It’s interesting to note that within two years, UPI has created a league of its own. If you recall, UPI overhauled cards (debit & credit) for the first time ever in September 2019. And it continues to do so with a 44.23% contribution in January ‘20.
One of the major reasons for its massive adoption is the push from the government, multiple banks, and wallet players.
When launched in 2016, UPI was just an addition to the evolving modes of P2P payments. However, the easy, instant, and hassle-free usage has led this payment mode to become the champion of digital payments today.
This January, PhonePe is catching up to Google Pay. Let’s take a look at more numbers.
All findings in this report are based on the P2M UPI transactions made on the Razorpay platform.
It does not come as a surprise anymore to see Google Pay as the first choice for UPI transactions. Almost half (49.08%) of the total UPI transactions on Razorpay were carried out via Google Pay alone.
Close to Google Pay’s heels was PhonePe with an impressive share of 30.08%. And, in the third spot, PayTM contributed 10.21%.
The other UPI apps that did not make it as big but got some traction are ICICI, SBI, Axis, and HDFC with 1.44%, 0.38%, 0.11%, and 0.06% respectively.
Let’s also have a look as to how each of these apps grew individually. With a high spike on the charts of PhonePe and PayTM (growth of 13.6% and 17.95% respectively), Google Pay, one of the most preferred options saw a growth of 1.56% while BHIM saw the other side of the story, a decline of 3.24%.
The other UPI apps on the list were the brick and mortar banks making their way into the wall-less world. SBI saw a growth of 15%, Axis climbed up by 4.95% while HDFC saw a growth of 1.83%.
Move over, plastic money (January ’20)
While the users have given a safe corner to UPI on their screens and minds, the race between UPI and cards have gotten the most interesting spectators.
Here are some insights:
- UPI contributed 44.23% of the total transactions that were made on the Razorpay platform
- Cards comprised of 39.62% of the digital transactions while Netbanking stood third with a share of 9.05%
- The rest of the modes were wallets (3.56%), bank transfers (2.41%), e-mandate (1.06%), and EMI (0.06%)
UPI in India – adoption and usage (January ’20)
In the effort of enabling digitalization across the nation, UPI has been a role player. In other words, UPI has easily been able to bridge through the set norms about the hassles of digital payments. The mobile-only payment option has made its way to become the primary payment option. But do you know how the individual states and cities contribute to the overall economy via UPI?
Take a look:
- Karnataka gets the tag of the most digitized state yet again by making up to 24.94% of the total UPI transactions that took place across the country. Among cities, Bengaluru was the biggest contributor eating up a whopping 35.5% of the share
- Maharashtra stood second in the row by contributing 15.2% with Pune contributing to 10%
- Thirdly, the southern state of Tamil Nadu contributed 10.21% to the overall UPI transactions in the month of January
Note: You may wonder how Karnataka’s contribution is 24.94% while Bangalore is 35.5%. The reason is, the state split is different from the city split. We consider the whole country to provide state-wise contribution, whereas we look into top 15 cities and calculate their contribution.
UPI in the last 6 months
Now, let’s also take a look at the past 6 months to understand this game-changer.
UPI saw its biggest growth jump in the month of September 2019. This was a striking hike of 39.56%! Just once in the past six months was there a dip in UPI usage, which was in November. From December 2019 to January 2020, UPI climbed up the ladder by 6.89% marking an incredible start to the new year, setting a benchmark for UPI in the months to come.
UPI in 2020
In the upcoming months, we expect UPI to move ahead at this very pace. Being one of the most groundbreaking innovations in the payments space, UPI has come a long way from where it started.
UPI will also be a gamechanger in the recurring payments space. NPCI has announced that consumers will be able to make recurring payments through UPI very soon. We believe that this will be the next big thing to take UPI forward by leaps and bounds in 2020.
Let’s wait and see how UPI will continue to explore new grounds in the Indian payments space in 2020.
