Apple Pay Alternatives: Open Banking & Digital Wallets

Apple Pay is popular with customers—but for merchants, it’s not always the best deal. Hidden fees, tech limitations, and a narrow user base can lead to shopping cart abandonment and chip away at your profits.

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at where Apple's mobile wallet falls short and explore smarter Apple Pay alternatives that can help you cut costs, speed up settlements, and reach more customers.

What Does Apple Pay Offer?

To better understand which Apple Pay alternatives might work for merchants, let’s first look at what Apple Pay actually offers as a payment method.

Firstly, Apple Pay is more protected, especially compared to online card payments, which make up 70% of all payment fraud. Like many other digital wallets, Apple Pay doesn’t share real card details with merchants, using encryption instead. Payments are authorised using biometric factors such as Face ID or Touch ID, and all data is locked away safely on the user’s device.

Apple Pay makes mobile checkout fast and easy for Apple users. It’s built into iPhones, iPads, and Apple Watches, so customers can pay in just a few taps––that’s 1.4 billion of active iPhone users worldwide. In fact, mobile wallets are beloved by digitally-native shoppers––Millennials and GenZs––who expect mobile-friendly payment options.

So compared to online card payments, Apple Pay offers two advantages: stronger security and smoother mobile UX, which results in less cart abandonment and more sales.

Drawbacks of Apple Pay

Since you’re here reading about alternatives to Apple Pay, you probably already know that while Apple Pay is a popular digital wallet, it does come with some downsides––for both merchants and customers.

• Slow settlements:  Even though Apple Pay is a separate payment method, it still runs on card networks. This means transactions are not always instant, and settlement times can be 1-3 days. 
• Card fees still apply: For the same reason as above, merchants still pay the usual processing fees––interchange and scheme fees–– which can eat into margins.

For example, the leading payment provider Stripe charges the same rate for processing Apple Pay transactions as they do for all other credit and debit cards. So does its competitor Square. Here are their rates for standard UK cards:

Transaction fees as of April 2025. For more up-to-date information, please visit the providers’ websites.

Therefore, merchants accepting Apple Pay still pay standard card processing fees as the transaction happens via digital wallet, then via card. The only difference is the end-user experience.

Read: How to reduce card processing fees

• Apple Pay only works on Apple devices, so Android users, who actually make up the majority, can’t pay with it. In the UK, over half of mobile users are on Android. Globally, it’s even higher, with Android holding more than 70% of the market. That means if you only offer Apple Pay, you could be shutting out most of your potential customers.

Alternatives to Apple Pay Alternative Payments: Pay-by-Bank & Other Wallets

Smarter Alternative to Apple Pay: Pay-by-Bank (Open Banking)

Most mobile wallet apps like Apple Pay still rely on cards. That means higher fees and slower settlements for you as a merchant.

Open banking—or pay-by-bank—is a smarter alternative to Apple Pay for merchants. It’s faster, cheaper, and cuts out the card networks entirely. Payments go straight from your customer’s bank account to yours.

Here’s how it works:

1. The customer starts the payment on your website or app
2. They pick their bank from a list
3. They’re redirected to their bank’s app or site to authorise the payment, usually with Face ID or fingerprint
4. The money moves instantly from their account to yours

These payments are fully regulated under Europe’s PSD2 and run on secure, consent-based APIs provided by the banks themselves.

Why Switch to Pay-by-Bank

Here’s why pay-by-bank (open banking) is a smarter way to accept online payments than digital wallets:

• It costs less: Open banking cuts out the middlemen. No card networks or wallet providers are involved. That means it eliminates scheme and interchange fees completely.
• You get paid instantly: The money goes straight from your customer’s bank account to yours, usually in real time. No waiting days like with wallets tied to card networks.
• It’s more secure: Open banking does not need card details, plus it uses bank-level security and always requires strong customer authentication—like Face ID or a fingerprint.
• No chargebacks: Since customers initiate the payment themselves, there's no way for them to reverse it like with cards. That means fewer disputes for you to deal with. Read more on how to prevent chargebacks.
• Seamless mobile checkout: Similarly to digital wallets, mobile checkout is superior to online card payments. Customers just pick their bank and confirm the payment in their app. It’s fast, smooth, and ideal for mobile shopping.

Integrate Pay-by-Bank with Noda

Looking for a smarter, more cost-effective alternative to Apple Pay? Try Noda’s Open Banking platform. Connect to over 2,000 banks in 28 countries in the UK and Europe, accept multiple currencies, and settle payments instantly.

Choose the integration option that suits you best. For full customisation, use our Open Banking API. If you have limited development resources, get started quickly with easy tools like plugins for major e-commerce platforms, or instant payment links with QR codes.

Other Apple Pay Alternatives: Digital Wallets

There are also other popular digital wallets you can integrate. Let’s take a closer look at the biggest competitors of Apple Pay.

Google Payl.

Google Pay is an obvious alternative as it's the biggest Apple Pay competitor, and globally it’s used even more widely. Google Pay is the absolute leader among mobile wallets, with a market share of 49%. It works the same way as Apple Pay but is designed exclusively for Android users.

The downsides are similar too: it still runs on card networks and only works on Android devices, therefore excluding Apple users. So if you offer Google Pay, it’s worth offering Apple Pay as well (and vice versa) to avoid shopping cart abandonment.

Samsung Pay

Samsung Pay is an app similar to Apple Pay, but for Samsung Galaxy device users. It lets them make contactless payments in stores and online by adding their credit or debit cards to Samsung Wallet. Each payment requires biometric authorisation via a fingerprint, PIN, or iris scan to go through, and Samsung Knox technology keeps card data encrypted.

The main drawback, like with Apple Pay and Google Pay, is that Samsung Pay only works on certain devices, excluding the other types. In the UK, for example, Samsung is only the second most popular phone brand with about 32% of the market, compared to Apple’s 49%. It also still runs on card networks, meaning merchants face the usual interchange fees and the risk of chargebacks.

PayPal

PayPal is another popular alternative—and unlike Apple or Google Pay, it’s not a mobile wallet, so it’s not tied to a specific smartphone type or operating system. It works across all devices via its app or website. PayPal has 429 million active users worldwide, spanning over 200 countries, with a payment processing market share of 45% (at the time of writing).

It supports more than just cards—users can top up their wallet or link a bank account. In some regions, PayPal offers open banking via its partnership with Tink, but many of its transfers still rely on traditional rails like direct debit or card networks, especially outside the EEA. This means that PayPal still charges card processing fees. Plus, PayPal is known for higher fees in international payments. For example it charges 2.49%+£0.30 for non-domestic EEA transactions, and 3.19%+£0.30 for all other markets.

Another downside of PayPal is that customers have to log in, or create an account, to complete a payment. If they don’t already have an account, this extra step can create friction and cause cart abandonment.

Revolut Pay

Revolut Pay is a digital wallet from Revolut, a digital-only challenger bank, serving 52 million users worldwide. Revolut is a startup success story, which shows how much payment habits have shifted away from traditional banking, especially among Millennials and Gen Z. Revolut Pay gives merchants access to a wide customer base and works across all mobile devices, without being tied to a specific operating system.

To integrate Revolut Pay, merchants would need a Revolut Pro account. The transaction charges are 1% + £0.20 (as of April 2025).

However, the digital wallet is not the bank’s main product—its core focus is still on its multi-currency account. It’s unclear how many of the 52 million Revolut users actively use Revolut Pay as a wallet. Another limitation is that customers need a Revolut account to pay this way, which can exclude those who don’t have one.

CoinBase Wallet

Coinbase Wallet (via Coinbase Commerce) lets merchants accept payments in a wide range of cryptocurrencies. Unlike traditional payment methods, crypto payments are borderless, settled instantly, and not subject to chargebacks. Like with PayPal, customers would need a CoinBase account to pay with this wallet.

You’d think that crypto adoption is still niche compared to other payment methods, but CoinBase Wallet mobile wallet market share is 17%, according to 6sense. Yet compared to traditional payment methods, merchants may face challenges with regulatory compliance, tax reporting, and the conversion of digital assets to fiat currency.

Final Thoughts

Choosing the right alternative to Apple Pay depends on your business goals. Think about your audience, your margins, and how quickly you want to get paid. Here are a few conclusions:

• If you want mobile-friendly UX, lower fees, instant payouts, and fewer chargebacks, pay-by-bank is your best bet. It’s ideal for businesses that want to cut costs and get paid faster, especially e-commerce merchants.
• If you serve mostly Android users, adding Google Pay makes sense. It offers a smooth mobile checkout but still comes with card fees. Samsung Pay is another choice—but it works only with Samsung Galaxy users.
• If you want a digital wallet that works across all devices, PayPal and Revolut Pay are good options—but be ready for login friction that could impact conversions.
• If you’re targeting crypto-savvy customers, Coinbase Wallet could help you tap into a growing market, though it comes with more complexity around regulations and taxes.