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Toast API alternatives

Toast API access, and the open alternative for restaurant software.

Toast’s API is gated. Partners apply, pass a discovery review, get approval from Toast’s compliance, privacy, security, and legal teams, sign an agreement, and pass a certification call before production credentials; standard API access needs an RMS Essentials subscription and a restaurant employee, and every scope it lists is read-only. Creating orders and authorizing card payments are for partner and custom integrations. Flint Pay is the open alternative for restaurant software that takes payments online: create an account from the terminal with flint signup, and your own API keys write orders with priced modifiers, open tabs, tips, split checks, and service charges.

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See the side-by-side table

3.79% + 35¢ on cards · no monthly fee · free sandbox · no credit card

last reviewed 2026-10-15 · sources

01The alternatives

Toast API alternatives for restaurant software, ranked.

Ranked for a team building online ordering, QR pay-at-table, or another restaurant product that creates orders and takes payments online. Each figure is from the vendor's own docs, linked under Sources.

  1. 01

    Flint Pay

    Restaurant software that creates checks and takes card-not-present payments, with modifiers, tabs, tips, and split checks in the API.

    Access
    flint signup, no partner review
    Order and card writes
    your own API keys
    Cards
    3.79% + 35¢
    Monthly
    no monthly fee
  2. 02

    Square APIs

    Software for restaurants that already run Square's point of sale and take Square payments.

    Orders API, other processor
    1% per transaction
    Itemized refunds, API
    not in Refunds API
  3. 03

    Clover REST API

    Apps sold to merchants on Clover devices through the Clover App Market.

    Developer's share of app revenue
    70%
    App fees and payment processing
    on Fiserv or Clover
  4. 04

    Stripe

    Teams that will build the check, modifiers, tabs, and split logic themselves.

    Order or check object
    your database
    Refund
    an amount

02Side by side

Toast's APIs and Flint, need by need.

The Toast column is what Toast's developer guide says today, each page linked under Sources. The Flint column is what a Flint account does, with the API name behind it.

Getting accessToast APIs: Partner integrations: application, discovery, approval from compliance, privacy, security, and legal, a signed agreement, development, a certification call, a week of alpha at one restaurant, and several weeks of beta at three to five locations.Flint: Run flint signup in the CLI for an account and a sandbox key the same day. No partner application or certification.flint signup
Standard API accessToast APIs: An active RMS Essentials subscription or higher, an active employee of that location, and the Manage Integrations permission. Every listed scope ends in :read.Flint: API keys the business creates itself, with the scopes it chooses, including order and payment writes.
Create ordersToast APIs: POST and PATCH on the orders API are for partner and custom integrations only.Flint: Create a check with line items and priced modifiers, append rounds, and add tips and charges.POST /v1/orders
Take card paymentsToast APIs: The credit cards API that authorizes payments for checks is for partner and custom integrations only.Flint: Hosted checkout, QR pay-at-table, payment links, or Stripe Elements on your own site, settled against the order.POST /v1/orders/{order_id}/pay
Business termsToast APIs: Set in a partner agreement signed before development. The partnership process page publishes no fees.Flint: Published pricing: 3.79% + 35¢ per card payment, no monthly fee.
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How switching works

03What you can write

What can a restaurant app do on Flint without a partner program?

Everything a check needs, from your first API key. The same calls run in a sandbox with Stripe's test cards and against live payments.

Create a check with modifiers
curl -X POST https://api.withflintpay.com/v1/orders \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: table-12-round-1" \
  -d '{
    "line_items": [
      {
        "name": "Smash burger",
        "quantity": 1,
        "unit_price_money": { "amount": 1450, "currency": "USD" },
        "modifiers": [
          { "modifier_id": "mod_1kmn0aExample" },
          { "modifier_id": "mod_1kmn0bExample" },
          {
            "text": {
              "modifier_group_id": "mg_1kmn0aExample",
              "value": "no onions"
            }
          }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }'

Modifiers name catalog choices or carry a kitchen note. Flint prices the add-ons and returns the order with its totals.

Create the check with priced modifiers and kitchen notes, and Flint totals it.

POST /v1/orders

Append each round to the open order, with a running balance in the activity trail.

POST /v1/orders/{order_id}/line-items

Request a tip as a percent; Flint computes it and shares it across split payments to the cent.

requested_tip

Add a service, delivery, or packaging charge as its own object, fixed or percent.

POST /v1/orders/{order_id}/charges

Settle one leg per guest in one call, rejected before charging if the check changed.

POST /v1/orders/{order_id}/pay

Let the guest pay the open check from a QR code, with a tip picker.

POST /v1/checkout-sessions

Hold the last portions of a dish while a guest pays, so two guests can't order the last one.

POST /v1/inventory-reservations

Refund one dish by line item, with its share of the tax.

line_item_allocations

Payments for restaurant tech →Square vs Stripe for restaurant software →

04Toast's process

How long does Toast's partner process take?

Toast’s integration partnership page lists eight phases: application, discovery, partner agreement, development kickoff, certification, alpha, beta, and general availability. Leaving discovery takes approval from Toast’s compliance, privacy, security, and legal teams. Toast says it “is not able to integrate with all interested integration partners.”

Certification is a one-hour, demo-style review, and production credentials come after any issues it finds are fixed. Alpha runs at one restaurant for about a week; beta runs at three to five locations or management groups for several weeks. Toast lists no overall timeline and no fees; business terms are in the partner agreement.

Flint has no partner phase. Run flint signup in the CLI and you have a sandbox key the same day; live payments start once the business finishes onboarding.

Flint CLI and flint signup →Accept your first payment →

05Who Flint is for

Flint is built for teams building online restaurant software in the US.

Flint is its own order and payments system. It doesn't read or write a Toast restaurant's data.

Card-not-present

Online ordering, QR pay-at-table on the guest's phone, payment links, and the dashboard's virtual terminal. Card readers and tap to pay aren't available.

US restaurants

Flint onboards businesses in the US and pays out in USD to each restaurant's own bank account. Guests can pay from anywhere with a card, Apple Pay, or Google Pay.

The whole check

Modifiers, open tabs, tips, split checks, service charges, line-item refunds, and stock per location on one order.

Developers and agents

A public OpenAPI spec, Node and PHP SDKs, a CLI, llms.txt, and MCP servers a coding agent can read.

06Switching

How do you start building on Flint instead?

No application to wait on. Each step runs in a sandbox before you switch to live keys.

  1. Create an account

    flint signup

    Install the CLI and run flint signup. It verifies your email and stores a sandbox key in your system keychain. Or sign up on the web.

  2. Load the menu

    POST /v1/products

    Create each dish with its variants and attach modifier sets, so add-ons are priced by the catalog.

  3. Open the check

    POST /v1/orders

    Create an order with the first round, leave it open, and append later rounds to it.

  4. Let the table pay

    POST /v1/checkout-sessions

    Create a checkout session for the open order with tipping on, and print its URL as a QR code on the check.

  5. Close it everywhere

    order.paid

    Listen for order.paid, which fires once when the whole check is covered, and update the kitchen and guest screens from it.

Read the restaurant tech page →

07Start

From a sandbox key to a paid test order in ten minutes.

Node

npm install @flintpay/node

CLI

npm install -g @flintpay/cli

Test keys are prefixed flint_test_ and bound to a sandbox with its own data, so nothing you try there touches live money. Pay with 4242 4242 4242 4242, any future expiry, any CVC.

Then read these

  1. 01
    Payments for restaurant techModifiers, tabs, tips, and split checks, end to end
  2. 02
    Square vs Stripe for restaurant software
  3. 03
    The Square Orders API fee
  4. 04
    Does Stripe have an Orders API?
  5. 05
    Flint CLIflint signup creates an account from the terminal
Sign up

Sources

Where each claim comes from.

  • Orders API POST and PATCH, and the credit cards API, are for partner and custom integrations; standard API access reads orders. Toast: API overview

    doc.toasttab.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • API access comes through a partner program with a formal application and certification process. Toast: Partner integration overview

    doc.toasttab.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • The eight phases, with compliance, privacy, security, and legal approval required to leave discovery; Toast's note that it can't integrate with all interested partners, the one-hour certification call, one week of alpha, several weeks of beta at three to five locations, and no published fees. Toast: Integration partnership process

    doc.toasttab.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • Standard API access needs RMS Essentials or higher, an active employee of the location, and the Manage Integrations permission. Toast: Standard API access requirements

    doc.toasttab.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • Every standard API access scope listed ends in :read. Toast: Standard API access scopes

    doc.toasttab.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • No transaction fee for orders paid with Square payments; 1% per transaction with a non-Square payments provider. Square: Payments pricing

    developer.squareup.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • The Refunds API doesn't support itemized refunds. Square: Refunds and exchanges

    developer.squareup.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • Developers receive 70% of what Clover collects for an installed app; app fees and merchant-customer payment processing must be implemented within the Fiserv or Clover platforms. Clover: Monetize your apps

    docs.clover.com · checked 2026-10-15

  • The fulfill function must handle repeat calls, retrieve the session with line items, check payment status, fulfill, and record fulfillment status; saving line items in your own database and updating inventory or stock records are listed as things you might want it to do, left to your code. Stripe: Fulfill orders

    docs.stripe.com · checked 2026-10-15

last reviewed 2026-10-15 · corrections: Flint Help

FAQ

Questions people ask.

How do I get Toast API access?

Two ways. Partner integrations go through Toast's application, discovery review, compliance, privacy, security, and legal approval, a signed partner agreement, and a certification call before production credentials. Standard API access requires an active RMS Essentials subscription or higher, and the person creating credentials must be an active employee of that Toast location with the Manage Integrations permission.

Can I create orders with Toast standard API access?

No. Toast's API overview lists POST and PATCH on the orders API for partner and custom integrations only, and every standard API access scope ends in :read. The credit cards API that authorizes payments for checks is also partner and custom only.

What is the best Toast API alternative?

For a team building online ordering or QR pay-at-table in the US, Flint Pay. Your own Flint API keys create checks with priced modifiers, appends rounds to open tabs, computes tips and shares them across split payments to the cent, adds service charges, and takes card payments online, with no partner application. Cards are processed on Stripe. Payments for restaurant tech

Is Flint a good alternative to the Toast API?

Yes, when you are building your own restaurant product and need to write orders and take payments online. Flint has no monthly fee and one card rate, 3.79% + 35¢, which covers Stripe’s processing fees and the check model. Flint doesn’t connect to a Toast point of sale and doesn’t take in-person card payments. Sign up on the web or from the terminal with flint signup.

Does Toast charge for API access?

Toast's partnership process page lists no fees; business terms are set in the partner agreement, which is signed before development starts. Standard API access requires an RMS Essentials subscription or higher. Flint publishes its pricing: one card rate with no monthly fee.

Does Flint work with a restaurant's Toast POS?

No. Flint is its own order and payments system for software you build. It doesn't read or write Toast data, and it takes card-not-present payments only, so in-person card payments stay on the restaurant's current point of sale.

Write the check today. No partner program first.

Free sandbox, no credit card, no sales call. Create a check with modifiers, split it across two test cards with the tip shared to the cent, and refund one dish.

Sign up
Read the restaurant tech page

Or run npm install -g @flintpay/cli && flint signup to create your account and a sandbox key from the terminal. CLI guide

More comparisons · last reviewed 2026-10-15