UPI completes 10 years as annual transactions soar nearly 13,000-fold

New Delhi: India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) has completed 10 years, marking a remarkable expansion from a fledgling digital payments system to the backbone of the country’s real-time payments ecosystem.

Launched on August 25, 2016, UPI has recorded a nearly 13,000-fold increase in annual transaction volume over the past decade. According to the Ministry of Finance, annual transactions rose from 1.78 crore in 2016-17 to more than 24,162 crore in 2025-26.

The value of transactions has climbed just as dramatically. Annual transaction value increased from around Rs 7,000 crore in 2016-17 to nearly Rs 314 lakh crore in 2025-26, highlighting the sheer scale at which digital payments have expanded across the country.

UPI has become a preferred payment method for millions of users, offering an interoperable, real-time system that allows money to move between bank accounts with relative ease. Its growth has also helped make digital payments accessible to a much wider section of the population.

The system has increasingly crossed India’s borders too. UPI is now operational in 11 countries, including the United Arab Emirates, France, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Singapore, Mauritius, Qatar, Cambodia, Greece and the Maldives.

The international expansion reflects the growing interest in India’s digital payments infrastructure as other markets look to develop faster and more accessible payment systems.

Within India, UPI has played a broader role in advancing financial inclusion by widening access to digital financial services. Its interoperable design has helped connect users, banks and merchants across a common payments network, supporting wider participation in the formal digital economy.

The scale of the platform has also drawn international recognition. The International Monetary Fund has acknowledged UPI as the world’s largest real-time payment system. As of 2025, UPI accounted for nearly 49 per cent of global real-time payment transaction volume, according to the Finance Ministry.

From 1.78 crore annual transactions in its first full financial year to more than 24,000 crore a decade later, UPI’s growth has reshaped how India pays, collects and transfers money. Its next chapter will be defined not just by transaction volumes, but by how far the platform can extend India’s digital payments model across borders.