India UPI Digital Payments: Volume and Value

How India's Unified Payments Interface became the country's main real-time payment system, using government and Reserve Bank of India data.

Updated October 1, 2026
6 min read
3 sources
India

Executive Summary

India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI) is now the backbone of everyday digital payments. Transaction value grew from about ₹1 lakh crore to ₹200 lakh crore by FY2023-24, a compound annual growth rate of 138%. In calendar year 2024, UPI handled 17,220.80 crore transactions worth ₹246.83 lakh crore.

Key Numbers

Value, FY2023-24: ₹200 lakh crore[1]; Up from about ₹1 lakh crore.
Value growth rate: 138%[1]; Compound annual growth rate, per the government.
Transactions, CY2024: 17,220.80 crore[2]; About 172 billion transactions.
Merchant share, Aug 2024: 62.40%[1]; Share of payments made to merchants (P2M).

Charts

UPI transaction volume

Number of UPI transactions per fiscal year, in crore (1 crore = 10 million).

FY2017-18
91.52
FY2023-24
13,116.47

Unit: crore transactions · FY2017-18 to FY2023-24Source: [3] Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR)

UPI transactions by type, August 2024

Person-to-merchant share of UPI transactions. The remainder is person-to-person.

Person-to-merchant62.4%
Person-to-person37.6%

Unit: % · August 2024Source: [1] Press Information Bureau, Government of India

Market Overview

UPI is a real-time payment system run by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI). It lets people move money instantly between bank accounts from a phone. A growing network of banks and fintech apps has made it India's preferred way to make real-time payments [1].

Historical Data

Transaction volume grew from 91.52 crore in FY2017-18 to 13,116.47 crore in FY2023-24 [3]. By our calculation, that is roughly 143 times as many transactions in six years.

In the first five months of FY2024-25 (April to August), transaction value had already reached ₹101 lakh crore [1], about half of the previous full year.

Segments

Payments to merchants now outnumber transfers between people. Person-to-merchant (P2M) payments made up 62.40% of UPI transactions in August 2024 [1].

Most of these payments are small: 85% were for ₹500 or less [1]. People use UPI heavily for everyday purchases, not just large transfers.

Methodology

Value and growth figures come from Government of India and Reserve Bank of India publications, which cite NPCI data [1][2]. The yearly volume series comes from an academic paper that compiles NPCI statistics [3]. Check it against NPCI's own published statistics.

One crore is 10 million. One lakh crore is one trillion rupees.

Sources

[1]
Press release on UPI growth / Press Information Bureau, Government of India / 2024 / View source
[2]
RBI Annual Report / Reserve Bank of India / 2025 / View source
[3]
The Growth and Impact of UPI on Digital Payments in India / Journal of Emerging Technologies and Innovative Research (JETIR) / 2025 / View source

Figures are reproduced from the publishers above. Calculations marked as our own are derived from these figures. Always check the original source before using a number.