Our guide at a glance
What are embedded payments?
Embedded payments are changing the way people pay by letting them complete purchases without ever leaving the app, platform or device they’re already using – think of buying from a social media post or paying with your voice through a virtual assistant.
By building payment options directly into your digital environments, you can offer flexible ways to pay — like buy now, pay later (BNPL), one-click checkout with saved details or pay-by-link options sent through email or text.
Why embedded payments matter
The benefits of embedded payments
By reducing friction at the point of purchase, businesses can boost customer satisfaction, increase conversion rates and open new revenue streams.
Seamless customer experience: Drive higher conversions by removing unnecessary steps at checkout. It’s not just about completing a transaction; it’s about delivering a seamless payment experience that inspires trust and keeps customers coming back.
Personalization: Use payment data to tailor offers, recommendations or experiences and create deeper connections with customers — encouraging repeat purchases and long-term loyalty.
New revenue streams: Open the door to new ways of growing your business by introducing subscription tiers, innovating new products for purchase or adding financing and flexible payment options.
Scalability: Expand and easily adapt to new trends when you partner with a scalable embedded payments provider, such as Visa. Access infrastructure that supports multi-currency and multi-payment methods while maintaining compliance standards.
Who benefits most from embedded payments?
SaaS and tech platforms
Boost product value, increase retention and unlock new revenue streams when you add payments to your platform.
Financial service providers
Embed payments into third-party apps and marketplaces to expand your financial products’ reach and attract new customers.
Merchants and SMBs
Simplify checkout, support multiple methods, reduce manual work and gain real-time insights when you place payments directly into your platform.
Common challenges with embedded payments
Implementing embedded payments comes with opportunities and challenges. Let’s look at some technical, operational and regulatory hurdles and explore solutions to overcome them.
Developer complexity and speed to market: Accelerate time to market when you partner with an embedded payments provider that offers ready-to-integrate APIs and pre-built infrastructure.
Security and fraud mitigation: Implement robust security measures to help prevent chargebacks, financial losses and damaged customer trust.
Scalability and global payments: Support your expansion by localizing payment experiences across different countries, currencies and regulations.
Regulatory compliance: Ensure you meet regulatory standards, from PCI DSS requirements to data privacy laws like GDPR, to avoid draining resources, creating operational bottlenecks and exposing your business to risk.
Visa solutions for enabling embedded payments at scale
Designed to help you move faster, reduce complexity and grow with confidence — locally and globally. Here’s how Visa can help you build embedded payments that work at scale.
Token management
Security and scalability are critical when embedding payments — especially when handling multiple customer tokens across platforms. Our solution helps you securely store, update and orchestrate tokens, reducing fraud risk, protecting customer data and keeping transactions running smoothly.
Developer-friendly tools
Speed up your market launch with developer-friendly APIs, SDKs and easy-to-use integrations. From subscription billing to payouts, our tools simplify development and cut costs.
Modular platform
Embed payments your way — whether you need a full-stack solution or specific components — and integrate secure, scalable payment capabilities into your existing systems.