Digital wallets are projected to overtake credit cards as South Korea’s leading e-commerce payment method by 2030, according to Worldpay’s Global Payments Report 2026. Credit cards dominated the market in 2025—accounting for 49% of online transaction value and 53% of point-of-sale (POS) spending—supported in part by tax policies that permit workers to deduct credit card expenditures from taxable income. However, digital wallets follow closely, holding a 35% share of e-commerce and 24% of POS spending in 2025, driven by major domestic platforms including Kakao Pay, Naver Pay, Samsung Wallet, and Toss.

By 2030, digital wallets are forecast to expand their e-commerce market share to 46%, while credit cards will drop to 40%. At physical points of sale, digital wallets will grow to 31% as credit cards decline to 48%. Minor payment methods are expected to remain steady or see slight contractions: account-to-account payments will hold at 7% of online spending, debit cards will dip to 4% online and 12% at POS, and cash usage—already the second-lowest in Asia-Pacific behind China—will slide from 6% to 5% at POS.

Overall market value is set to grow across both online and physical retail channels over the four-year period. South Korea’s e-commerce payments market is projected to expand at a 6% compound annual growth rate (CAGR), rising from $180 billion in 2025 to $236 billion by 2030. The POS market will experience more modest growth, rising from $313 billion to $344 billion at a 2% CAGR. Throughout this evolution, domestic card schemes continue to command the market, representing 97% of total card spending compared to 3% for international networks like Visa and Mastercard.

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