The European mobile payments market is expected to triple to €148 billion over the next five years, according to a new study.

Forrester’s Mobile Payments Forecast, 2016 to 2021 report attributes the predicted growth to increasing consumer awareness and growing retailer interest in mobile payments. Of the three types of mobile payments (mobile in-person payments, mobile remote payments, and peer-to-peer (P2P) payments), mobile in-person payments are predicted to grow the fastest, increasing almost fivefold between 2016 and 2021, from €4.6 billion to €22.8 billion. This is due to the launch of European mobile payment platforms such as BNP Paribas’ Wa! in France and PayPal’s collaboration with Vodafone in Italy, coupled with the launches of mobile wallets from Apple, Google and Samsung across the continent.

Mobile remote payments are expected to remain the largest mobile payment segment. They currently account for nearly three quarters of mobile payments and will still account for two-thirds in 2021. The growth and ease of in-app payment buttons or ‘order ahead’ functionalities is helping to drive the use of mobile shopping.

The P2P market is expected to continue its steady growth to account for 17 per cent of all mobile payments in 2021. There is an abundance of apps and services now that offer instantaneous mobile P2P payments, with other features such as bill splitting also helping to push growth.

Shaurya Priya and Jacob Morgan, authors of the report, commented: “While cash continues to be the bedrock of consumer transactions in the EU-7 (UK, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Netherlands and Sweden), mobile payments will see growth of almost 23 per cent over the next five years.

“We project that in-person payments will grow fastest, although mobile remote payments will dominate by value. We will continue to see a gradual evolution rather than a swift revolution as well as variation by country.”

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