Quarterly number of active PayPal accounts worldwide 2010-2022

PayPal's users - tracked by way of active registered accounts - continued to increase into the fourth quarter of 2021, growing by over 13 percent y-o-y from the fourth quarter of 2020. Daily active users (DAU) can vary per country, however. PayPal use in the UK, for instance, was somewhat higher than in Germany but significantly higher than the DAU found in 19 other European countries.

PayPal in general

PayPal is a global online payment business allowing users to make payments and money transfers online. In 2002, PayPal was acquired by auction site eBay and has made great gains in visibility and online popularity since then. The service is often considered as the leader of the online and mobile payment market. Many retailers such as BestBuy and Home Depot and digital content sellers like Humble Bundle or Valve use PayPal as an in-store payment or digital wallet top-up method. Online payment providers usually generate revenue through transaction fees.

Adoption

Recently, brick-and-mortar retailers and shops have also begun to accept PayPal as a mobile payment method. As of December 2018, 36 percent of North American retailers already accepted PayPal as a payment method and 34 percent planned to accept it within the next 24 months. Customers are required to use their NFC-enabled mobile device to make a payment or use a PayPal card, which can also be swiped or touched in at physical point-of-sale locations. In 2018, the service's annual mobile payment volume amounted to 227 billion US dollars, representing a 46 percent growth compared to the previous year.