UPI completes ten years with nearly 13,000-fold rise in transactions
Prime Minister Narendra Modi called the Unified Payments Interface a major turning point as annual volumes grew from 1.78 crore transactions in FY 2016-17 to 24,162 crore in FY 2025-26.
New Delhi1 min read
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The Unified Payments Interface marked ten years of public operation on August 25.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi described it as a major turning point in India's digital payments journey and invited citizens to share how it has affected their lives. The system was launched by the National Payments Corporation of India under Reserve Bank of India oversight after a pilot with 21 banks earlier that year.
Annual transaction volume expanded from 1.78 crore in FY 2016-17 to 24,162 crore in FY 2025-26, an almost 13,000-fold increase. Transaction value rose from Rs 0.07 lakh crore to about Rs 314 lakh crore over the same period. In July 2026 the platform recorded a monthly high of 2,366 crore transactions worth Rs 29.88 lakh crore.
UPI now processes an average of around 66 crore transactions each day and accounts for roughly 84 percent of India's retail digital payment transactions by volume. Average transaction value has declined in recent years as everyday low-value payments dominate.
The platform's growth has continued at 20 to 30 percent annually even after a decade. Banks and other payment service providers have expanded participation steadily since the initial rollout and the later launch of the BHIM application.
Official data from the Finance Ministry, RBI and NPCI show the system has become the dominant retail payment rail in the country.
