In 2018, 31.9% of Korea’s smartphone users are expected to use their phones to pay for goods or services at a POS, reports KoreaHerald, citing a January report by analytics company eMarketer.
The introduction of Samsung Pay in 2015 has caused a surge in offline mobile payments. Samsung Electronics said that Samsung Pay has more than 10 million users in Korea who used the e-wallet to transact more than USD 17.02 billion, in March 2018.
Korea is a prime market for Samsung Pay as the smartphones manufacturer already enjoys a dominant position in the market. Many consumers go for the premiums models equipped with biometric authentications, which makes the payment prices even simpler.
Online, the mobile pay service competition is divided between several players, among which the most important ones are N Pay operated by Korea’s portal website Navel and Kakao Pay offered by Kakao, the operator of the country’s top mobile messenger KakaoTalk.
According to the “2017 Electronic Pay Service Usage” report released by the Bank of Korea, overUSD 2 million mobile payment transactions were made daily in 2017, with an on-year increase of 147.4%.
In addition, the proportion of offline payments in the overall simplified mobile pay realm has increased from 46.5% in 2016 to 55.6% in 2017, overtaking online payments.
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