NFC-Enabled POS Terminals Numbered Nearly 25M Worldwide In 2017

A new report has found that the global installed base of point-of-sale (POS) terminals grew to almost 109 million units in 2017.

“The world is continuously shifting from coin and paper-based payments, such as cash and checks, to electronic forms, such as payment cards and mobile phone payments,” researchers said in a press release. “As a part of this evolution, POS terminals are becoming more and more common in all parts of the world.”

In addition, the researchers said market growth is “primarily fueled by the increasing adoption of electronic payments in emerging markets. Developed markets are relatively saturated in terms of POS terminal adoption.”

The POS Terminals and Wireless M2M — 3rd Edition also found that cellular connectivity was in 38 percent of the devices shipped in 2017, with the technology playing an important role in the global adoption of electronic payments. In fact, the installed base of cellular POS terminals reached 37.7 million in 2017.

With that in mind, the report forecasts a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.1 percent between 2017 and 2022, for a total of 61 million cellular POS terminals at the end of the forecast period.

The market for near-field-communication (NFC)-ready POS terminals reached an estimated 24.7 million units worldwide in 2017. The attach rate was highest in Europe and North America, where 90 percent and 88 percent of the POS terminals shipped and featured NFC. Not to mention, NFC was a popular feature in other major markets around the globe, including Brazil, Turkey and China.

However, though many are embracing the technology, many of the terminals still don’t have their contactless features turned on. The report estimated that approximately 30 million POS terminals accepted contactless payments with Visa payWave, Mastercard PayPass or UnionPay QuickPass at the end of 2017.

The report concluded, however, that the mPOS market is growing faster than the traditional POS terminal market. It projects that the installed base of mPOS terminals worldwide will grow from 34 million units in 2017 to reach 86 million units by 2022.