Cash is #1 for In-store Payments in Germany

calendar iconMay 30, 2022

Source

A recent survey found cash is the most common way to make in-store payments in Germany. In the other ten countries surveyed worldwide, cards were number one and cash was the next most used ahead of mobile payments, bank transfers and instalment schemes.

The study—Benchmarking the World’s Digital Transformation—surveyed over 15,000 individuals across 11 countries for payment companies PYMNTS and Stripe. It showed cash is also especially popular for in-store payments in Italy (representing 31.7 percent of such transactions), Spain (27 percent) and Japan (25.8 percent).

Benchmarking the World’s Digital Transformation, PYMNTS

While cards make up around 60ercent of payments in Australia, the UK and the U.S., cash is still used for around one in five in-store transactions. This is also true of Singapore, which was the country that made highest use of mobile payments, which represented 22 percent of all payments (slightly higher than cash at 21.3 percent).

The lowest use of cash was seen in France (12.6 percent) followed by Brazil (16 percent) and the Netherlands (18.1 percent). France also saw the highest percentage of card-based payments at 74.9 percent, which is far higher than the next-strongest users, the U.S. on 62.2 percent and Australia/the UK tied on 59.8 percent.

Alongside its preference for cash, Germany is also a strong user of digital wallets, which account for more online transactions than any other payment method, demonstrating that cash can comfortably coexist with cashless options, with each being chosen for different purposes.

Last Updated: May 31, 2022