UPI volumes report 3% dip in April to 22.5 billion transactions after record high numbers in March

The Unified Payments Interface (UPI), operated by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), recorded 22.5 billion transactions in April, a slight dip from the 22.6 billion recorded in March. Year on year, the transaction volumes jumped 25% from 17.9 billion in April last year.

In terms of the total amount of funds settled, NPCI data shows that Rs 29 lakh crore was settled in April, compared to Rs 29.5 lakh crore in March.

“April’s slight month-on-month dip is more due to UPI’s overperformance in March than an overall slowdown. The financial year-end usually drives a surge in payments, which is seen every year,” said Akash Sinha, cofounder, Cashfree, a payment aggregator startup.


The daily average transaction volume went up to 745 million in April from 730 million in March, which industry insiders said was a positive sign, revealing higher adoption of UPI for retail consumer payments.

Mirroring the trends in UPI, Immediate Payment Service (IMPS), the inter-bank instant fund transfer method run by NPCI, reported 362 million transactions in April, compared to 366 million in March. Fastag, the digital toll collection method, continued to hover around the 360 million base, remaining steady between March and April.

While the growth trajectory of UPI continues to dominate headlines, a lot of UPI transactions are actually shifting from debit card swipes, resulting in net growth in transactions remaining tepid.

India’s larger digital payments sector has seen a slowdown in recent months, with month-on-month growth in terms of transactions getting slower. Also, the number of new users joining the UPI ecosystem is not growing at the same pace, industry insiders said.

ET reported on April 29, that in a recent meeting with NPCI, smaller third-party payment applications were planning to pitch for introduction of certain growth restrictions on larger UPI apps. NPCI has been planning to introduce a 30% market cap on UPI TPAPs, but the logistical challenges of such a cap has resulted in multiple delays in implementation, with the deadline now moved to December 2026.

Currently, PhonePe and Google Pay dominate more than 80% of the overall UPI market share, with Paytm accounting for around 10%.