The Unified Payments Interface (UPI) has achieved a milestone with 18.30 billion transactions in March, marking a 13.6% increase from 16.11 billion transactions in February. This impressive growth represents a 36% year-on-year rise, according to data from the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
For the first time, UPI surpassed the 18 billion transaction mark in a single month. The total transaction value for March also saw a significant jump of approximately 12.80%, reaching Rs 24.77 lakh crore, up from Rs 21.96 lakh crore in February.
On average, UPI processed 590 million transactions daily in March, compared to 575 million in February. The average daily transaction amount also increased, rising from Rs 78,446 crore in February to Rs 79,910 crore in March.
The surge in UPI usage can be attributed to various factors, including the growing adoption of UPI by merchants across different sectors, government initiatives aimed at promoting digital payments, and increasing consumer awareness about the convenience of UPI.
To further bolster the adoption of digital payments, the Indian government recently introduced an incentive scheme aimed at encouraging small merchants to use the BHIM-UPI platform. The ‘Incentive Scheme for Promotion of Low-Value BHIM-UPI Transactions (P2M)’ will run from April 1, 2024, to March 31, 2025, with a budget allocation of Rs 1,500 crore.
While PhonePe, Google Pay, and Paytm continue to lead the UPI market, Flipkart’s Super.money made its debut in the top five UPI apps in February, pushing out CRED from the list.
