $79/mo per terminal A few days to a couple weeks
Square for Restaurants Restaurant POS + AI Cafes & small spots starting out Free; Plus $49/mo per location Same day to a few days
Popmenu AI marketing + website + answering Owning your marketing & website $179/mo (AI answering +$149) A few days
Owner.com AI website + online ordering Cutting delivery-app fees $249/mo + 5%/order Onboarding (a few days)
Slang.ai AI phone answering Busy reservation lines $399/mo per location Under an hour to same day
SoundHound AI AI voice ordering Chains & drive-thrus By quote Custom deployment
7shifts AI scheduling + labor Scheduling & labor cost Free; paid from ~$30/mo per location An hour or two
5-Out AI sales forecasting + labor Sales & prep forecasting By quote Quick (vendor: ~5-min integrate)
Marqii AI listings + reviews Menus, listings & reviews $90/mo per location A few days
OpenTable Reservations + guest data Reservation-driven restaurants $149/mo + cover fees A few days

Pricing and setup times as of 2026-06-22. Always confirm current pricing with the vendor — plans and promos change.

The deep dives

The 10 tools, one at a time

Grouped roughly by what they fix. What it does, the standout features, how you'd use it in a real week, the price, who it's for, and one honest caveat each.

01

Toast

Restaurant POS + AI

What it is. Toast is an all-in-one, restaurant-built point-of-sale (POS — the system that takes orders and payments). It runs the register, online ordering, gift cards, loyalty, and inventory in one place, processes its own card payments, and now layers AI on top through what it calls ToastIQ.

Standout features
  • ToastIQ and "Sous Chef." Toast's AI engine surfaces prompts and recommendations across the platform, and its conversational assistant (early users knew it as Sous Chef) lets you ask questions in plain language and take actions like updating menus.
  • AI menu upsells. The POS suggests add-ons, pairings, and upgrades at the terminal and handheld; Toast says checks with an upsell run, on average, over 35% higher (vendor-reported).
  • AI marketing assistant. Builds cross-channel marketing from your own sales and menu data.
  • Built-in online ordering, gift cards, and loyalty. Native channels so you keep more of the order instead of handing a cut to a third party.
  • Restaurant-grade hardware and an offline mode. Terminals and handhelds that keep ringing up orders when the internet drops.
A real week with it. Orders come in at the table, the counter, and online, all onto the same system. The handheld suggests a side or a drink as your server rings it in. The kitchen sees tickets in real time, you take card payments through Toast, and at the end of the night the sales, food cost, and labor reports all run off one set of numbers. When you want to tweak a menu price across every channel, you ask the assistant instead of clicking through screens.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Core POS software as low as $79/mo per terminal. Hardware starts around $899; remote install from $499. Payment processing is by quote (Toast is your processor). Volume and annual discounts offered.
Best forFull-service and quick-service restaurants that want one end-to-end system and are fine using Toast for card processing. Scales from one location to large groups.
Honest take. Toast makes you use Toast as your payment processor — you can't bring an outside one — and the headline processing rate isn't published, so you only learn your real all-in cost from a quote. There are also separate hardware and install costs on top of the software. Get the processing rate in writing before you sign.
Visit Toast → from $79/mo per terminal
02

Square for Restaurants

Restaurant POS + AI

What it is. Square for Restaurants is a cloud POS for full and quick service, part of the bigger Square ecosystem you already know from the little card reader. It covers ordering, payments, the kitchen display, online ordering, and menus, and it has a genuinely free tier so a small spot can run on payment fees alone.

Standout features
  • Square AI. A conversational assistant in your dashboard that answers plain-language questions about your business — top items, labor cost, best customers — with charts. (Square lists it as a newer/beta feature.)
  • AI menu generator. Build a full menu in minutes by answering a few questions, and have the AI write item descriptions for you.
  • AI voice ordering. A conversational AI answers incoming phone orders, including customizations, even during a rush.
  • Kitchen display with auto-routing. Square KDS can auto-assign items to the right station screen.
  • Free starter tier. Run the full POS at $0/month and pay only per-transaction processing.
A real week with it. You set the menu (or let the AI draft it), take orders at the counter and online, and the kitchen sees them on the display. A phone order comes in mid-rush and the AI voice feature can field it instead of pulling a cook off the line. At the end of the week you ask Square AI which items are actually making money and what your labor cost ran, in plain English.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Free $0/mo (pay only processing, 2.6% + 10¢ per tap). Plus $49/mo per location. Premium $149/mo per location. Plus and Premium include a 30-day free trial; hardware is separate.
Best forCafes, quick-service, and small-to-mid restaurants that want a low-barrier, free-to-start POS in a payments ecosystem they already trust.
Honest take. The AI pieces (Square AI, voice ordering) are newer and some are in beta, so what's available can vary by account — check that the feature you're counting on is live for you. And while the software starts free, the processing fees are where Square makes its money, so a high-volume spot should run the per-transaction math, not just the monthly fee.
Visit Square for Restaurants → free; Plus $49/mo per location
03

Popmenu

AI marketing + website + answering

What it is. Popmenu is a marketing platform built around your restaurant's website. You get an SEO-friendly site with an interactive menu, online ordering, email and text marketing, reputation tools, and an AI phone answering add-on. It's for restaurants that want to own their marketing instead of living on the delivery apps and a stale Facebook page.

Standout features
  • AI Answering. Answers your phone 24/7 with a custom greeting and voice, handles questions like hours, location, allergens, and parking, texts links for ordering or reservations, and flags priority calls.
  • AI-powered marketing. Auto-generates monthly emails and social posts from your menu and activity (6 a month on the Essentials and Premier plans).
  • AI-crafted review replies. Drafts on-brand responses to reviews; included on the Premier plan.
  • SEO website + interactive menu. A site built to rank on Google, with a menu that syncs to your Google Business Profile.
  • Online ordering & catering. Direct ordering that lives on your own site (sold as a paid add-on).
A real week with it. Your website carries the menu, takes direct orders, and turns up in Google searches for your food. When the phone rings during service and nobody can grab it, AI Answering picks up, answers the regulars' questions, and texts a link to order or book. Once a month the platform sends out an email and a few social posts without you writing them, and new reviews get a reply drafted for you.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Billed monthly (prepaid annual in parentheses): Starter $179/mo ($159), Essentials $299/mo ($269), Premier $499/mo ($449). AI Answering is an add-on from $149/mo. Online ordering is a paid add-on (price by quote).
Best forIndependent and multi-location full-service and main-street restaurants that want a marketing-led website plus phone and review automation in one subscription.
Honest take. The two pieces most people want — AI phone answering and online ordering — are both paid add-ons on top of the base plan. So a realistic Premier-plus-answering-plus-ordering setup runs well above the $499 headline, and Popmenu doesn't publish the online-ordering price. Add up the whole stack before you commit.
Visit Popmenu → from $179/mo
04

Owner.com

AI website + online ordering

What it is. Owner.com is an AI-powered, all-in-one for independent restaurants. It gives a small spot the same digital setup the big chains have: an AI-built website, commission-free online ordering, a branded mobile app, automated SEO pages, loyalty, and email and text marketing. The whole pitch is steering orders away from third-party delivery apps and back to you.

Standout features
  • AI-optimized website + AI SEO. Owner builds and tunes the site with AI to pull in Google traffic and rank for your food (the site claims about 20% more SEO traffic in 30 days — vendor-reported).
  • Commission-free online ordering. Direct orders that skip the delivery-app cut.
  • Branded mobile app. Your own app in the app stores; Owner says branded-app guests reorder about 2x more often (vendor-reported).
  • AI-powered marketing. Automated email and text campaigns, loyalty and rewards, and smart upsells.
  • AI phone ordering (waitlist). Listed on Owner's site as an upcoming feature on a waitlist, not yet live as of 2026-06-22.
A real week with it. A hungry customer searches your food, lands on the Owner-built site, and orders direct — no commission skimmed off the top. Regulars order again through your branded app. The platform runs the email and text campaigns and the loyalty program in the background, so the marketing happens without you sitting down to do it after close.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Month-to-month, no long contract. Flexible $249/mo + a 5% per-order restaurant fee. Flat Rate $499/mo with no per-order fee (better once you're doing $5k+/mo online). On both plans, guests pay a 5% order-support fee. No free tier — you book a demo. Multi-location rates by quote.
Best forIndependent and small-group restaurants (its case studies lean pizzerias, taco shops, family diners) that want to cut delivery-app fees and run direct online ordering without building the tech.
Honest take. You trade design freedom for a proven template — Owner says so on its own site: if you want a lot of control over how your site looks and feels, it's "not the right fit." And the AI phone ordering they market is still a waitlist feature, not something live you can count on today.
Visit Owner.com → from $249/mo + 5%/order
05

Slang.ai

AI phone answering

What it is. Slang.ai is an AI voice agent that answers your restaurant's phone around the clock. It greets callers like a person, answers the common questions, takes and manages reservations end to end, and hands off to your staff when it needs to. Think of it as a host who never misses a call, even at 11 PM or mid-rush.

Standout features
  • 24/7 reservation handling. Books, changes, and cancels reservations by voice, with integrations to OpenTable, SevenRooms, Yelp, and Fishbowl.
  • Call recordings, summaries, and CSAT. Full recordings, AI summaries, and a customer-satisfaction score on every call.
  • VIP call handling. Recognizes your frequent and VIP guests and routes them straight to a human.
  • Text links and confirmations. Sends real-time texts — reservation confirmations, ordering links, the wine list.
  • Premium extras. Custom branding, cross-selling to sister restaurants, real-time topic alerts, and bilingual (Spanish) support.
A real week with it. Every call gets answered, even the ones that used to ring out during a Friday rush or after you'd locked up. Slang books the 7:30 table, tells the caller you're closed Mondays, and texts a link for online ordering. When a regular big-spender calls, it recognizes them and rings your host instead. In the morning you skim the call summaries and CSAT scores to see what people actually asked for.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Per location. Core from $399/mo, Premium from $599/mo, Enterprise custom. Add-ons: Private Events $199/mo, Bilingual Support $99/mo. No free trial; you book a demo, and setup can go live the same day.
Best forFull-service and reservation-driven restaurants (and groups) that miss calls during peak hours or after close and want an AI host to catch the bookings.
Honest take. There's no free trial or self-serve signup — you book a demo — and $399/month per location is well above a basic POS or scheduling tool. It earns its keep when you've got real phone and reservation volume; a quiet spot with a slow line probably won't see the math work. It's a phone layer, not a POS or ordering system.
Visit Slang.ai → from $399/mo per location
06

SoundHound AI

AI voice ordering

What it is. SoundHound is an enterprise voice-AI company whose restaurant products take orders by voice across the drive-thru, the phone, and the kiosk, and help your staff in the back. It's built for chains and franchises — the names on its site include White Castle, Five Guys, and Beef 'O' Brady's — not a single independent diner.

Standout features
  • Dynamic Drive-Thru. Generative-AI drive-thru ordering with suggestive upselling, plus Smart Lane (advance pre-order) and a voice-enabled kiosk.
  • Smart Ordering. Voice AI that takes orders across phone, text, in-app, and in-car through one integration, answers on the first ring, and upsells; works with Square, Toast, and Oracle POS.
  • Smart Answering. An AI voice assistant the company says handles 100% of your phone calls.
  • Employee Assist. A back-of-house voice helper that gives staff hands-free answers on ingredients, allergens, and equipment, trained on your own manuals.
  • In-car ordering. Lets customers order through in-car voice assistants as a new off-premise channel.
A real week with it. At a busy drive-thru or phone line, the AI takes the order, gets the customizations right, and suggests a side or a drink, so your team isn't pulled off the line during the lunch rush. In the back, a cook asks Employee Assist whether a dish has nuts and gets the answer hands-free. It's volume-driven automation aimed at locations doing serious order counts.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)By quote. SoundHound publishes no prices; every restaurant product routes to "talk to a specialist" and a custom deployment. Enterprise sales model (discovery call, demo, proof of concept).
Best forMulti-location chains, franchises, and QSR/drive-thru brands that need high-volume, enterprise-grade voice automation — not a self-serve tool for one independent restaurant.
Honest take. There's no self-serve option and no public price — everything is a sales call and a custom build (menu ingestion, POS integration, per-location tuning), so expect a longer setup and an enterprise budget. The impact stats on its site (revenue lift, faster service) are vendor-reported, not independently verified. It's voice automation only, not a website or ordering storefront.
Visit SoundHound AI → pricing by quote
07

7shifts

AI scheduling + labor

What it is. 7shifts is restaurant-only staff software: scheduling, time clock, tip management, payroll, and team chat in one app. It's built around the way restaurants actually run shifts, and its AI sits in the scheduling and forecasting — predicting how much labor you'll need and flagging when a schedule breaks a labor rule.

Standout features
  • Auto-Scheduler. Builds the schedule (or creates open shifts) using projected sales to figure out how many people you need.
  • Machine-learning labor forecasting. Hourly forecasts and labor recommendations that improve over time and account for seasonality (7shifts claims up to 95% sales-forecast accuracy when tied to your POS — vendor-reported).
  • AI labor-compliance flags. Bakes local labor rules into the schedule and flags likely violations like a missed meal break or short notice.
  • Tip management and pooling. Automates the tip math and distribution.
  • 60+ integrations. Connects to Toast, Square, Lightspeed, ADP, Gusto, and more; plus an AI course builder for staff training.
A real week with it. Instead of building next week's schedule by hand on a Sunday, you let the Auto-Scheduler draft it from the sales forecast, then tweak it. Staff swap shifts and clock in from the app. The system warns you before you schedule someone into overtime or a missed break, and at the end of the pay period the tip pooling and hours flow toward payroll without a spreadsheet.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Per location, with a free tier. Comp is free (single location, up to ~20 employees). Paid plans (billed annually) run roughly $30 to $150/mo per location depending on tier and features. 14-day free trial; about 10% off for annual billing. Published tier prices vary by source — confirm the current numbers with 7shifts.
Best forRestaurants of any size, from a single independent on the free plan up to multi-unit groups, that want scheduling and labor forecasting built for restaurants rather than generic shift software.
Honest take. It's a labor platform only — it doesn't take payments or run your POS, it integrates with them. And its "AI" is mostly machine-learning sales and labor forecasting plus the course builder, not a chatty assistant. The exact tier prices move around between 7shifts' own page and third-party sites, so get the current quote before you bank on a number.
Visit 7shifts → free; paid from ~$30/mo per location
08

5-Out

AI sales forecasting + labor

What it is. 5-Out is an AI forecasting and operations tool for restaurants. It predicts your sales, then turns that forecast into the practical lists you actually need: prep, purchasing, inventory levels, and a labor schedule. Its whole pitch is "action, not insights" — it tells you what to do next, not just what happened last week.

Standout features
  • AI sales forecasting. Hourly, daily, and weekly predictions built from your own sales history, day-part trends, menu mix, seasonality, and outside signals like weather and local events.
  • Labor optimization. Set a target labor-cost percentage and 5-Out builds the budget and an optimized schedule from projected demand (it has its own scheduler).
  • Automated prep lists and Smart Pars. Predictive inventory levels and prep that move with the forecast instead of a fixed list.
  • Purchasing recommendations. Combines your recipes with forecasted volume to suggest order quantities.
  • Recipe and food-cost visibility. Plus real-time "smart actions" guidance and quick POS/scheduling/inventory integrations.
A real week with it. Tuesday it tells you Saturday's going to be busy (weather's good, there's an event nearby), so you prep and order to match instead of guessing. The labor schedule comes pre-built to your target labor cost. Your prep list and pars adjust to the forecast, so you're not throwing out food on a slow night or running out of a special on a busy one.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)By quote. 5-Out doesn't publish prices; the pricing page only says it's "right-sized for your restaurant" with an annual-billing discount, and its FAQ says cost depends on locations, modules, and complexity. You get a number from a demo.
Best forQuick-service, fast-casual, full-service, and multi-unit restaurants — single locations up to large groups — that want demand forecasting tied straight into labor, prep, and purchasing.
Honest take. No price is published anywhere, so you can't comparison-shop without a sales demo. It's back-of-house software — forecasting, labor, prep, purchasing — not a guest-facing reservations or reviews tool. And forecasts get better as the model learns your restaurant, so the first few weeks are less sharp than month three.
Visit 5-Out → pricing by quote
09

Marqii

AI listings + reviews

What it is. Marqii keeps your restaurant's info right everywhere people look. From one dashboard it pushes your hours and menus out to 70+ places like Google, Yelp, Facebook, and Apple Maps, auto-syncs your menu from the POS, and manages your reviews — increasingly with AI that drafts the replies in your voice.

Standout features
  • Listings management. Unlimited updates pushed to 70+ listing publishers from one place, so your hours and address are never wrong on Google.
  • Automated menu sync. Connect your POS and each location's menu updates itself across Google, Yelp, Facebook, and Apple Maps (Marqii cites about 70 hours saved a month per location — vendor-reported).
  • AI Suggested Review Response. AI that learns your brand voice and drafts on-brand replies for Google, Yelp, and Facebook, with a human check before they post.
  • AI review summaries + sentiment. Monitors reviews across Google, Yelp, Facebook, DoorDash, Grubhub, Uber Eats, and ezCater and summarizes what guests are saying.
  • First-party reviews. Branded review-request forms via link, QR code, or embed, plus social posting on the top tier.
A real week with it. You change a price or pull a special, and it updates everywhere automatically instead of you logging into five sites. New reviews come in across Google and the delivery apps; Marqii drafts a reply in your voice for you to approve and post. Once a week you skim the AI summary to see whether people are raving about the wings or grumbling about the wait.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Per location, annual contract. Base $90/mo (listings + menus). Pro $145/mo ("most popular"; adds review monitoring, AI review response, sentiment). Kitchen Sync $180/mo (adds first-party reviews + social). 5+ locations by quote. Done-for-you Managed Review Response add-ons run $100–$375/mo.
Best forIndependent restaurants, multi-location brands, ghost kitchens, and agencies that manage restaurant clients and want listings, menus, and reviews handled from one place.
Honest take. The published per-location prices are on an annual contract; month-to-month may differ and isn't listed. AI review response covers Google, Yelp, and Facebook (monitoring spans more platforms than the AI replies do), and the AI drafts still go through a human before posting — fully hands-off replies are the paid Managed Review Response add-on.
Visit Marqii → from $90/mo per location
10

OpenTable

Reservations + guest data

What it is. OpenTable is the reservation and guest-management platform a lot of diners already use to book. For your restaurant, it runs reservations off that big diner network, manages your tables and waitlist, handles reviews, and builds guest profiles you can use for marketing and loyalty. The "AI" here is more automation than a branded assistant — smart table assignment and automated guest messaging — but it's a real workhorse for reservation-driven spots.

Standout features
  • Reservations on a big network. Bookings from OpenTable's diner network plus a widget for your own site and ties into 100+ booking sites and apps.
  • Table management with Smart Assign. Customizable floor plans and automated table assignment to fit more seatings in.
  • In-house and online waitlist. Plus a mobile app with the floor plan and real-time guest-spend alerts.
  • Guest CRM. A guest database with tags and notes, "360" profiles, pre-shift reports, and automated email campaigns and tags.
  • Reviews, automated messages, and events. Reputation tools, automated reservation reminders, plus experiences and ticketed events.
A real week with it. Diners book you from the OpenTable app and your own website. Smart Assign fits the reservations onto your floor plan to keep tables turning, and the waitlist runs on busy nights. Automated reminders cut down no-shows, and your host sees notes on the regulars — the anniversary couple, the guest who always orders the special — before they walk in.
Pricing (as of 2026-06-22, confirm with vendor)Basic $149/mo ($1.50 per network cover after a 30-day waiver). Core $299/mo ($1 per network cover; website reservations free). Pro $499/mo (adds the full guest-data tools). You pay cover fees only for seated diners — not no-shows, walk-ins, or phone bookings. One-year auto-renewing contract.
Best forReservation-driven restaurants of all sizes, from a single independent on Basic up to data- and loyalty-focused groups on Pro, plus bars, wineries, and hotels.
Honest take. The monthly fee is only part of the cost — the per-cover network fees ($1 to $1.50 per seated diner) stack on top, so a busy restaurant's real bill can run well past the headline price. It also locks you into a one-year auto-renewing contract, and Basic is US-only with website reservations charged separately unless you move up a tier. And to be fair, OpenTable doesn't market a named "AI" product on its plans page; what it has is automation, not a chatbot.
Visit OpenTable → from $149/mo + cover fees
How to choose

Which one should you start with?

You don't need all ten. Pick the one that fixes your biggest, most expensive problem, run it for 30 days, and add the next only if the first one earned its keep.

You're losing calls and bookings

The phone ringing out during a rush is a table that went somewhere else. An AI phone agent like Slang.ai (from $399/mo per location) answers and books 24/7; Popmenu's AI Answering (add-on from $149/mo) does it inside a marketing platform; and OpenTable (from $149/mo) runs the reservations off its diner network.

Delivery apps are eating your margin

If most of your orders come with a commission attached, build your own. Owner.com ($249–$499/mo) and Popmenu ($179–$499/mo) put up an AI-built website with direct online ordering so the order — and the customer — is yours. Your POS (Toast, Square) has native ordering too.

Your POS feels dumb

If your register just rings up checks, the newer restaurant POS systems do a lot more. Square for Restaurants (free to start, Plus $49/mo per location) and Toast (software from $79/mo per terminal) now bake AI into menus, upsells, voice ordering, and reporting.

Labor and prep are guesswork

If you're over-staffing slow nights and running out of food on busy ones, let AI forecast it. 7shifts (free to start) schedules and forecasts labor; 5-Out (by quote) predicts sales and builds prep and purchasing. And Marqii ($90/mo per location) keeps your menus and reviews right on Google and Yelp.

A simple 30-day plan

  1. Find the thing that costs you most.

    Missed calls and bookings, delivery-app fees, or labor and prep that swing all over the place. Be honest about which one stings worst right now.

  2. Match it to one tool, not five.

    Missed calls go to an AI phone or reservations tool. Delivery fees go to your own ordering site. A dumb register goes to a real restaurant POS. Labor and prep go to a forecasting tool. One tool.

  3. Run a 30-day trial in real service.

    Most of these offer a free trial or a demo. Turn it on during real shifts and real calls, and measure the one number you wanted to move.

  4. Train whoever runs the floor and the phones.

    Your host, your manager, or you. The heaviest user has to be comfortable before anything else changes.

  5. Check the number, then expand or swap.

    Fewer missed calls? More direct orders? Tighter labor cost? If it moved, keep it and add the next tool. If it didn't, swap the tool, not the whole plan.

Rough budget to start: most independents can get going for somewhere between free and about $400 a month on one tool, before setup fees or card processing. The trick isn't spending more, it's picking the right one. If the tool makes or saves back more than it costs in a month, it's worth a trial. And if you'd rather not wire it up yourself, a local AI consultant from our free directory can pick the tools and set them up for you.
Common questions

Restaurant owners ask us these

What's the best AI tool for a restaurant that keeps missing phone calls?

Start with an AI phone agent. Slang.ai answers your line 24/7, handles FAQs, and books reservations, starting at $399 a month per location. If you'd rather add answering to a marketing platform, Popmenu's AI Answering is an add-on starting at $149 a month. For chains and drive-thrus that need high-volume voice ordering, SoundHound's restaurant voice AI does it at enterprise scale, priced by quote. Pricing as of 2026-06-22; confirm with each vendor.

Can AI take phone or drive-thru orders for my restaurant?

Yes, depending on the channel. SoundHound's voice AI takes orders at the drive-thru, on the phone, and at the kiosk, but it's enterprise software built for chains and priced by quote. Square for Restaurants has AI voice ordering that answers incoming phone orders. Owner.com markets AI phone ordering, but as of 2026-06-22 it's listed as a waitlist feature, not live. Slang.ai answers the phone and books reservations by voice, but it's built for reservations and FAQs, not full food ordering. Confirm current capabilities with each vendor.

Which AI point-of-sale is best for a small restaurant or cafe?

For a small spot or cafe starting out, Square for Restaurants is the low-barrier pick: a free plan at $0 a month (you pay only card processing, 2.6% + 10 cents per tap), with Plus at $49 a month per location. Toast is the all-in-one heavyweight, with core software as low as $79 a month per terminal, but hardware and payment processing are priced separately and processing is by quote. Both now build AI into menus, upsells, and reporting. Pricing as of 2026-06-22; confirm with each vendor.

How much do AI tools for restaurants actually cost?

It ranges a lot. POS software runs from free (Square's starter tier) up to $149 a month per location (Square Premium), or from $79 a month per terminal for Toast, plus card processing on top. An AI phone agent like Slang.ai starts at $399 a month. Marketing and website platforms run $179 to $499 a month (Popmenu) or $249 to $499 a month (Owner.com). Scheduling (7shifts) is free to start and climbs to roughly $150 a month per location. Listings and reviews (Marqii) run $90 to $180 a month per location. Reservations (OpenTable) start at $149 a month plus per-cover fees. Forecasting (5-Out) and enterprise voice (SoundHound) are quote-based. A good rule: if the tool saves or makes back more than it costs in a month, it's worth a 30-day trial. Pricing as of 2026-06-22; confirm with each vendor.

Will AI tools replace my restaurant staff?

Not really. Most of these tools catch the work that falls through the cracks: the calls nobody could grab during a rush, the after-hours reservation, the review that sat unanswered, the prep list someone forgot. An AI phone agent answers when your host is slammed; an AI scheduler drafts the rota so a manager isn't doing it by hand on a Sunday. The point is to free your people for the guests in front of them, not to cut the team. Try one tool on one job and see what it actually takes off your plate.

Can AI help me cut third-party delivery fees?

Yes, indirectly, by helping you own more of your orders. Owner.com builds an AI-optimized website, a branded app, and commission-free online ordering so direct orders come to you instead of through a delivery app that takes a cut. Popmenu does similar with an SEO website and online ordering as an add-on. Toast and Square also have native online ordering built into the POS. None of them make delivery apps disappear, but every direct order is one you keep more of. Confirm current pricing and order fees with each vendor.

Do these AI tools work with my current POS?

Many do. Scheduling and forecasting tools (7shifts, 5-Out), listings and review tools (Marqii), and phone agents (Slang.ai) are built to connect to the big restaurant POS systems like Toast, Square, and Lightspeed, so the AI works off your real sales and menu data. A common setup is one POS for orders and payments, plus one AI tool on top for the phone, the schedule, or your listings. Start with one, get it working, then add the second. Confirm current integrations with each vendor.

Is it legal for AI to record or answer my restaurant's phone calls?

Answering calls with AI is fine. Recording them is where the rules come in. Some states have two-party-consent laws, meaning you have to tell the caller the call is being recorded before you do. If your AI phone tool records or transcribes calls, check your state's rule and add a recording notice to your greeting where it's required. This is general information, not legal advice; confirm with a local attorney.
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Local AI consultants in the directory — for example:

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Sources

Every price and feature on this page was checked against the vendor's own current website on 2026-06-22. Prices and plans change, so confirm with the vendor before you buy. Growth and revenue figures vendors state about themselves are their own claims, not independently verified.

Last reviewed: 2026-06-22. Pricing and features verified against each vendor's site on this date. Confirm current pricing with the vendor before purchasing.
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