India’s rapid shift towards digital payments gathered further pace in 2025, with cheques now accounting for less than 3% of all transactions in the first half of the year, according to the Reserve Bank of India’s Payment System Report (June 2025) released on Thursday.
Digital payment transactions made up 99.7% of all payments by volume and 97.5% by value in 2024, a trend that continued into H1 2025, when digital modes comprised 99.8% of transactions by volume and 97.7% by value, the report said.
“The payments ecosystem in India has witnessed remarkable growth in recent years,” the RBI noted, adding that the landscape now includes a wide range of instruments from NEFT, IMPS, RTGS, NACH, debit and credit cards, and prepaid instruments to UPI, which continues to dominate.
Paper-based instruments have been steadily declining, accounting for just 2.3% of total transaction value. In contrast, total payment transactions have grown from 3,248 crore in 2019 to 20,849 crore in 2024, with their overall value rising from Rs 1,775 lakh crore to Rs 2,830 lakh crore during the same period.
In the half-year ended June 2025, India recorded 12,549 crore transactions worth Rs 1,572 lakh crore, almost entirely driven by digital payments.
The Unified Payments Interface (UPI) remains the backbone of India’s retail payments system, accounting for 85% of all transactions by volume in H1 2025, though only 9% in value, underscoring its role in small-ticket transfers.
UPI transaction volumes skyrocketed from 1,079 crore in 2019 to 17,221 crore in 2024, with value surging from Rs 18.4 lakh crore to Rs 246.8 lakh crore. In just the first half of 2025, 10,637 crore UPI transactions worth Rs 143.3 lakh crore were processed.
The Real Time Gross Settlement system, designed for high-value payments, held the largest share in value terms at 69% in H1 2025, despite contributing just 0.1% to overall volume.
RTGS volumes rose from 14.8 crore in 2019 to 29.5 crore in 2024, while value increased from Rs 1,388.7 lakh crore to Rs 1,938.2 lakh crore. By mid-2025, it had already processed 16.1 crore transactions worth Rs 1,079.2 lakh crore, reflecting steady growth.
Similarly, NEFT transactions more than tripled between 2019 and 2024 from 262.2 crore to 926.8 crore in volume and Rs 232.9 lakh crore to Rs 432.8 lakh crore in value. In H1 2025 alone, 490.5 crore NEFT transactions worth Rs 237 lakh crore were recorded.
Credit card usage has surged sharply, with transactions rising from 208.7 crore in 2019 to 447.2 crore in 2024, and value climbing from Rs 7.1 lakh crore to Rs 20.4 lakh crore. In the first half of 2025, 266.3 crore transactions worth Rs 11.1 lakh crore were logged.
Private sector banks continued to dominate the segment, expanding their share from 65.8% in June 2020 to 70.8% in June 2025. Public sector banks also gained ground, increasing their share from 22.5% to 24.1%, while foreign banks saw their share drop sharply to 4.1%, with outstanding credit cards falling from 67 lakh to 45 lakh. Small Finance Banks had issued 10 lakh cards by June 2025.
In contrast, debit card usage has declined since 2019, both in volume and value. The RBI attributed this to the increasing use of credit cards for online purchases and the dominance of UPI and other digital payment options.
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