Apple Pay India launch is now expected to take place by 2026 end and here's what you can expect from the service.

Apple Pay India launch is expected to take place by the end of 2026 according to a new report.

Such reports have surfaced before, dating back to 2017, but the latest one seems to be more credible than the reports that came before. Here's what you can expect from the launch.

The report from Business Standard suggests that Apple Pay is yet to receive the necessary regulatory clearances to launch in India, but according to people familiar with the matter, Apple is actively engaging with banks, regulators, and card networks to make the service available in the country later this year.

Once the Apple Pay India launch takes place, people should likely be able to use Tap to Pay on iPhone, which would allow users to make contactless payments at NFC-enabled point-of-sale terminals. This will work similar to how Samsung Pay works with Samsung phones in the country. However, enabling this feature would require Apple to first finalise commercial agreements, including fee structures, with major card issuers operating in India.

Despite India being heavily driven by UPI-based digital payments, the sources indicate that Apple is not currently planning to seek approval as a third-party app provider for the UPI ecosystem. That said, some progress has already been made on the merchant side. In 2025, payment platforms such as Cashfree Payments and Razorpay integrated Apple Pay to enable international transactions for Indian businesses.

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Integration for UPI could be done in the second phase after the launch of the payments service in India but that would require a more complicated set of approvals from the regulatory bodies in India. The first phase of Apple Pay India launch will focus on contactless payments through debit and credit cards on iPhones and maybe even Apple Watches.