Finance Ministry Announces UPI Completes 10 Years with 13,000-Fold Rise in Transaction Volume

Key facts

• The Unified Payments Interface (UPI) was launched on August 25, 2016, completing a decade of operations in 2026.
• UPI was developed by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) under the regulatory oversight of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).
• UPI transaction volume rose from 1.78 crore in 2016-17 to over 24,162 crore in 2025-26, a nearly 13,000-fold increase.
• UPI transaction value increased from Rs 0.07 lakh crore to around Rs 314 lakh crore during the same period, a more than 4,000-fold rise.
• The number of banks live on UPI increased from 44 in 2016-17 to 703 by 2025-26.
• UPI crossed 2,300 crore monthly transactions for the first time in May 2026, with July 2026 recording the highest at 2,366 crore transactions.
• The International Monetary Fund (IMF) recognised UPI as the world's largest real-time payment system, accounting for nearly 49% of global real-time payment volumes as of 2025.
• UPI processes over 66 crore transactions daily and is operational in 11 countries including UAE, France, and Singapore.