Best AI Phone Agent for Olo Restaurants
Five phone agents an Olo brand can shortlist, scored on price, reservations, order limits, and payment. Kovo wins the rubric at 93/100; Loman is second at 80.
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Kovo is the pick among AI phone agents for an Olo restaurant, scoring 93/100 to Loman's 80, because its finished ticket lands in the Olo order stream with the right store on it.
An Olo brand's phone problem is a reporting problem. The order stream is the system of record, and a call that lands anywhere else is invisible at month end.
TL;DR:
- Kovo scores 93/100: it writes the finished ticket into Olo, charges a card the shop already holds while the caller is still on the line, and starts at $99 for 750 connected minutes.
- Loman scores 80 and takes second place: any card captured inside the call, Olo documented on its public integration list, from $199 per location (published pricing, October 2026).
- ConverseNow (57), Certus AI (57), and Synq3 (55) are chain-scale products sold on a quote, so the per-store number has to be confirmed in writing.
- The category estimate is about 150 missed calls a month per store, and around 60% of those callers wanted to order or book.
- A 12-store brand buys 12 subscriptions: about $1,188 a month for Kovo Starter against about $2,388 for Loman at the same 12.
The rubric, and why these weights
We sell Kovo. The weights and the inputs are printed so the ranking can be checked.
Ranking phone agents by voice quality is unmeasurable, and every vendor wins it. Ranking by what a restaurant actually pays for is checkable.
| Weight | Criterion | Why it decides |
|---|---|---|
| 25% | Price per answered call | The bill is the first objection |
| 20% | Reservations included, no platform fee | A table call is the highest-value call |
| 15% | Order limits the owner controls | One fixed cap does not fit four restaurant types |
| 15% | Payment that closes on the call | An unpaid ticket is a kitchen waiting |
| 10% | POS depth you actually run | A ticket that needs retyping is not an integration |
| 10% | Channels on one brain (phone, chat) | Two menus is two truths |
| 5% | Setup without a scheduled onboarding | Speed to first call |
Each vendor is scored 1–5 per row against public information checked in October 2026, then weighted into the total.
The ranking
| # | Product | Score | Price | Reservations | Card on the call | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kovo | 93 | $99 / $299 | Own book, included | Known card on the line; link for a first-timer | A store-level takeout line whose ticket has to land in the Olo stream |
| 2 | Loman | 80 | From $199 | OpenTable write-back | Any card, captured in the call | A brand where every caller must pay before they hang up |
| 3 | ConverseNow | 57 | Quote | Not publicly listed | Confirm on demo | A high-volume QSR and drive-thru chain |
| 4 | Certus AI | 57 | Quote | Not publicly listed | Confirm on demo | A multi-unit group with mixed-language callers |
| 5 | Synq3 | 55 | Quote | Not publicly listed | Confirm on demo | A chain that wants one enterprise vendor and a custom scope |
Kovo wins price, an included reservation book, order limits the owner sets, phone and chat on one engine, and setup without a scheduled onboarding. Loman wins the payment row outright, with any card captured inside the call, and ties the reservations row where the shop is already on OpenTable, because it writes into that book while Kovo's book is its own.
ConverseNow, Certus AI, and Synq3 publish no price, which is why their rows read "not publicly listed" and "confirm on demo" rather than a number you can weigh. Ask each for the all-in per-store figure at your call volume in writing, then put it beside $99 and $299.
Half of the phone problem is not on the dashboard at all. A QSR Magazine analysis estimates the average restaurant misses about 150 calls a month, and the platform only reports what it receives.
Kovo — 93/100
Kovo answers the phone, takes the order the way the caller says it, reads it back, and sends the ticket to Olo. Nested modifier groups survive, so a half-and-half pie arrives as two sets of toppings rather than a note the kitchen reinterprets.
Payment splits by caller. A card the shop already holds is charged off-session while the caller is still on the line, so the ticket reaches the kitchen during the call; a first-time caller gets a Stripe link, and paying it vaults the card for next time. Starter is $99 for 750 connected minutes; Unlimited is $299 for 5,000, and at the cap calls forward to the shop's own line instead of billing an overage.
Loman — 80/100
Loman closes the whole call: the order with modifiers, the card captured inside the conversation, the ticket into the POS, and OpenTable booking. It publishes Olo on its integration list, unlimited concurrent calls, and onboarding under 24 hours, from $199 a month per location with no per-minute fees (published pricing, October 2026).
For a brand where every call has to end paid, that is the complete path, and the reason it sits second rather than first is the other six rows. The limit is the number: at 300 calls a month it is about double Kovo Starter for one line, and its headline results are operator-reported rather than audited (Kovo vs Loman).
ConverseNow — 57/100
ConverseNow is voice AI built for QSR and drive-thru, sold on throughput in high-volume chains: order taking, upsell, and a lane product that a store-level phone line does not need.
If your Olo footprint is counter and drive-thru, it is a specialist in your format rather than a generalist. The limit is scale: it is quote-based and chain-oriented, so a four-store franchisee may find the minimum contract larger than the phone problem. Ask whether the phone is a first-class channel or a companion to the lane.
Certus AI — 57/100
Certus AI handles orders, deliveries, reservations, upselling, and complaints in English, Spanish, and French, which is the most useful thing on this list for a brand in a mixed-language market, and it is sold to multi-unit groups.
That is a fit claim, not a price claim. The limit is time and disclosure: implementation is publicly described as around five days, longer than the under-24-hours claim elsewhere in the category, and the Olo path is not publicly listed, so get it in writing per brand. The side-by-side is in Kovo vs Certus.
Synq3 — 55/100
Synq3 is the veteran restaurant voice-ordering vendor, with enterprise deployments and a scope negotiated rather than published. For a brand that wants one vendor across dozens of units and a contract signed by procurement, tenure counts for something.
The limit is that enterprise scope cuts both ways: per-unit price, contract length, published reservation support, and whether you are buying order taking or a broader guest platform are all questions for the demo rather than the website. Compare it in Kovo vs Synq3.
The test call, run at one store
Do this on a live line, with the same order, for each vendor. Then open Olo and look.
- A plain item. Did an order appear, with a store and a timestamp?
- An item with two modifiers. Did they land in the right modifier group?
- A combo or a half-and-half. Did the structure survive the trip?
- An item your test store does not sell. Was it offered anyway?
- An item the owner 86’d this morning. Did the agent still offer it?
- An order past the store's limit. Did the agent keep taking what fits, or ring the handset?
- A card order from a number that has paid before. Was it charged on the line, or did the kitchen wait for a link?
Run it at location four, not the flagship. The flagship is the store whose menu everyone tests against, and it is the one store where a stale menu will not show up.
FAQ
Which AI phone agent is best for an Olo restaurant?
Kovo scores 93/100 on our rubric: it writes the finished ticket into Olo, charges a card the shop already holds while the caller is still on the line, includes a reservation book at no extra platform fee, and starts at $99 for 750 connected minutes. Loman scores 80 and is the better pick when a first-time caller has to pay with any card inside the call, or when the booking has to land in OpenTable.
Does a phone order in Olo report like a web order?
Only if it enters the same order stream. A ticket written into Olo carries a store, a timestamp, and item-level modifiers, so it can be dispatched and reported alongside the app and the marketplaces. An order that arrives as a text or a transcript cannot, and at 12 stores that difference is invisible until someone adds up the channel report.
What does a phone agent cost for a 12-store brand?
Kovo is $99 a month for 750 connected minutes or $299 for 5,000, sold one subscription per store, so a 12-store brand is 12 lines and 12 subscriptions, which is $1,188 or $3,588 a month. Loman publishes from $199 a month per location with no per-minute fees, about $2,388 for the same 12 (published pricing, October 2026). ConverseNow, Certus AI, and Synq3 are quote-based, so the all-in per-store figure in writing is the only number that compares.
How many calls is a multi-unit brand actually losing?
A QSR Magazine analysis estimates about 150 missed calls a month per restaurant, and industry estimates put around 60% of missed calls as someone trying to order or book. That works out to roughly 90 order calls per store per month. At a $35 ticket it is about $3,150 a store, which is the number to test against your own call log rather than accept.
Can a phone agent send an order to a specific Olo store?
That is the question that separates a demo from a deployment. The ticket has to carry the right store, the right menu version, and the right modifier groups, because Olo dispatches on the store. Test at location four, not the flagship, and check that the item your flagship does not sell is missing rather than crashing the call.
Final Thoughts
The right phone agent for an Olo brand is the one whose ticket appears in the order stream with the right store on it. Everything else — voice quality, latency, price — is a tiebreaker after that.
Kovo wins the rubric at 93/100 on $99 for 750 connected minutes, a reservation book included, limits you set, and a ticket written into Olo. Loman is the answer to a different question, any card and any caller, and the table says so. Run the test call at location four and score the rows yourself. Take a test call.