Payment methods in Nigeria

Flutterwave is a pan-African fintech unicorn enabling Nigerian and African merchants to accept and process payments across multiple methods including cards, bank transfers, mobile money, and USSD. It is particularly strong for cross-border payments, helping Nigerian businesses accept international customers.

Generic online and mobile bank-transfer methods (internet banking, e-banking, EFT and interbank transfers). Customers pay directly from their bank account via their bank's own online/mobile banking portal. Implementation and rails differ by country, but the consumer flow is a standard account-to-account bank transfer.

Verve is Nigeria's dominant domestic card scheme, issued by Interswitch and supported by all major Nigerian banks. It accounts for the majority of card transactions in Nigeria and is designed for the local market — enabling payments at Nigerian merchants with lower cross-border capability than international schemes. Verve is the backbone of Nigeria's domestic e-commerce payments.

Paystack (acquired by Stripe in 2020) is Nigeria's leading payment gateway, processing over half of all online transactions in the country. It supports card payments, bank transfers, mobile money, and USSD payments through a single API. Paystack is the default integration for most Nigerian e-commerce startups and established merchants.

Opay and PalmPay are Chinese-backed Nigerian fintech apps that have rapidly grown to serve urban and peri-urban consumers with wallet-based payments, transfers, and bill payments. Both platforms have gained tens of millions of registered users and are increasingly integrated into merchant checkouts.

Chipper Cash is a pan-African wallet for free cross-border transfers, bill pay, virtual cards and online payments across seven markets. Operator: Chipper Technologies Inc. Est. users: 7M+ users (2024).

JumiaPay is the embedded wallet and checkout solution for the Jumia marketplace and bill payments across several African markets. Operator: Jumia Technologies AG. Est. users: ~5.4M Jumia active customers (2024).

Kuda is a Nigerian app-only neobank offering free transfers, debit cards and budgeting tools usable for online and in-store payments. Operator: Kuda Microfinance Bank. Est. users: ~7M users (2024).

Moniepoint is a Nigerian business-banking and payments provider serving millions of merchants and personal customers with accounts, cards and online payments. Operator: Moniepoint MFB. Est. users: 10M+ customers (2024).

Quickteller is Interswitch's consumer retail-payments platform for paying bills, buying airtime and checking out online with cards or bank accounts. Operator: Interswitch Group. Est. users: 200,000+ businesses on platform (2024).

Remita is a Nigerian electronic-payments platform widely used to pay bills, salaries, school fees and government revenue online via cards, transfers and wallets. Operator: SystemSpecs Technologies Ltd. Est. users: Millions of users (2025).

Tingg is Cellulant's consumer payments app and checkout that aggregates mobile money, cards and bank rails across eight African markets. Operator: Cellulant Corporation. Est. users: Large pan-African user base (2024).

NQR is Nigeria's unified national QR-code payment standard letting customers scan to pay merchants directly from their bank app. Operator: Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS). Est. users: Nationwide merchant/consumer base (2024).

PocketMoni is eTranzact's CBN-licensed mobile-money wallet for payments, bill pay and cardless withdrawals across Nigeria. Operator: eTranzact International PLC. Est. users: 2M+ users (est.).

EcobankPay (via the Ecobank Mobile app) offers QR-based scan-to-pay and account payments across 33 African countries. Operator: Ecobank Transnational Inc. Est. users: 4M+ app users (multi-country).

FairMoney is a Nigerian credit-led digital bank offering accounts, cards, transfers and loans usable for everyday and online payments. Operator: FairMoney Microfinance Bank. Est. users: 6M+ users (2024).

Pocket (formerly Abeg) is PiggyVest's social-commerce payments app for sending money, requesting payments and online checkout. Operator: PiggyVest (PiggyTech Global). Est. users: Millions of users (2024, est.).

USSD-based banking allows Nigerians without smartphones or internet access to initiate bank transfers and payments by dialling short codes on any mobile phone. This is a critical payment channel given Nigeria's infrastructure constraints, enabling payment from customers who cannot use internet-based methods.