Despite a slow start, Apple Pay has gained traction in the American consumer economy. According to a 2019 survey, 51 percent of mobile payment users in the United States have used Apple Pay in the past 12 months to pay in stores, restaurants or other points of sale. According to a November 2018 survey of Apple Pay users in the United States, 22 percent of respondents stated that they used Apple Pay two to three times per week, with over a quarter of respondents using Apple Pay on a daily basis.

Apple Pay implements the contactless EMV standards from major payment card networks and should work at any merchant that supports contactless payments worldwide, regardless if they specifically advertise Apple Pay acceptance or if Apple Pay support is offered by card issuers in that country. Apple Pay was the digital payment method most commonly accepted by North American retailers as of December 2018. Also, 35 percent of online merchants worldwide accepted Apple Pay, ranking second after PayPal, and outranking Visa Checkout.

In 2022, research estimates that near-field-communications or other contactless technology payments will be accessed by almost a third of U.S. smartphone users, up from 25.3 percent in 2018. At the end of the first half of 2018 there was a total of 440 million contactless payment users worldwide, and by the end of 2020 this number is forecasted to reach to a new total of 760 million users.

Despite mobile payments having gained a foothold among consumers, privacy and safety concerns increase resistance to carrying out transactions using mobile devices. As consumers are wary of permitting tech companies to use their data to learn more about their buying habits, cash and credit cards still predominate in certain regions. As of May 2019, 65 percent of smartphone owners in the United States were still reluctant to try out mobile wallets due to security reasons. Not knowing where mobile wallets were accepted was another common barrier to adoption.

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