Lavu API
Lavu markets an open API, and a REST surface covering menus, orders, payments, employees, and inventory exists. Its documentation is visible only to active merchants and approved partners; ISVs apply through the integrations team, and there is no self serve portal or official SDK.
Frequently asked questions
Lavu scores D on the API Report Card. Lavu markets an open API, and a REST surface covering menus, orders, payments, employees, and inventory exists. Its documentation is visible only to active merchants and approved partners; ISVs apply through the integrations team, and there is no self serve portal or official SDK.
Without a usable official API, teams fall back on manual exports, file drops, or one-off vendor integrations. The other option is an unofficial API layer like Supergood that automates the authenticated web app directly.
Lavu is a cloud-based, iPad-native restaurant point-of-sale platform founded in 2010 in Albuquerque, NM by Andy Lim and Corey Fiala. It was the first restaurant POS app published in the Apple App Store.
POS / Hospitality - specifically small-to-mid-market independent restaurants and small chains. Restaurant servers and bartenders use Lavu on iPads and handhelds to open and manage checks, take orders at table or counter, split/merge checks, apply discounts and comps, fire orders to the KDS or kitchen printers, run EMV/NFC card payments and tips, and clock in/out.
Lavu is well known in the iPad-POS segment and is regularly featured in 'best restaurant POS' lists (Capterra, Software Advice, GetApp), but its installed base is materially smaller than Toast, Square for Restaurants, Clover, and Aloha.
Yes - Lavu holds restaurants' core operating data: real-time orders and check detail, menu and modifier configuration, EMV/NFC payment and tip data, employee records, time/attendance and payroll, end-of-day sales and tax reporting, multi-store performance, inventory levels, loyalty/guest contact data, and (via Lavu Pay and the banking hub) merchant cashflow and payout data.
~15 years old (founded 2010 in Albuquerque, NM by Andy Lim and Corey Fiala). Lavu was the first restaurant POS in the Apple App Store, originally built for Sushi King Restaurant.
API documentation is not publicly accessible - requires active Lavu account or approved partner status to view. Developers integrating with QuickBooks and other tools report having to go through Lavu directly with no public onboarding or sandbox flow. Full sourced list under Sources below.
Common alternatives include Toast, Square for Restaurants, Clover (Fiserv), NCR Voyix Aloha, TouchBistro, Revel Systems. Graded alternatives appear under "More from the report card" below.
Grades measure one thing: can a customer's engineering team get their own data out programmatically? We check six things (whether a real API exists, how access is gated, data coverage, auth quality, docs and developer experience, and stability) and roll them into a letter grade. Grades get re-verified, and they only move on evidence.