WhatsApp, the popular text and voice service, has expanded its payment offering in India by launching an in-chat payments service for businesses. With millions of users in India, WhatsApp now allows shoppers to pay for products and services through the app using credit and debit cards, WhatsApp Pay and India's digital payments network, UPI.
Businesses will not be charged for in-app payments, but WhatsApp's parent company, Meta, may benefit from increased business messaging payments. This new service also provides WhatsApp with more data for targeted advertising. The recent data protection bill in India, which excludes rules on data sharing, may support this objective.
WhatsApp has already enabled merchant payments in Singapore and Brazil, but with India's large population, it has the potential to become one of the top digital payment apps in the country. Additionally, Meta can monetize its platforms through charges for marketing or customer service messages and running ads on Facebook or Instagram that lead customers to a WhatsApp chat.
Meta is optimistic about WhatsApp's prospects in India due to the business-friendly data bill and its existing payments presence through its investment in Jio and the in-app customer business payments service with JioMart.