More people than ever pay for items using their mobile phones, whether they’re having their rewards card scanned by a barista for the first time or they've gone "all in" by loading their Visa debit and credit card on their phone.
But as rapidly as mobile payments have grown, the technology is still in its infancy. By 2020, many people could be leaving their wallets behind and paying for almost everything using their mobile phones.
This infographic discusses the growth of mobile payments since 1997 when vending machines that took payments by text were first introduced. Since 2010, the amount of money that's passed from consumers to merchants via smartphones has gone up nine-fold. By 2017, more than $721 billion will change hands via mobile1.
More importantly, though, more people and more merchants will feel more comfortable to use mobile, whether it's those NFC chips in your phones that let you hold your phone up to a scanner at a store or via transaction apps, by 2020 Visa believes mobile payments could become the preferred method of both consumers and merchants.