Which online payment methods to accept in Germany?

Germany
E-commerce Market Profile

Find below the key stats for the German ecommerce market.
Here you can find the most popular online payment methods in Germany.

Would you like to know which Payment Service Providers can help you to accept payments online?
Start with our short list of Payment Service Providers in Germany.

Currency

euro (EUR)

Household Internet Access Rate

Internet Country Code

.de

B2C E-commerce Market Size

67.5 billion USD (2015)

Population (+ Global Rank)

80.1 million (2020) (#19)

Online Payment Methods

SOFORT, ELV, SEPA Credit Transfers, Giropay, PayPal, Visa, MasterCard, Klarna, Ratepay, Paydirekt

Country GDP (+ Global Rank)

$4,199,000,000,000 (#5)

National E-commerce Association(s)

Händlerbund

GDP per capita (+ Global rank)

$50,800 (#27)

Find the right Payment Service Provider »

Number of Payment Providers

Online Payment Methods in Germany

Klarna

Klarna allows shoppers to buy now and pay later. And Merchants to increase their conversion rate with optimised user experience for m-commerce as well as state of the art payment options.

Trustly

Trustly is a convenient alternative to cards, which allows consumers to make or receive payment by signing into online banking without leaving the merchant's website or mobile app.

RatePAY

RatePAY is a popular 'shop now, pay later' payment method in Germany and Switzerland. Shoppers can choose between full payment of installments to settle the invoice amount. Merchants are pre-funded (and can directly ship their goods). RatePay absorbs the merchant's risk of non-payment.

paydirekt

paydirekt was founded in June 2014 as a joint online payment method for German banks and savings banks. Around 1,400 banks and savings banks have been offering paydirekt as a new payment standard since April 2016. This means over 50 million German banking accounts can use paydirekt for online payment.

SOFORT - Pay now by Klarna

Sofort, also known as Pay now with Klarna, is a popular online banking method in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, and Belgium. Sofort is also available in Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

Amazon Pay

Amazon Pay is an online payment service owned by Amazon that lets shoppers use their amazon.com account to make online purchases. With Amazon Pay, shoppers can make purchases using credit or debit cards stored in their digital wallet. The acceptance of Amazon Pay can lead to an improved payment acceptance rate, lower cart abandonment, and increased conversions as Amazon Pay shoppers can pay for products and services without creating new accounts or leaving a merchant’s site.

VISA

Visa is one of world's best known online payment methods and largest credit card brand. Visa truly is a global payment brand with acceptance at point-of-sale and online in over 170 countries.

American Express

American Express is a credit or charge card that can be used for online payments. American Express is amongst the major credit card brands in the world.

MasterCard

MasterCard is one of world's best known online payment methods and dominant credit card brands. MasterCard is truly a global payment brand, supporting 150 currencies with over 35 million acceptance locations (point-of-sale and online) in over 210 countries.

Giropay

giropay is one of the popular online payment methods in Germany. giropay enables German consumers to pay online using their trusted online banking account. Merchants receive instant confirmation and are guaranteed of payment.

Apple Pay

The Apple Pay payment service allows consumers to pay contactless, in-app and on desktop through the newest Apple Macbook and iMac's. Consumers are able to securely store credit and debit card details into their Apple Pay wallet and confirm payment by simply scanning their fingerprint with Apple's Touch ID or by using Face ID.

PayPal

PayPal is the online payment method that enables people to send money and to shop online without sharing financial information. Shoppers can pay from their PayPal preloaded balance, directly from their bank account or stored credit cards like MasterCard and Visa.

SEPA Credit Transfer

The SEPA Credit Transfer (SCT) allows consumers to pay for their goods and services by using their euro bank account to transfer money directly to the merchants' bank account. Both the consumer and merchant should be domiciled within the SEPA (eurozone) region.

ELV

ELV stands for Elektronisches Lastschriftverfahren and is a popular online payment method in Germany. By choosing to pay with ELV at checkout, the consumer permits the merchant to collect (debit) the purchase amount directly from his or her bank account.

SEPA Direct Debit

The SEPA Direct Debit enables to make pan-European collections in euro's on a one-off or recurrent basis.

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The German payment markets is dominated by bank transfers (credit transfers and direct debit) whether conducted through SOFORT, ELV, Giropay or Paydirekt.

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