Cash use in the Nordics is the lowest in the world, with almost a third of Nordic consumers indicating they now never pay with cash in physical sales locations.

Nets’ latest Nordic Payment Report, conducted with Kantar Sifo, found:

Almost one in two Swedes never pay in cash (in Norway this is 40%, Denmark 27% and Finland only 10%, although the Finnish rejection of cash is accelerating).

Mobile payments continue to grow, becoming the preferred method of about a fifth of Danish and Swedish consumers.

Apple Pay now contributes a significant share of all digital payments in Denmark and Sweden, but local brands including Sweden’s Swish, Norway’s Vipps and Denmark’s MobilePay retain strong use among consumers.

Across the Nordics, mobile payments have now overtaken cash as the second most preferred payment method, behind card payments. Contactless capabilities are the major driving force behind this transformation, with consumers favouring their convenience and security over alternatives such as cash or QR Code-based mobile payment solutions.

“We’ve carried physical wallets for centuries,” said Lars Erik Tellmann, Chief Regional Officer for Nexi in the Nordics, “taking cash, cards, receipts, and photos of loved ones with us everywhere. Nowadays, Nordic consumers want to use their mobile phone as this wallet, carrying the same things with them but in digital form. Contactless provides a seamless and secure payment experience for consumers, while facilitating newer payment methods like SoftPOS, which are set to transform physical commerce experiences in the coming years.”

Convenience increases contactless payments

The contactless payment limit without requiring PIN increased to 50 EUR in 2019. Since then, the share of payments made via the technology has grown, accelerated by the pandemic. From 1 January 2024, Finland will also adopt the same technical setup as its neighbours, requiring just PIN (rather than a contact payment) for transactions above this level. Combined with a significant increase in payments made via mobile wallets, such as Apple Pay and Google Pay, Nexi expects to see the proportion of contactless payments made in the Nordics grow further next year.

In Denmark, 96% of consumers use contactless payments, and a potentially world-leading 94% of card payments are now made contactlessly. In Sweden, this is 89% and 86% respectively, while Norway and Finland also show high adoption. Overall, nine in ten Nordic consumers use contactless payments, with seven out of ten consumers in Denmark, Norway and Finland using it ‘often’.