UPI crosses 23B monthly transactions for first time
What's the story
India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI) has achieved a major milestone by crossing the 23 billion monthly transaction mark for the first time in May 2026. The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) released data showing that UPI processed an impressive 23.2 billion transactions worth ₹29.9 lakh crore during the month. This is a significant increase from April's figures of 22.35 billion transactions worth ₹29.03 lakh crore, marking a month-on-month growth of 3.8%.
Daily stats
PhonePe continues to lead UPI market
In May, UPI processed nearly 748 million transactions per day, with an average daily transaction value of about ₹96,465 crore. The platform has seen consistent growth over the past few months with February recording 20.39 billion transactions, March seeing 22.64 billion transactions, and April accounting for 22.35 billion transactions. PhonePe dominated the UPI market in April with a whopping 46.2% share in transaction volume and an even bigger chunk of nearly half (49.3%) in terms of transaction value.
Market players
Smaller players raise concerns over dominance of big apps
Google Pay came second with a 33% share while Paytm was third with an 8% market share. The NPCI has not yet released the market share breakup for May. The dominance of these top players has raised concerns among smaller apps such as Amazon Pay, CRED, Navi, MobiKwik, super.money and others who recently met NPCI to discuss ways to make the UPI ecosystem more equitable.