Spain

Spain launched its domestic instant payments service Bizum in October 2016 and later adopted SCT Inst in November 2017. The adoption and use of instant payments in the country has been on a gradual rise, supported by increasing participation from banks and financial institutions. While Bizum has 37 participants, SCT Inst was adopted by more than 90 banks in Spain as of November 2023.

Spain is still a card-dominated market, but strong growth is expected for instant payments in the near term, owing to a combination of the mobile-based Bizum service (largely used for P2P payments) and the new law mandating instant payments across the EU. In terms of volume, instant payments are set to see a CAGR of 29.6% from 2023 to 2028. Consequently, the share of instant payments of the total payments volume is expected to increase from 2.3% in 2023 to 7.7% by 2028.