Will Europe escape the American networks?

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Compaytence Brief · September 28, 2026

European banks are investing in alternatives to Visa and Mastercard, with the clear goal of reducing Europe’s dependence on American payments infrastructure.

Their biggest bet: Wero, a bank-backed payment service built around instant account-to-account payments, with ambitions to become a major payment method across Europe.

On 25 August, German drugstore giant dm-drogerie markt added Wero to its online checkout, roughly a month after discount grocery chain Lidl introduced it.

dm has put a number on what success looks like. dm CFO Martin Dallmeier says that if Wero captures around 5% of transactions within the first six to twelve months, he would consider the rollout a good result.

As it stands, five percent is a minor threat to Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal. But Wero’s ambitions extend far beyond a handful of German retailers. Its backers are building it as a pan-European payment system, with plans to expand its reach across European markets and into more types of payments.

Why build an alternative?

Wero comes from the European Payments Initiative (EPI), a bank- and provider-backed company aiming to make one European payment service work across borders. Customers pay from their bank account and approve the purchase in a banking app or the Wero app.

Visa and Mastercard connect banks and merchants across countries. Visa alone reported more than 175 million accepting merchant locations worldwide in 2025. Wero’s retail rollout is operating on a much smaller scale.

The European Central Bank put the dependence in perspective in a 2025 report: 13 euro-area countries relied entirely on international card schemes for card transactions. International schemes accounted for about 61% of euro-area card payments in 2022. Those are card-payment figures, not a measure of all European spending.

EPI’s stated aim is more European control over payment rules and infrastructure, alongside another commercial choice for banks, merchants and shoppers. Wero uses SEPA instant transfers, which move euros between bank accounts, rather than processing purchases through the card networks.

Where the rollout stands

EPI reported more than 43.5 million registered users in September 2025 and 60 million users a year later. Its September 2026 update also says more than 48,000 merchants across five countries have processed Wero payments. Those totals do not tell us what share of purchases shoppers pay for with Wero.

Online payments are already live in Germany and Belgium. France is adding merchants, and Luxembourg is migrating from Payconiq, an existing local mobile-payment service. In the Netherlands, iDEAL, the established bank-payment option, is moving onto Wero infrastructure. Growth will include both new adoption and existing payments changing platforms.

A migrated iDEAL payment does not automatically represent business won from Visa or Mastercard. To measure that shift, we will need data showing which methods shoppers used before and how often they choose Wero now. And dm’s 5% remains a target for one retailer, not a market-share figure.

How Wero plans to grow

Established partners give Wero a head start. Payment services like iDEAL and Payconiq bring banking relationships, familiar payment habits and merchant connections.

Payment providers could spread access further. The bank BNP Paribas is expanding merchant acceptance, and Nopan, a payments company that facilitates bank transfers, says Solidgate merchants in supported markets are scheduled to get Wero in October 2026.

Lower costs may give merchants a reason to promote it. Sparkasse Hanau advertises 0.77% per transaction, with a €0.07 minimum, before any applicable provider charges. This is about 70% cheaper than PayPal’s 2.75%. That is one offer, not a universal Wero tariff. Savings still depend on actual usage and the work involved in supporting another payment method.

Cross-border connections could matter just as much. EPI and other European services, including Italy’s Bancomat, Spain’s Bizum, Portugal’s MB WAY and the Nordic Vipps MobilePay, have agreed to connect their systems. Their roadmap targets online and in-store payments in 2027. A successful cross-border QR-payment test in April 2026 demonstrated technical progress, rather than general commercial availability.

The pace will depend on repeat customer use as well as technical availability. Published user totals alone do not tell us what Wero’s future checkout market share will be, but their broad partnership targeting implies big potential.

When is Wero coming to your checkout?

There is no worldwide switch-on date in the published roadmap. Merchant access depends on the provider, business location, participating customer banks and payment type. A U.S. merchant serving European shoppers still needs its provider’s eligibility confirmation; a European launch announcement does not establish general U.S. availability.

Late 2026: Online acceptance is expanding across the existing markets. The next Dutch migration phase is scheduled for October, with existing iDEAL merchants moving in stages through their providers.

Through 2027: The Dutch partners aim to complete the iDEAL migration by the end of the year. Broader in-store availability in France and Germany is planned progressively from 2027 onward. The separate cross-wallet project also targets merchant payments in 2027.

Those are rollout plans, not guaranteed activation dates for every merchant. Recurring payments and other added features also need to be confirmed at provider level.

What a less card-dependent Europe looks like

One outcome is a more mixed checkout: international cards for their reach, alongside European bank-payment options that work routinely across borders. If those alternatives attract regular use, merchants gain more choice and bargaining power on fees.

Getting there takes more than new logos. Shoppers need a reason to change habits, and merchants need reliable payments, workable refund and dispute processes, and predictable costs. EPI also acknowledges that Wero still relies on some non-European technology providers, so European governance does not mean complete technology independence.

The next few years will show whether Wero becomes an everyday way to pay across Europe.

Have a question about what this means for the European markets you sell into? Let us know. The payments landscape changes frequently. Let us be your guide.