News
Saudi Digital Payments Reach 80% As Cash Use Shrinks
Visa data shows cards and mobile wallets dominate spending, with smartphones now driving a growing share of daily transactions.
Digital payments now account for 80% of all transactions in Saudi Arabia, according to Visa’s latest Where Cash Hides report, another marker of how quickly the Kingdom is moving away from cash.
The share is up four percentage points from a year ago. Around 67% of consumers are now largely non-cash users, paying mainly with cards or mobile wallets. Smartphones are taking a bigger role, with mobile payments making up 16% of transactions.
Cash is retreating in routine spending. Eating out dropped 9%. Bill payments fell 8%, as shoppers opt for faster checkouts and app-based payments.
“The data shows a steady move toward digital payments in Saudi Arabia. Such progress is possible only because banks, fintechs, merchants, and technology partners are moving together in the same direction, in line with the Kingdom’s Vision 2030,” said Ali Bailoun, Visa’s Senior Vice President and Group Country Manager for Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Oman.
Also Read: UAE Users Sleep Less, But More Efficiently, ŌURA Data Reveals
Despite the recent findings, it’s important to note that cash hasn’t yet disappeared. It still shows up for tips (39%), peer-to-peer transfers (28%) and rent (14%).
Visa points to security features such as tokenization, along with rewards and cashback, as factors nudging more spending onto cards and phones — a shift that tracks with Saudi Arabia’s wider Vision 2030 push to digitize commerce.
News
Egypt’s Mobile Wallets Are Booming, But Cash Still Has Power
Egypt’s telecom regulator says $57.6 billion moved through more than 57 million wallets in six months. And one operator handled 77% of the value.
Egypt’s mobile wallets handled EGP 2.96 trillion ($57.6 billion) in transactions in the first half of 2026, according to the National Telecom Regulatory Authority – a 56% rise on the EGP 1.90 trillion ($36.9 billion) recorded a year earlier. Transactions grew faster still, up 62% to 2.22 billion, while registered wallets climbed 23% to 57.01 million.
On one reading, that is exactly what Egypt’s regulators have been pushing for: a payments system that runs through telecom-linked wallets rather than banknotes. But the same data shows how far cash still reaches into it. Cash withdrawals made up just 12% of the transactions taking money out of wallets, yet 75% of the value withdrawn or spent.
Money arrives mostly from bank accounts: transfers through InstaPay accounted for 78% of deposit transactions and 58% of the value deposited, while incoming remittances from abroad made up 3% of deposit transactions but 10% of their value. Once inside, it largely moves between wallets – wallet-to-wallet transfers accounted for 54% of all transactions and 67% of total value, with mobile and internet top-ups a distant second at 25% of volume. In effect, the wallet is serving as a transfer layer: the place money passes through between the bank account and the banknote.
That layer also runs predominantly through one operator. Vodafone Cash held 53% of registered wallets and 57% of active ones, but handled 69% of transactions and 77% of their value. Its nearest rival, e& money, held 23% of registered wallets but 14% of transaction value; Orange Cash 20% and 8%; WE Pay 4% of wallets. How many of the 57.01 million are active is not stated.
Also Read: Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
Adoption is rather uneven in other respects. Men held 38 million wallets, or 67% of the total, against 19 million held by women. Users aged 26 to 45 accounted for half of all wallets, and Cairo alone had 10.6 million, or 19% of the national total, with Giza next at 6.5 million.
The NTRA says it is continuing to work with telecom operators on the regulatory framework for wallet services, part of a wider effort to expand electronic payments and financial inclusion. Its own figures show that effort succeeding on the way in. On the way out, three-quarters of the value still leaves as cash.
Egypt’s Mobile Wallets Are Booming, But Cash Still Has Power
Apple’s First Folding iPhone Arrives Late To A Shrinking Market
Apple’s Latest Product Releases Make The Headlines
Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
RØDE’s New DS3 Studio Arm Is Built For Heavier Creator Setups
Anghami’s New Elite Program Starts With A Three-Decade Catalog
Dubai’s aradus Wants AI To Run The Back Office Of Physical Trade
Qatar Is Getting Its First EV Plant, Built To Cope With Gulf Heat
Qatar Airways Flies The World’s First Starlink-Equipped 787-9
Former Rockstar Director Dismisses GTA 6 Leaks As “Nothing Burger”
-
News3 weeks agoFormer Rockstar Director Dismisses GTA 6 Leaks As “Nothing Burger”
-
News3 weeks agoRØDE’s New DS3 Studio Arm Is Built For Heavier Creator Setups
-
News3 weeks agoDubai Turns AI On Its Own Civil Service To Measure Productivity
-
News3 weeks agoVisa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon