Digital payments are on the rise in the euro area, but cash was still the payment instrument used most often at points of sale (POS) in 2024. More than half (52%) of all POS transactions were paid in cash in 2024. In the Netherlands, this figure is considerably lower at around one in five. A recent comprehensive bi-annual ECB survey of how payments are made in the euro area has revealed this.
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In 2024, cash was the most frequently used payment method at points of sale in 14 out of 20 countries. In Slovenia, Malta, Austria and Italy, the share of cash payments is still over 60%, whereas this is less than 30% in Finland and the Netherlands (see Figure 1). The ECB's previous survey, from 2022, showed that 59% of POS payments in euro area countries were made in cash. This means the use of cash has declined by 7 percentage points in the past two years. In the Netherlands, the use of cash remained unchanged.
Of all euro area countries, Dutch consumers use digital payment methods at the POS the most. They use their phones more than in other euro area countries – in almost one in five payments. This is twice as much as consumers in Finland and Ireland (10%), which are the other top three mobile phone payers.
The ECB survey also shows that a large majority of respondents from all euro area countries (62%) think it is important for merchants to accept cash. Of that group, half even consider it "very important" that this option is available. This is true even in countries like Belgium, Luxembourg and Finland, where consumers use other payment options for the majority of POS purchases. The Dutch attach less importance to cash acceptance in shops: 45% say they consider it important or very important.
At the start of the day, Europeans had an average of €59 in cash in their wallets. At €35, the average Dutch consumer carried the smallest amount, down from €46 in 2022. Together with Finland and France, the Netherlands is one of three countries where people had €50 or less in their wallets. By contrast, consumers in Cyprus and Luxembourg had the most money in their wallets at the start of the day: €82.
This year, the ECB asked respondents for the first time about privacy concerns in digital payments. Digital payments are payments made online and payments made at points of sale with a card or a mobile phone. Three in five respondents across euro area countries said they were concerned about their privacy when making digital payments. Dutch consumers are least concerned about this: 32% voiced concerns about privacy in digital payments.
The ECB study on payment attitudes by consumers (SPACE) is available here.
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