Diverse and dynamic — these two words barely scratch the surface of Southeast Asia’s biggest digital payment market. Home to the region’s largest economy, Indonesia is fast overcoming hurdles to digital payments and getting its 65 million micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) on board with the cashless revolution.
Indonesia’s consumers have a strong appetite for local goods and low prices. This has fuelled a thriving ecosystem of micro and small businesses, which together make up 61% of the country’s GDP. Many of these MSMEs have been early adopters of digital payment systems, in turn driving the rise of diverse e-wallets to meet strong demand.
To date, consumers and businesses can choose from over 40 digital wallets to pay for their everyday goods and services. The result is a diverse yet highly fragmented payments landscape. Amplifying this fragmentation is the fact that Indonesia is an archipelago, with millions of underbanked people scattered across thousands of islands.
Interconnectedness is key to creating greater payment efficiencies, and the government has set out to achieve this in recent years. The central bank’s launch of the Quick Response Indonesia Standard (QRIS) has helped to make various payment systems interoperable, including e-wallets and mobile banking. Most recently, it rolled out the NFC-enabled QRIS TAP, which allows users to use their smartphones to complete transactions with a tap.
Bank Indonesia has also introduced an open API framework to support linkages between banking and fintech services. A digital rupiah is also in the works, which will enhance cross-border payments at lower cost.
These initiatives are quickly propelling Indonesia’s payment landscape towards efficiency and interconnectedness. A future where anyone can easily use any digital payment method they prefer, anywhere in the archipelago, may not be so far off. For businesses looking to expand into Indonesia, such payment convenience will unlock your access to this rising economic powerhouse.
Key insights for online merchants
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Known as Southeast Asia’s largest economy, Indonesia’s GDP exceeded IDR (Indonesian Rupiah) 22,139 trillion in 2024 — a 5.03% increase compared to the previous year. The country is also the world’s largest archipelago and the fourth-most-populous country, home to 285 million people.
Indonesia’s population has a balanced gender ratio. The bulk (70%) of the population is of working age — between 15 and 64 years old — and comprises the majority of the consumer class. Although the primary language is Indonesian, English is widely spoken.
The service industry is Indonesia's dominant sector, accounting for 58% of total value added to the economy. Indonesia's unemployment rate has continued to decline since 2020, dropping to 4.82% in 2024. It is lower than that of several major global economies, such as the US and the UK.
The country is also a major importer in Southeast Asia. In 2024, it imported goods worth USD 23.46 billion, mainly manufactured products. China has been Indonesia's largest trading partner and source of imports for 11 consecutive years.
The country’s retail sector is valued at over USD 100 billion, and is expected to reach USD 243 billion by 2026. In July 2024, the consumer confidence index was 123.4, indicating that consumers are optimistic about the future.
Indonesian consumers are avid shoppers both online and offline, with a liking for local products. This preference has supported the boom of over 65 million MSMEs in the country, shaping a diverse and competitive landscape where sellers seek to woo consumers with deals, discounts, and digital payment methods.
While MSMEs in Indonesia are enthusiastic about digital tools like e-wallets, they face many barriers to adoption: a lack of digital literacy, uncertainty about which technologies to adopt in a fragmented payment landscape, and costs of technology investment. To help businesses gain greater access to digital payments, the government has launched a range of initiatives that are streamlining and unifying payment services.
How the Indonesian government is boosting financial inclusion and opportunities for consumers and businesses
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Key insights for online merchants
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Indonesia’s economic growth is backed by robust household consumption, with household spending accounting for 54% of the country’s GDP in 2024. The average monthly wage of an Indonesian employee was around 3 million rupiah in 2024 (around USD181), while the average monthly expenditure is 1.5 million rupiah per capita. Three-quarters of household expenditure goes to food, housing, and utilities.
Physical retail remains prominent in the country, with convenience store players like Alfamart and supermarket chain giants like PT Matahari Putra Prima Tbk leading the market.
Online marketplaces are increasingly making inroads into Indonesia’s retail scene and gaining a strong foothold among tech-savvy consumers.
Indonesia's e-commerce market has grown rapidly in the past decade. In 2023, there were 59 million e-commerce users. This number is expected to reach 100 million by 2029. In 2022, Indonesia's average spending per e-commerce user was $620. It is expected that by 2025, Indonesia's e-commerce market will exceed $5.9 billion.
Indonesia’s online shoppers
Indonesia's online shoppers are mainly millennials aged 20 to 37, making up about 88% of the total. Most online shoppers are men, around 53%. Almost all customers access e-commerce through smartphones, while a small number use personal computers.
A 2023 survey in Indonesia found that 24.11% of respondents shop online at least once a month, and 16.69% shop online multiple times a week.
What do Indonesians do when browsing e-commerce platforms? As of the third quarter of 2023, about 59% of Indonesian respondents said they had purchased goods or services during their weekly e-commerce activities.
Motivations and concerns in online shopping
Price sensitivity is a defining factor for Indonesian consumers. Discounts are the main reason that people choose to shop online.
The biggest problem that stops Indonesians from shopping online is delivery speed. Another issue is trust in payment methods, which affects 22.43% of shoppers.
Indonesian consumers most often buy clothing, shoes, cosmetics, and body care products online. Notably, 76% of consumers find shopping reviews helpful. 53% search online before making big purchases, and 34% use smartphones or tablets to place orders.
Indonesian consumers love shopping online. You might wonder, how much has digitalisation affected their lives beyond online shopping?
According to the latest data from the Indonesian Internet Service Providers Association, Indonesia's internet users reached 215 million in 2024, the highest in Southeast Asia. Nearly 70% of these users are young, and the internet penetration rate is 79.6%. Almost all (99.5%) people aged 16 and above own a smartphone.
As of the third quarter of 2024, Indonesian internet users spend about 7 hours and 22 minutes online each day. Young people aged 16 to 24 mainly split their time among social media, online shopping, and video streaming.
Given the high internet usage in Indonesia, many consumers have come to adopt digital payments, especially for online shopping. They also use digital platforms to pay bills and send money to friends and family.
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Key takeaways:
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As the number of digital payment users in Indonesia grows, the landscape looks increasingly fragmented. This means Indonesian consumers and businesses are spoilt for choice. The government and digital finance players are striving to balance this variety with smooth integrations, though, to reduce friction between different payment systems and increase overall adoption.
As the chart shows, Indonesian consumers are embracing digital payments. Convenience and speed are the top reasons — transactions are fast and there’s no need to carry cash or credit cards around.
According to PPRO's 2023 data, digital wallets are the most popular payment method, making up 39% of all transactions. Bank transfers come next with 27%. The market share of different payment methods in Indonesia is as follows:
As consumers embrace diverse payment methods, it has become more important than ever for businesses to get support in adopting digital payment solutions. An IDC survey shows that 71% of merchants accept card payments, with bank transfers, digital wallets, and real-time/QR code payments following closely. However, Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) is still not widely accepted.
Digital wallets and bank transfers are the most commonly used digital payment methods in Indonesia. However, they are still less accepted by merchants compared to credit and debit cards.
There’s no question that digital wallets have become the dominant digital payment method amongst Indonesians. A Statista survey in 2024 revealed that 96% of Indonesians use e-wallets, with this popularity driven by a young and mobile-savvy population. Indonesia is now one of the top countries in Asia Pacific for digital wallet use, along with China and India.
The most popular digital wallets in the country are Dana, OVO, GoPay, ShopeePay, and LinkAja.
As a leading e-wallet, Dana is also driving financial inclusion by offering complimentary training to help MSMEs digitalise, and connecting unbanked customers and businesses with digital financial services. In a country where 48% of individuals don’t have a bank account and many small businesses (or warungs) are unregistered, e-wallets are changing the game in Indonesia’s payment landscape.
From 2017 to 2021, the adoption rate of digital banking surged by 57%. Today, at least 78% of Indonesian consumers use digital banking services.
A 2023 survey in Indonesia showed that 55% of millennials used BCA Mobile Banking and 45% of Gen Z used BRImo.
One reason for this rising popularity is the launch of BI-FAST, the national retail payment system infrastructure developed by Bank Indonesia. BI-FAST makes it easy to make interbank transfers online and perform transactions in real-time at lower cost.
Since the official rollout of QRIS in 2019, the volume of transactions using QRIS codes has soared. In 2023, over 1.6 billion transactions were made via QRIS, far exceeding the target of 1 billion transactions set by the government.
34% of users made QRIS transactions two to three times a week, with the majority of transactions involving 100,000 rupiah or less. This suggests that QRIS has become a regular part of Indonesians’ payment habits for their everyday purchases.
QRIS enables merchants to accept payments from various e-wallets, local banks, and even overseas banks with a single QR code, bringing much-needed efficiency to a fragmented payments ecosystem. Bank Indonesia has also taken steps to lower barriers for small businesses by waiving merchant fees for transactions up to 500,000 rupiah.
With 30 million merchants already accepting QRIS – 92% of whom are MSMEs – this payment initiative is interconnecting Indonesia’s payments landscape and making digital payments more accessible for all.
Now, let's take a look at other popular payment methods: card, cash on delivery and Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL).
Cards
Despite a low credit card penetration rate, credit and debit cards are still Indonesia's key e-commerce payment methods, representing 10% and 7% of total transaction volumes. Visa and Mastercard are the dominant brands.
Due to the pandemic, credit card transactions dropped in 2020. In May 2020, the Central Bank of Indonesia lowered the maximum credit card interest rate from 2.25% per month to 2% to help the economy recover from the crisis, leading to a steady increase in credit card transactions. In 2022, the total value of credit card transactions in Indonesia reached IDR 315.7 trillion. In contrast, the transaction value of ATM and debit card payments was about IDR 7.92 quadrillion.
Cash on delivery
In e-commerce, cash on delivery (COD) allows buyers to pay for goods upon receipt, making it a popular choice for its safety and convenience. Although Indonesia's cash usage dropped from 77% in 2020 to 53% in 2021, cash remains the preferred payment method by many Indonesians. This is mainly because 66% of the population do not have bank accounts, as such, cash payments are still a necessity.
Indonesia launched the Quick Response Code Indonesian Standard (QRIS) to unify digital payment services and promote cashless transactions. With support from the government and banks, cash usage amongst Indonesians is expected to decrease.
Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL)
BNPL allows consumers to split large purchases into more affordable monthly payments. By 2021, BNPL started growing rapidly in Indonesia, accounting for 11% of all digital payments in e-commerce.
According to Fintech News, BNPL users in Indonesia are generally satisfied with this service, especially appreciating its convenient transaction experience, simple application requirements, and fast approval process. In the future, BNPL is expected to continue to grow. By 2025, its share of Gross Merchandise Value (GMV) is projected to steadily increase from 1% in 2019 to 6%. The 2021 Indonesia Paylater Ecosystem Report predicts that BNPL's GMV will grow by 75.7%, from $889.7 million in 2020 to $8.5 billion in 2028.
Amidst a diverse and highly competitive payments landscape, Indonesia has taken remarkable strides towards greater payment efficiency in recent years. The result has been increased interconnectedness and lower barriers to digital payment for both consumers and businesses.
In such a payments landscape, consumers expect the best of both worlds: the freedom to choose from diverse payment methods, and the ability to pay with a tap at any time. Other payment methods are catching on — BNPL transaction value, for instance, grew by 24% from 2023 to 2024. Although cryptocurrency payments are still restricted in Indonesia, adoption may surge in response to consumer enthusiasm. The country currently ranks 7th globally in cryptocurrency usage.
Meanwhile, the growth of cross-border payments in Southeast Asia has caught the attention of Indonesian merchants. Many merchants view cross-border e-commerce as key to future growth, according to IDC. The central bank’s digital rupiah project is also expected to support interoperability in both domestic and international payments. In the face of such developments, international merchants looking to sell to consumers in Indonesia will find a vibrant market with flexibility and compatibility in digital payments.
How Antom can help you navigate payments in Indonesia
Antom provides a convenient and flexible option for global merchants to offer the most popular digital wallets and bank transfer services from leading banks in Indonesia.
Payment methods supported by Antom in Indonesia
Products and services supported by Antom in Indonesia
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