The payments service launched two months ago in the region, supported by most banks and retailers. Samsung claims daily payments exceed 100,000, $1.8 million spent per day, and $88 million spend since launch.
It has not been hard for Samsung Pay to catch on in South Korea, considering the strong sales of the Galaxy S6, S6 Edge, and Galaxy Note 5. Samsung Pay has received a good amount of advertising and support in the country as well, nudging more users to try out the service.
The real test will be Samsung Pay trying to win over customers in Europe and the United States. The payments service is rolling out in the U.S. later this month on most carriers, but comes without the hype Apple Pay received when it launched earlier in the year.
Samsung Pay does have one feature both Apple Pay and Android Pay don’t, Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST). This removes the limitations of the other services, which only work with contactless readers, allowing users to pay for things on normal cash readers.
Samsung is competing with its software maker Google for the most popular payments service on Android. Google has a larger userbase, since it can tap into every mobile running Android 6.0 Marshmallow, while Samsung Pay will only work on a few Samsung devices.
The payments service currently works both offline and online in South Korea, and can initiate cash withdrawals at most major banks in the country. Samsung plans to add transport and membership card support by the end of the year, though it did not confirm if the same support will be added to the U.S. version.
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