Walmart Pay, the mobile payment system launched by the retailer in late 2015, may be on the verge of overtaking Apple Pay usage in the United States, a new report claims.
The service is available for both iOS and Android, across 4,774 Walmart stores, and is currently enrolling “tens of thousands of new users” per day. Two-thirds of them utilize the service for a second time within 21 days, Walmart claims — thereby giving it impressive repeat business.
“If daily enrollments don’t slow down, I think that’s pretty well in the cards shortly,” Daniel Eckert, senior vice president of Walmart Services & Digital Acceleration, told Bloomberg. “I would have to imagine we are getting pretty close [to surpassing Apple Pay in the U.S.].”
Eckert isn’t the only person who thinks Walmart Pay may soon overtake Apple’s mobile payments service. Richard Crone, CEO of research company Crone Consulting, estimates that Walmart will surpass the number of active Apple Pay U.S. users (defined as those making two or more transactions each month) by the end of 2018.
Walmart Pay vs. Apple Pay
Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, launched Walmart Pay in late 2015. Although Walmart’s service began a year after Apple Pay, the retailer was no novice in the mobile app space: With 22 million customers per month using the regular Walmart app at the time, it ranked in the top three retail apps in both Google Play and the iOS App Store.
Apple Pay, meanwhile, continues to expand around the world. Last month, it launched in Sweden, Finland, Denmark and the United Arab Emirates, bringing its number of active markets to 25 countries.
Despite these impressive stats, however, Apple Pay hasn’t always had an easy time. Recent data from payment systems consultant First Annapolis suggests that only around 27 percent of eligible iPhone owners have ever used Apple Pay. Only 8 percent use Apple Pay, which launched in October 2014, on a weekly basis.
Do you use either Apple Pay or Walmart Pay? What has been your experience with mobile payment services so far? Let us know in the comments below.
Source: Bloomberg
