Meta-owned WhatsApp Pay has significantly expanded its footprint in India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI) market, recording 167.89 million transactions in July 2026. These transactions amounted to a total value of ₹12,957.07 crore, marking a substantial increase from the 74.6 million transactions processed in the same month last year.
Rapid Ascent in UPI Rankings
The messaging platform's payment service has now climbed to become the eighth-largest UPI application in India by transaction volume. This surge has enabled WhatsApp Pay to move ahead of other prominent players in the digital payments space, including Cred and Amazon Pay.
The rapid growth observed in payments activity follows the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) removing user onboarding restrictions on WhatsApp Pay in December 2024. This crucial decision allowed the platform to significantly expand its user base without the previous limitations.
Key Milestones and Regulatory Changes
- November 2020: NPCI initially approved WhatsApp Pay to go live on UPI under a multi-bank model, with an initial cap of 20 million users.
- 2021-2022: User limits were progressively increased to 40 million in 2021 and then to 100 million in 2022.
- December 2024: All user onboarding restrictions were removed by NPCI, paving the way for accelerated growth.
- December 2025: WhatsApp Pay crossed the 100 million transaction mark for the first time.
Despite its impressive growth, WhatsApp Pay still trails the top three UPI platforms. In July 2026, PhonePe led the market with 10.85 billion transactions, followed by Google Pay with 7.64 billion, and Paytm with 1.90 billion transactions.
Partnerships and User Experience
At its launch, WhatsApp Pay collaborated with major Indian banks, including ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank, State Bank of India, and Jio Payments Bank. The service was designed to offer users the convenience of sending and receiving money directly within the WhatsApp application, eliminating the need for a separate payment app.
The platform's continued expansion highlights the competitive and dynamic nature of India's digital payments ecosystem, with user convenience and broad accessibility driving adoption.