RTGS Accounts for 68.6 Percent of India's Payment Value in H2 2025

The RBI's H2CY25 Payment Systems Report shows India's retail-wholesale payment split widening, with total digital transaction volumes growing at a 42.9 percent compound rate to 268 billion annual transactions as debit card usage declined 67 percent since 2021.

The Reserve Bank of India's Payment Systems Report for the second half of calendar year 2025, published May 18, quantifies a sharp infrastructure divergence in India's payments. UPI commanded 85.5 percent of all digital payment transaction volume during the period. RTGS processed 68.6 percent of total transaction value despite accounting for just 0.1 percent of transactions. NEFT captured 3.6 percent of volume and 14.9 percent of value, serving as the mid-tier system between UPI's retail scale and RTGS's wholesale settlement function.

India's total digital payment transactions reached 26,819 crore in calendar year 2025, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 42.9 percent from 6,437 crore in 2021. Transaction value rose to Rs 3,215 lakh crore over the same period, a CAGR of 16.6 percent.

Debit card transactions fell 67 percent from 4.087 billion in 2021 to 1.336 billion in 2025, the sharpest decline among India's retail payment instruments. India's three-tier payment architecture remains structurally intact, with RTGS anchoring institutional settlement, NEFT serving mid-value transfers, and UPI dominating retail transactions.