Restaurant scheduling software pricing 2026 | Smarteaming.

Five tools, five pricing pages, five different ways of counting. This is what restaurant scheduling software actually costs in 2026 — with the per-employee maths done so you can compare like for like.

The headline price on a vendor's site is rarely what you pay. Some charge per location, some per user, some per "workspace," some hide their key features behind add-ons. Below, we've normalised everything to a single question: for a restaurant of N employees, what does this tool cost in 2026?

The Five Tools at a Glance

Two patterns jump out. Per-location pricing (Skello, Combo) penalises small teams — a 5-person bistro pays the same flat rate as a 25-person brasserie. Per-user pricing (Planday, Smarteaming) scales with reality. Shyfter sits in between, with stepped tiers.

What "Entry Price" Actually Buys

Skello — €79/month/location (Planning Standard)

Schedules, time-off requests, basic time tracking. The HR module (€20/month) adds documents and onboarding. Managed payroll is a separate line item starting from €20/employee/month. Multi-site reporting is upper-tier. Full Skello vs Smarteaming breakdown.

Combo — from €60/month/location (Time plan)

Schedules, time clock, basic exports. Compliance features and detailed reporting move you up the tiers. The 7-day trial is the shortest in this comparison — barely enough to set up your team and run one schedule. Full Combo vs Smarteaming breakdown.

Planday — from £2.99/user/month (Starter)

Per-user looks cheap until you read the fine print: 5-user minimum, multi-location requires the Plus plan (£4.99/user + €25/month subscription), and sales-assisted signups can require a 12-month commitment. Good fit for single-site restaurants with stable headcount. Full Planday vs Smarteaming breakdown.

Shyfter — €39/month for 30 employees

Stepped tier model: every additional 30 employees adds roughly €50/month. A 35-person restaurant lands on around €89/month; a 60-person operation on €139. Belgian-built, with Dimona-aware exports. Full Shyfter vs Smarteaming breakdown.

Smarteaming — €1/employee/month

Schedules, shift confirmation, mobile app, payroll-ready exports, multi-site, Belgian compliance presets (CP 302 horeca, sursalaires, Dimona-ready XML). One price, one feature set, no add-ons. The trial is 90 days because most managers need a full quarter to test through a real season.

Annual Cost by Restaurant Size

Same workload, four different headcounts. All figures in EUR, rounded, including tax-exclusive list prices for 2026.

Three observations worth pulling out:

• The flat-rate tools punish small teams. A 5-person team on Skello pays €948/year for capacity it doesn't use. The same team on Smarteaming pays €60.
• Per-user tools punish growth. Planday at 30 employees costs more than Skello's flat plan. The crossover sits around 25 users.
• Shyfter looks cheap until you scale past one tier. The €39 list price doubles before you hit the second site.

Use the Smarteaming pricing calculator to plug in your own headcount — the maths is the same one we'd quote a customer.

Hidden Costs to Read the Contract For

List price is one thing. The annual invoice is another. These are the line items that move the real number:

• Per-location surcharges. A second site on Skello or Combo doubles the bill, even if the second site is a 4-person coffee bar attached to the main restaurant.
• Add-on modules. HR documents, payroll export, advanced reporting and integrations live in higher tiers or as paid add-ons. Map your must-haves before you commit.
• Annual lock-in. Any plan with a 10–20% annual discount has a 12-month commitment behind it. If you close two months in summer or downsize the team, you keep paying.
• Termination clauses. Sales-led contracts can include early-exit penalties of the remaining balance. Read the cancellation paragraph before signing.
• Onboarding and support. Some vendors charge for setup hours or phone support past the first month.
• Currency mismatches. A GBP price on a UK-anchored tool will move with the exchange rate — budget for ±5% across a year.

Which Tool Fits Which Restaurant

If you take headline price out of the equation, the real choice depends on your shape:

• One site, 5–15 staff, no payroll integration urgency: Smarteaming or Planday Starter. Smarteaming is cheaper above ~3 employees and includes shift confirmation by default.
• One site, 15–30 staff: Smarteaming or Shyfter on its first tier. Crossover with Skello/Combo only kicks in past 80+ employees on a single site.
• Multi-site (2–5 locations), each under 20 staff: Smarteaming wins on cost outright. Per-location pricing punishes you here.
• Multi-site (5+) with managed payroll outsourced to a French firm: Skello with the managed-payroll add-on is the path of least resistance, but you're paying for the integration not the scheduler.
• Belgian operation, CP 302 / Dimona / sursalaires top of mind: Smarteaming or Shyfter. Both ship the Belgian primitives natively; the rest treat them as exports you map yourself.

Three Numbers to Pull from Your Current Invoice

If you already pay for a tool, this is the quick test that tells you whether you're overpaying:

• Cost per active employee per month. Take last month's invoice (base + add-ons + per-location fees), divide by the number of employees who actually appeared on a schedule. Anything above €4–5 is high.
• Cost of your slowest month. Pull the invoice from your quietest period and divide again. Per-location and flat-rate plans get expensive fast when half the team is on holiday.
• Cost of features you've never opened. Audit which paid modules you actually use. Anything dormant for 60+ days is a candidate for a downgrade or a switch.

A worked example for a 12-employee French bistro on Skello with the HR add-on: €99 × 12 = €1,188/year. The same restaurant on Smarteaming: €144/year. The €1,000+ delta isn't a rounding error; it's a payroll specialist's monthly fee, or two months of the head waiter.

How We Got These Numbers

All prices come from the vendors' public pricing pages as of April 2026, cross-checked against signed customer quotes where customers have shared them. We've flagged ranges (~€) where pricing moves with sales context or commitment length. List prices exclude VAT.

For a deeper breakdown of the per-tool maths and the hidden-cost mechanics, see our companion piece: The real cost of restaurant scheduling software in 2026.