The number of retailers accepting Apple Pay is still climbing and has hit the 2 million mark. Au Bon Pain, Chick-fil-A, Create & Barrel, and Zappos are among the latest to get on board with Apple's wireless mobile payment system, and more are on the way.
Apple Pay retail partners hits 2 million
Zappos head of mobile, Aki Iida told Business Times, "We've been getting requests from customers to use Apple Pay for quite a while."
Apple Pay is Apple's NFC-based credit card payment system for the iPhone 6 and newer, along with Apple Watch. You can use your iPhone or Apple Watch to tap-and-pay at supported credit card terminals without using your credit card, and it's more secure because your actual card number isn't used in transactions.
Apple Pay is more secure and convenient than swiping magnetic stripes on cards, but many smartphone users aren't ready to trust the system. Some retailers aren't interested in enabling the feature at their pay terminals, which isn't helping push wireless payment adoption.
"The challenge for us and Apple as well is to see how much the feature is adopted—not just by retailers but also consumers," Mr Iida said.
Despite the resistance, mobile payments are expected to increase from 2015's US$450 billion to $620 billion this year. Apple Pay will likely be a big part of that because China's biggest banks are rolling out support this month—that's a huge increase in potential mobile payment users.