Yet another milestone for UPI: Processed 822 million transactions in July

Surpassing all previous records, Unified payment interface (UPI) has registered 822.29 million transactions in July. To be sure, UPI has never crossed 800 million mark since its inception although it registered close to 800 million transactions in March.

The data revealed by umbrella organisation NPCI comes amidst anticipation around saturation in UPI transaction market. While July registered the highest volume, the growth in value of transaction remains flat, recorded at Rs 1,46,386.64 crore, a little lower than the previous month.

Comparatively, UPI's volume of transaction increased by 9% from 754.54 million in June to 822.29 million in July.

Cashless transactions have now become simpler and convenient thanks to BHIM UPI. #DigitalIndia #InstantPayments #HighOnUPI #NPCI #BHIMUPI @dilipasbe pic.twitter.com/Fy8iLKQS0U

— BHIM (@NPCI_BHIM) August 1, 2019

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Like before, the growth in government-owned BHIM's usage has once again remained flat with 16.01 million transactions worth Rs 6,121.67 crore in July. In June, it recorded 15.49 million transactions amounting to Rs 6,202.49 crore.

Meanwhile, NPCI-regulated inter-bank electronic funds transfer system (IMPS) has also recorded its highest transaction value at Rs 1,82,021.01 crore. With 189.28 million transactions in July, IMPS processed its second-highest volume ever.

The growth in UPI has been mainly driven by Paytm, Google Pay and PhonePe. With huge userbase, the trio has managed to process more than 90% of UPI transaction via their platform.

Of late, Google Pay has emerged as the largest contributor to UPI ecosystem followed by PhonePe and Paytm. Among them, the Alibaba-backed company was leading the UPI segment till February. However, Google Pay and PhonePe took over Paytm's dominance in the UPI ecosystem since March this year.

Apart from the consumer-focused transaction, merchant payments via UPI have also increased in the past few months – 15% in April to 31% in June. About 240 million merchant payments were processed via UPI in June 2019.

Given that Paytm has shifted its focus from incentives and the cashback-oriented peer-to-peer transaction to merchant-based UPI payments, it would be interesting to watch how UPI maintains its mojo in terms of volume as well as the value in the coming months.