Buy Now Pay Later

Digital bank/pay later company Klarna says its global merchant base now exceeds 1 million. The number of merchants offering the company’s payment methods rose by 47% in the last year, the ...

Consumers are becoming far more deliberate about how they use Pay Later tools, assigning each payment option a specific role in managing their finances. The emerging pattern suggests that speed, ...

Popular commentary portrays Generation Z as financially reckless, a cohort supposedly driven by impulse purchases, social media trends and a casual approach to money. The data tells a different story. Evidence from ...

The credit industry has spent decades competing for something consumers were never actually optimizing for. Top of wallet. Issuers built elaborate rewards architectures to win it. Travel points. Cash back ladders. Category ...

Buy now, pay later has been hitting an adoption wall, and could be losing momentum with the critical Gen Z and millennial age groups. The recent holiday shopping season tells a ...

Consumer spending cooled slightly in January, although strong growth in digital retail channels suggests that the broader trajectory of household consumption remains intact. Advance estimates released Friday (March 6) by the ...

Splitit aims to make flexible payment options part of agentic commerce through its support of Google’s Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP). Splitit joins Google and dozens of retail giants in supporting this ...

The checkout button may soon belong to a machine. As artificial intelligence agents move into booking travel, managing subscriptions and executing purchases on behalf of consumers, the payment layer underneath ...

Pay later provider Affirm is expanding its partnership with payments company Stripe. The expanded collaboration is designed to support shared payment tokens (SPT), which allow AI agents to make purchases with ...

Consumer credit is entering a new phase—one shaped by rising demand for flexibility, personalization and real-time control. As installment plans and hybrid repayment models become more common, issuers are seeing ...

Klarna said Wednesday (Feb. 25) that the number of people using its app on a daily basis rose by 53% over the past year and now stands at 9 million. The ...

Sezzle is accelerating its super app plans in 2026 after seeing growing engagement with its existing offerings in 2025, the company said in a Wednesday (Feb. 25) press release. During the ...

About a hundred years ago, so the story goes, F. Scott Fitzgerald, chronicler of the Jazz Age, turned to Ernest Hemingway and remarked, “The rich are different from you and ...

The New York State Department of Financial Services has published and opened for comment proposed regulations for buy now, pay later (BNPL) financing options. The draft regulations for BNPL lenders were ...

Modern furniture brand Article now offers Klarna’s flexible payment options at checkout in the United States and Canada. With these options, Article customers can choose to pay in full, split purchases ...

Klarna’s fourth-quarter results offer a snapshot into the appeal of paying over time. They also provide a window into the mechanics of a rapidly scaling financial network, where checkout activity, ...

Klarna said in a fourth-quarter earnings report that it doubled its number of banking customers over the past year. During the fourth quarter, Klarna’s number of banking customers grew 101% year ...

Australian buy now, pay later firm Zip says it is seeing enthusiasm from American customers. The company reported earnings Thursday (Feb. 19) that showed revenue growth of 46.4% for Zip’s U.S. business. Growth during the company’s ...

Sezzle has opened a waitlist for a mobile phone plan it will add to its all-in-one financial app. The new Sezzle Mobile plan includes unlimited 5G data, unlimited talk and text, unlimited HD streaming, Canada and Mexico roaming, ...

Apple is promoting the ability of Apple Pay to let users pay over time in stores as well as in apps and online. This capability is available with iOS 26 and ...

Sezzle and David’s Bridal teamed up with the Times Square Alliance to highlight payment solutions during a “Love in Times Square” event held on Valentine’s Day (Saturday, Feb. 14). Love in ...

Airbnb is expanding its “Reserve Now, Pay Later” program to properties around the globe. The vacation rental platform introduced the service last year, and announced its expansion Tuesday (Feb. 17) after ...

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) provider Affirm launched a partnership with home improvement retailer Lowe’s, according to a Tuesday (Feb. 17) press release. The collaboration will see Affirm offer biweekly or ...

Buy now, pay later is no longer just a checkout feature. It is becoming a line item in the monthly household budget. That is the central shift identified in “The Pay ...

Klarna says its pay later options are now available on Google Pay in the U.K. With this offering, Google Pay users in the U.K. have the choice of using Klarna’s interest-free ...

Computer seller MSI has formed a pay-later partnership with B2B payments company Mondu. The collaboration, announced Thursday (Feb. 12), will allow MSI to offer buy now, pay later (BNPL) solutions in its online business store. “As B2B ...

The United Kingdom’s financial watchdog announced its new protections for buy now, pay later (BNPL) users. The BNPL sector comes under the control of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) July 15, ...

What began as a checkout convenience for sneakers and sofas is now threading its way into grocery aisles, utility bills and subscription renewals, as paying over time assumes a regular ...

Virgin Media O2, a leading mobile provider in the United Kingdom, has partnered with flexible payment network Affirm to provide hardware financing.  This collaboration will allow O2 customers to access Affirm’s pay-over-time options at checkout when purchasing mobile phones, ...

QuickBooks will soon enable small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) in the United States to offer their customers flexible payment options from Affirm. The capability will result from a new multiyear partnership ...

Affirm is now the exclusive provider of buy now, pay later (BNPL) payment options for lodging and packages on the Expedia Group brands Expedia, Hotels.com and Vrbo in the United States. In addition, Affirm will become available to Canadian ...

After-purchase installment plans are moving more firmly into the center of everyday payments, reshaping how banks, FinTechs and retailers compete for the same transactions. What began as a merchant checkout feature ...

Synchrony Financial closed 2025 with fourth-quarter purchase volume of $49 billion, a company record and a 3% year-over-year increase, as spending patterns strengthened across most platforms and co-branded cards continued ...

Checkout and payments company Bolt is teaming with buy now pay later (BNPL) provider Affirm, according to a Tuesday (Jan. 27) press release. The collaboration makes Affirm the default BNPL provider ...

Payments and financial services company Fiserv has launched a partnership with pay-over-time provider Affirm. This collaboration is designed to bring buy now, pay later (BNPL) capabilities to the debit card programs at Fiserv’s bank ...

For millions of households, rent is the anchor expense that dictates everything else. PYMNTS Intelligence has estimated that housing absorbs 37% of take-home pay for consumers earning under $50,000 annually, ...

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) provider Affirm aims to establish a bank subsidiary called Affirm Bank. Affirm submitted applications to the Nevada Financial Institutions Division and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation ...

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) provider Affirm has partnered with FinTech company Esusu to enable some people to pay their rent in two installments, CNBC reported Thursday (Jan. 22), citing ...

Household finances are increasingly shaped by credit use, as more consumers carry balances month to month rather than paying off purchases in full. According to the PYMNTS Intelligence report, “Pay Later ...

OnePay and Klarna have partnered to enable the users of the OnePay Cash financial services platform to convert recent purchases into fixed-term payment plans. This ability to choose after checkout to pay over time will be available for ...

Americans are no longer just spreading payments over time. They are spreading risk, timing and lifestyle choices as rising costs reshape how discretionary spending actually happens. That shift is at the ...

Pay later is no longer a niche solution for cash-strapped consumers, as high earners increasingly use credit card installment plans to manage spending with precision and control. New PYMNTS Intelligence research ...

“For last year’s words belong to last year’s language. And next year’s words await another voice.” — T.S. Eliot When T.S. Eliot wrote those lines in 1942, he was pointing to a ...

The latest inflation data released Tuesday (Jan. 13) suggests a steady pace of inflation overall, but groceries and other essentials continue to rise faster than the headline number and influence ...

The CFPB’s decision to dial down enforcement of BNPL and other nonbank credit products hasn’t created a vacuum. It has invited fifty competing rulebooks to take its place.

In 2026, Buy Now, Pay Later stops being a checkout feature and becomes working capital for the modern middle class, replacing overdraft and late fees as the default way paycheck-to-paycheck ...

Merchants using Gr4vy’s cloud-based payment orchestration platform can now offer Affirm’s flexible payment options to eligible customers through online and mobile channels. The offering is enabled by a partnership between the ...

Pay Later has stopped being a seasonal convenience and started to look like a standing line item in how many households manage money. That is the broader takeaway from PYMNTS Intelligence’s Pay ...

Credit limits have traditionally been treated as a mechanical feature of card programs: a numeric ceiling determined by algorithms, credit scores and internal risk thresholds. But new findings from the ...

On the eve of the COVID-19 pandemic, large banks were jolted by the sudden rise of a new credit alternative. That 2019, buy now, pay later option from specialized providers ...

Revolve Group, a fashion retailer for millennial and Generation Z consumers, now offers Affirm’s flexible payment options to shoppers in Canada and the United Kingdom. The offering marks an expansion of ...

Mastercard and LoanPro plan to launch a program that will enable lenders to deliver installment loans through virtual and physical cards. The Loan on Card program is set to launch in ...

Watch more: Need to Know: Thredd’s Jim McCarthy There’s new urgency for banks to innovate as consumers embrace flexible repayment options and new digital channels. What once looked like a stable structure ...

Sweden-based flexible payments provider Klarna has extended its relationship with Apple to two new countries. The company’s pay-later products are now available for consumers checking out on Apple Pay in France and Italy, Klarna announced Tuesday (Dec. ...

Consumers are reshaping how they use credit, and PYMNTS Intelligence data shows that installment plans are becoming a central tool for managing cash flow in both predictable and discretionary spending. The ...

Socure acquired Qlarifi to establish what it called “the industry’s first unified identity, anti-fraud and BNPL credit infrastructure.” The combination brings together Socure’s artificial intelligence-first platform for global identity, compliance and ...

Digital bank and payments firm Klarna is expanding its new membership plan to the U.S. The Sweden-based company introduced its Premium and Max plans in Europe and the U.K. in October and announced in ...

Visa says it is helping launch Vietnam’s first artificial intelligence (AI)-powered pay-later card. The card is being rolled out in collaboration with Visa-owned financial transaction processing platform Pismo and neobank Circle Asia Technologies, the ...

Generation Z consumers are not only saving more; they’re reshaping how financial activity moves, stores and circulates online. Their behavior is challenging long-standing assumptions in banking and payments. Their habits look ...

Direct-to-consumer furniture brand Cozey has added Klarna’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) solutions to its online stores in the United States and Canada. Cozey’s eCommerce site now enables shoppers to pay ...

Digital bank/pay-later provider Klarna is launching a new tap-to-pay feature. The new contactless payment offering is rolling out in 14 European markets, the Swedish FinTech announced in a Tuesday (Dec. 2) news release. “With more ...

State attorneys general from Connecticut and North Carolina have opened an inquiry into the U.S. buy now, pay later (BNPL) sector, putting the industry’s largest providers on notice. Led by Connecticut ...

Retail rivals Walmart and Amazon are reportedly expanding their lending footprint in India. For Amazon, that means plans to offer loans to small business owners in the world’s most populous country, ...

Lufthansa Group customers in several countries can now choose Klarna’s flexible payment options when booking travel experiences. The options allow the airline group’s travelers to pay in full, pay later or ...

Thanksgiving invites a pause, a chance to acknowledge progress in a year that has been unpredictable for consumers and businesses. Across the payments, banking and FinTech sectors, 2025 delivered real advances ...

David’s Bridal has added buy now, pay later at the altar of wedding spend, rolling out Sezzle in all of its stores as couples face rising costs and tighter planning ...

For Synchrony Chief Financial Officer Brian Wenzel, the story of today’s consumer isn’t about inflation, credit tightening, or macro stress signals. It’s about expectation. Throughout his Monday Conversation with PYMNTS CEO ...

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) platform Klarna is expanding its partnership with gift card company Blackhawk Network (BHN). The new collaboration, announced in a news release Thursday (Nov. 20), is aimed ...

As the annual holiday shopping ritual ramps up, consumers’ finances are less robust than they might appear. Last month, PYMNTS Intelligence surveyed more than 2,100 U.S. adult consumers for the most ...

Buy now, pay later (BNPL)’s rapid expansion across retail, travel, healthcare and even everyday essentials has made it one of the fastest-growing credit products in the United States, but its ...

Klarna’s third-quarter earnings update Tuesday (Nov. 18), its first earnings report as a publicly listed company, detailed a strategic transformation that seeks to push the brand beyond payments and into ...

Watch more: Digital Shift: Marqeta’s Todd Pollak According to Marqeta Chief Revenue Officer Todd Pollak, the future of payments is being built by ecosystems in which merchants and consumers drive change ...

PayPal Holdings and global investment firm KKR renewed their agreement in which KKR’s credit funds and accounts purchase PayPal’s European buy now, pay later (BNPL) receivables. The new agreement includes a ...

A shift is taking hold inside the pay later economy, and it is not the one that most observers expected. The real action is not only in buy now, pay later ...

U.K.-based consumer payments platform Zilch has raised $175 million in debt and equity. The new funding will go towards marketing efforts, product development and improvement to Zilch’s platform, as well as ...