Commerce is at a pivotal moment. Technological advances such as biometrics and AI, combined with consumers’ increased demand for seamless and secure payment experiences, are evolving the ways people pay and get paid, fast. This pace of change is not letting up and by 2030, our vision is for online payments to replicate the ease, consistency, speed and security of contactless payments, whilst delivering additional value by making the experience truly personal.
Whilst some retailers offer a super simple user experience, it’s by no means universal. Many checkouts still require you to manually enter card details, remember passwords, wait for one-time-passcodes or redirect you to an entirely separate site. It’s time for that to change.
To make online payments as simple and secure as possible for all our consumers and merchants, we must deliver consistently great user experiences; bring down fraud rates everywhere to an even lower rate; and improve data quality to support fraud management and the demand for personalisation in the era of AI.
The technology to deliver this vision already exists. So, what can be done to ensure that every online purchase aligns with the best-in-class standard by 2030?
The evolution of the checkout experience
Over the last five years, significant progress has been made in e-commerce payments. Through the increased adoption of Visa’s authentication and token technologies, we’ve consistently innovated to tackle fraud, with Europe achieving Visa’s lowest fraud rates around the world.
In partnership with our clients, we’ve enhanced trust in digital payments, increased authorisation rates by up to 10% with solutions like Click to Pay,¹ and built exceptional commerce experiences, adding immense value to European economies – for example its token technology has delivered over $11 billion in incremental sales and counting.²
Now, we are entering a new era: agentic commerce.
Agentic commerce refers to a future where AI-powered agents act on behalf of consumers, with their consent, to discover, compare, and purchase goods and services. These agents learn from user preferences, operate within defined permissions, and interact with merchants to complete transactions—all while maintaining user control and trust.
Our blueprint for payment innovation: identity, choice and experience
We believe the convergence of identity, choice, and experience, underpinned by trust, will be vital to enabling tomorrow’s e-commerce.
- Identity: Enhanced personalisation, powered by AI and embedded intelligence, is the next frontier. Whilst identity and authentication have always been integral parts of a safe and reliable payment experience, we believe their placement within the payment experience should move to front and centre. By putting identity first in the payment experience, once a consumer has been recognised securely with their Passkey, enriched experiences can follow. By linking payment credentials with identity documents, such as passports, or attributes like concessions, consumers can unlock a curated shopping experience, tailored to their needs.
- Choice: Until now we had one physical form factor, attached to one credential, attached to one use case: A prepaid for a one-off prepaid balance, a credit card to access credit. These were built for a physical world and not adapted for a digital world. As these worlds converge, it’s important to treat individuals as individuals, enabling choice and control and protecting them across all their payments – card, non-card, account-to-account etc. Solutions like Visa Flexible Credentials, Visa A2A and Visa Instalment allow consumers to effortlessly link their identity credentials with multiple funding sources and payment options, so they can enjoy unparalleled freedom of choice.
- Experience: Up to now, life, experiences and purchases were all separated from the payment. But as the lines between the physical and digital worlds continue to blur, commerce is becoming increasingly ‘phygital’, with things like QR codes and biometrics now commonplace. With Gen Z demonstrating more interest in experience-based spending than ever before, embedding the payment more seamlessly into the experience is vital. As AI continues to advance, consumers increasingly rely on it to help them discover goods and services online. Visa is at the forefront of enabling these experiences, working closely with our partners to deliver a personalised, seamless and, above all, secure commerce experience for everyone.
As we look towards 2030, businesses must be ready to meet the rapidly changing consumer landscape. The focus should be on delivering bold and innovative experiences that leverage the latest advancements in technology and put trust at the centre of everything.
