Whether you own an Android or iOS device, most phones in 2020 can double as a digital wallet and mobile payments service thanks to the inclusion of Apple, Google, or Samsung Pay. This allows you to store your debit and credit card information on your phone and securely pay for in-person purchases by holding it near a point of sales terminal. It’s a convenient, easy-to-use, and, most of all more, secure way to pay for things.
Over the years, Google’s mobile payments platform has had a couple of different names. What started as Google Wallet in 2011 then became Android Pay in 2015 before the company finally settled on Google Pay in 2018. As these things usually go, in North America and other parts of the West, the technology started to pick up steam when Apple adopted it for use with the iPhone. Now we’ve come to the point where it’s rare to see a phone ship without NFC and access to at least one mobile payments platform.
Loading pollProvided you own a phone that supports one of the three platforms listed above, do you use your phone to pay for things? Keep in mind you can also use Apple and Google Pay to pay for online purchases.
Related: Google vs Apple and Samsung Pay
Of course, a lot of your decision to use a digital wallet will depend on where you live. While availability has gotten a lot better in recent years, not all countries and financial institutions support Apple, Google, and Samsung Pay yet. As of 2020, Google’s mobile wallet is only available in about 30 countries across the globe. Moreover, not every feature of each mobile payments service is available in every country where you can use that platform. For example, you can only use Samsung Pay for online purchases in Korea.
As always, let us know what you think by voting in the included poll and sharing your thoughts in the comment section below.
