Payment trends update: predictions in payments for 2025

Forrester¹ predicts a 40% fall in cash use worldwide in 2025, primarily in holdout markets like Europe and Latin America. In parallel, the same report indicates that faster digital payments, such as account-to-account (A2A) transfers and real-time payments (RTP), will see global momentum.

Among emerging trends in payments, Javelin² foresees increased adoption of:

• Biometric authentication. The Javelin report points out that this technology—which is proven, widely available, and generally accepted by consumers—is an easy verification method that can help remove friction from the payment experience and reduce fraud.
• Targeted advertising in payments. Historically, companies have generally used data-driven targeted advertising to identify the customers most likely to be receptive to their offers. Within payments, this model has appeared in some digital wallets and card-based offerings. Javelin suggests that digital targeted ads might be more profitable than customized cross-selling.
   

Delivering a great shopping experience—including a great checkout process—continues to be a top priority for many retailers, as customers expect features like contactless payments, digital wallet acceptance, and seamless unified commerce shopping.

That's why, according to Javelin,³ many retailers who've adopted payment platforms understand that the value they deliver outweighs the cost. As Javelin puts it: "Saving a penny on a payment transaction becomes expensive if a clunky process drives up cart abandonment and customer attrition."

The same Javelin report says that, in addition to fast and frictionless unified checkout solutions, merchants are looking for solutions that reduce fraud and chargeback risk, while also minimizing false alerts that could negatively impact the checkout experiences.

As the retail industry continues to transform, IDC⁴ predicts that retailers will make investments in a range of payment technologies, including:

• Advanced analytics, AI, machine learning (ML), and natural language processing (NLP). These investments will reflect retailers' ambitions to shift from being data rich to data driven.
• AI- and GenAI-enabled voice, AR/VR, and robotics, to improve search, personalization, content creation, data accuracy, and customer service management. By doing so, retailers will aim to support unified commerce by meeting customers' expectations for choice, value, and convenience throughout their shopping journey.
   

Meanwhile, Forrester sees a mixed outlook for conversational commerce—online commerce and customer interactions facilitated by conversational AI such as chatbots, messaging apps, and voice assistants. It predicts that, in 2025:

• Uptake among retailers and brands will be low, with only one in five adding conversational commerce.⁵
• Conversational banking will take off, with in-app conversational assistants helping customers navigate the app, get assistance, and access personalized financial guidance.⁶
   

IDC makes a similarly positive prediction for conversational commerce in the insurance industry, saying that insurers are set to use GenAI-driven chatbots and virtual assistants to "bridge the gap between digital and human services, creating a more seamless and satisfying customer experience."⁷

Inevitably, integrating GenAI and other modern technologies into digital commerce will require investment in flexible architectures over the coming years. As a result, IDC forecasts that the worldwide digital commerce platform market will reach $19.7 billion in 2028, exhibiting a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 14.6%.⁸

As mentioned above, faster digital payments are seeing increased global traction, and are already well established in the consumer space. In 2025, Javelin⁹ expects to see increased momentum in the commercial and enterprise sector, especially among:

• Businesses that depend on contract workers, who can use instant payments to put money in workers' accounts as soon as their shift ends.
• Suppliers, especially SMBs, for whom instant payments can alleviate cash-flow problems.
• Buyers and sellers, for whom instant payments can be a way to access a larger global community without the expense or complexities of legacy cross-border payment methods.
   

The same Javelin report calls out the advantages of digital payment methods over checks. While checks are expensive to process and prone to fraud, digital payment methods:

• Traverse automated systems quickly and efficiently without costly manual intervention.
• Offer built-in security features, encryption, and real-time fraud detection, making them a more secure choice.
   

Similarly, Forrester predicts that real-time payments (RTP) will replace checks and account clearing house (ACH) for B2B payments in the U.S.¹

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) is a well-established, broadly understood payment option, but now there's also save now, pay later (SNPL). Like a savings plan, this is a form of short-term savings account that can, for example, be embedded in an eCommerce website or mobile app, or linked to a customer's loyalty account.

Offering SNPL lets a merchant enable and incentivize customers to save up for (typically high value) items they want to buy from the merchant. Already in use in countries like India, Forrester⁶ anticipates that, in 2025, payments firms with strong merchant ecosystems will launch SNPL offerings in markets like the U.S. and Europe.

It's clear from this selection of analyst-predicted trends that improving the customer experience remains a top priority in 2025, leading merchants and other businesses to focus on strengthening their capabilities in data, automation, and innovation through deployment of GenAI and other modern technologies.

We'd love to discuss these and other trends and innovations in payments and eCommerce with you. Feel free to reach out and discover how Visa Acceptance Solutions and our uniquely open payments platform can help you build the future of payments.

And keep an eye out for our next update for more news and commentary.