Compare
Grace vs SumUp.
SumUp is a brilliant card reader that grew a light till. If all you need is to take a payment cheaply, it is hard to beat. If you are an independent venue that needs to know your guests, it stops well short.
SumUp earned its place by making card acceptance cheap and simple — a £25 reader, a flat 1.69% per tap, no contract, no monthly fee. For a market stall, a coffee cart or a pop-up, that is exactly right. The question for a restaurant, bar or events space is different. Once you need reservations, a guest record, loyalty that survives a refund, marketing that drives repeat visits, and a till that ties to all of it, SumUp is a payments device with software bolted around it — not a hospitality platform.
Side by side
Outcomes in plain language. Where we can't verify a claim, we say so.
Pricing model1
Grace
£99 / £179 / £299 / Enterprise. Per venue, per month. Whole product on every plan. Use Grace Pay at our published rate, or bring your own card provider on any plan. Grace adds no fee of its own on top.
SumUp
No monthly fee on standard pay-as-you-go; 1.69% per in-person card payment (0.99% on Payments Plus at £19/month). POS Pro from £49/month. Readers from £25 +VAT. Online/links 2.50%.
SumUp keeps the original processing fee when you refund a card transaction — it is not returned. Matters most in deposit- and event-heavy venues.
What it is
Grace
A hospitality operating platform — reservations, guest CRM, EPOS, loyalty, marketing, WiFi, analytics and AI on one guest record.
SumUp
A payment processor that grew a light POS. Payments-first; everything else is thin or absent.
Reservations
Grace
Native booking widget on your domain, deposits, OTP-verified guest identity, service-aware availability, walk-ins, waitlists, host screen.
SumUp
None. SumUp has no reservation system.
Guest CRM
Grace
One record per guest across every channel. Behavioural tiers, dietary/allergy notes, marketing consent per channel, walk-in identification via WiFi.
SumUp
Knows the card, not the guest. Basic customer/contact capture only; no unified guest record.
Loyalty
Grace
Universal tiers, points on bookings and on spend, EPOS redemption, automatic reversal on refunded transactions — included.
SumUp
No native loyalty programme.
Marketing
Grace
Always-on email + SMS journeys, UK SMS from a venue-specific number, revenue attribution as the headline metric — included.
SumUp
None native. You would add a separate email/SMS tool.
EPOS depth
Grace
Native iPad EPOS with hash-chained audit trail, accrual accounting, native KDS, dual-attribution on sensitive actions.
SumUp
POS Lite/Pro covers a basic till, items and simple stock. Built for fast, simple service — not table-service workflow.
WiFi guest capture
Grace
Captive WiFi turns anonymous walk-ins into identifiable guests automatically.
SumUp
None.
AI
Grace
Grace AI as the primary operator interface — plain-English commands across every module.
SumUp
None.
Hardware
Grace
Bring your own iPad; pair your existing card reader or move to . No vendor hardware lock-in.
SumUp
SumUp readers/terminals; pay-as-you-go owned hardware (cheap and yours — a genuine plus at the smallest scale).
Target venue type
Grace
Independent UK table-service hospitality with a returning-guest base.
SumUp
Sole traders, market stalls, coffee carts, pop-ups, micro-businesses, counter service.
What Grace does
Specific to Grace, missing in SumUp.
A platform, not a payment device.
One guest record across reservations, EPOS, CRM, marketing, loyalty and WiFi.
- Reservations, deposits and a host screen SumUp doesn't have
- Loyalty and marketing in the box, not bolted on from other vendors
- Native EPOS with audit and accrual accounting
- One login, one record, one bill
Know your guests, not just the card.
SumUp sees a transaction. Grace sees a guest.
- Walk-ins identified via the WiFi captive portal
- Behavioural tiers assigned automatically
- Visit history, preferences, consent per channel
- Returning guests recognised on the host screen
Marketing and loyalty included.
Always-on journeys and universal loyalty tiers, on the same record as the till.
- Welcome, win-back, birthday journeys ship by default
- Revenue attribution back to bookings and covers
- Points on bookings and spend, EPOS redemption
- No separate subscriptions to stitch together
Use Grace Pay at our published rate, or bring your own card provider on any plan. Grace adds no fee of its own on top.
Keep your processor or use native . Grace doesn't take a cut.
- Processing fees go to your provider, not us
- Integrate SumUp itself if you want to keep it
- No hardware lock-in to one card vendor
- Predictable per-venue monthly price
Where SumUp leads
What they do that Grace doesn't (yet).
Honest reverse. If these matter to your venue, SumUp is worth looking at.
The cheapest, simplest start in the market
A £25 reader, 1.69% per tap, no monthly fee and no contract. For the smallest operations, nothing beats it on cost or simplicity, and Grace would be overkill. SumUp is the right tool when all you do is take a payment.
Owned hardware, no commitment
You buy the reader once and there is no monthly software cost on the standard plan. For seasonal, pop-up or very low-volume trading, that economics is hard to argue with.
Global and instant to set up
SumUp works in many countries and you can be taking payments within minutes of unboxing. Grace is UK-only by design and is a platform you set up, not a reader you switch on.
Customer fit
Two different venues.
Grace is built for…
Independent UK venues running table service with a returning-guest base — who need reservations, CRM, marketing, loyalty and EPOS to work as one, and want to actually know who comes back.
SumUp is built for…
Sole traders, market stalls, coffee carts, pop-ups and the smallest counter-service operations who need cheap, simple card acceptance and little else.
Alternatives
SumUp alternatives for hospitality venues
SumUp alternatives searches usually mean one of two things: a cheaper card reader, or software that does more than take a payment. SumUp wins the first. It was not built for the second.
- Grace is an alternative when you need reservations, a guest record, loyalty, marketing and a proper till — not just a reader with a light POS.
- Square or ICR Touch may fit if you want a till upgrade without replacing the whole stack.
- For deposits, events and repeat-visit marketing, compare what you would pay to add those tools separately.
SumUp is hard to beat on simple card acceptance. Grace is built for independents who have outgrown payments-only.
Common questions
Things operators ask before switching.
Claims verified as of June 2026. Competitor pricing and features change; we update this page as we notice changes worth noting. If you spot something stale, tell us.