India's ATMs are disappearing as digital payments take over
India's ATM numbers dropped in 2024-25, falling to 2.51 lakh from 2.53 lakh last year, says the RBI's latest banking report.
The reason? More people are choosing digital payments over cash, so banks—both public and private—are quietly trimming their ATM networks.
Banks are opening more branches, just not more ATMs
Even with fewer ATMs, bank branches actually grew by 2.8% to hit 1.64 lakh, especially in rural and semi-urban areas where public sector banks led the charge.
Meanwhile, white-label ATMs (the ones not tied to a specific bank) saw a small boost too.
Digital shift is changing how we save and insure money
Basic savings accounts jumped to 72.4 crore and balances reached ₹3.3 lakh crore—much of it handled by business correspondents out in the field.
Deposit insurance now covers nearly all accounts but only about 41% of total deposits—a slight dip from before.