Digital wallets have rapidly evolved into robust, multi-service platforms, now serving over 4.3 billion users worldwide. With global usage set to top 6 billion by 2030, Mastercard is introducing Mastercard Wallet Pay, a global portfolio of solutions designed to foster interoperability and innovation for digital wallets across contactless (NFC), QR codes and online digital payments.
Harnessing the industry’s most advanced capabilities, Mastercard Wallet Pay solutions empower wallet providers to deliver frictionless experiences — from everyday spending to cross-border transfers – meeting the demands of a rapidly expanding digital economy.
Through collaborations with leading digital payment service providers including Alipay+ — the global wallet gateway of Ant International that supports its partner wallets such as AlipayHK, Clip, GCash, KakaoPay, TNG eWallet and TrueMoney — together with Axian, CRED, DaviPlata, Mercado Pago, MTN and TenPay Global, Mastercard Wallet Pay expands access to essential financial tools and enables acceptance at hundreds of millions of acceptance locations and digital access points worldwide, ensuring that people everywhere can participate in the digital economy.
Wallet Pay reinforces Mastercard’s commitment to powering stored value digital wallets across its global payments network. Leading wallet providers are choosing Mastercard for its global acceptance and digital access points, while providers such as Alipay+ — which connects more than 50 e-wallets and banking apps as well as over 10 national payment schemes worldwide — are helping enable their wallet partners to connect to Mastercard Wallet Pay at scale.
A portfolio built for possibility
With technologies like cloud-based payments and Mastercard’s global acceptance network, wallet providers can leverage Mastercard Wallet Pay and bring new use cases to life without significant changes to their infrastructure.
Whether travelers are linking their cards to local wallets, businesses are moving money instantly or communities are accessing financial tools for the first time, Wallet Pay solutions are engineered for inclusion, innovation and scale:
- Interoperability: Enables smooth connections between wallets across borders, platforms and payment types
- Secure issuing: Supports providers in launching their own credit, debit or prepaid card programs, unlocking new revenue streams and deepening customer engagement.
- Unified digital and e-commerce experiences: Allows merchants to accept payments from cards and wallets in person and online, enabling more than 3.7 billion Mastercard credentials to connect to digital wallets – driving transaction growth across channels.
- Accelerated money movement: Facilitates fast transfers between cards, wallets or accounts across 200-plus countries and territories and 150 currencies.
- Expanded access: Delivers low-cost financial tools to underbanked and unbanked consumers and supports digital inclusion in emerging regions.
“Wallets are gateways to the digital economy and launchpads for broader financial services,” said Jorn Lambert, chief product officer at Mastercard. “Through our Wallet Pay solutions, we’re helping payment providers to enhance the interoperability and user experience of their services, underpinned by trust, scale and convenience for the people and businesses they serve.”
“Consumers and merchants don’t think about the complexity behind payments. They simply want to pay and get paid using the payment experiences they already know and trust, whether they’re shopping at home or abroad,” said Joyce Bo, executive vice president, Core Payments, Asia Pacific, Mastercard. “The first chapter of digital wallets was adoption. The next chapter is interoperability at scale. As wallet ecosystems mature, the challenge is extending their reach across more merchants, use cases and borders. Mastercard Wallet Pay helps wallet providers expand what they can offer, from cross-border payments to card issuing, without having to build all of that connectivity themselves.”
Mastercard Wallet Pay builds upon the company’s longstanding commitment to driving financial inclusion. This includes the recently announced Global Financial Health Coalition, which brings together leading digital wallet providers to help close the gap between access and true financial health.
With the Wallet Pay portfolio, Mastercard is not only expanding access and interoperability but leading the way for digital wallet innovation and inclusion worldwide.
Download Mastercard’s new white paper, “Scaling digital wallets: Unlocking a sustainable path to profitability”.
