How Many People Use PayPal Worldwide? (2020–2025)
As the number of people shopping online increases year after year, the demand for online payment methods is set to rise with it. Ranked among the most popular online payment gateways in the world is PayPal. But just how many people use PayPal worldwide?
How many users does PayPal have worldwide?
According to recent data, the number of PayPal users worldwide is set to hit 223.3 million in 2023. The number covers global internet users aged 14 and above who access their PayPal accounts and/or use the payment service to purchase items at least once a month. This is a 6.7% annual increase from 2022’s 209.3 million, when the number of PayPal users exceeded 200 million for the very first time.
The number of PayPal users is projected to continue rising over the next few years. In 2024, it’s forecasted to increase by 6%, to hit 236.7 million. By 2025, analysts expect there to be 249.9 million global PayPal users, a 5.6% annual increase.
The rise in the number of PayPal users is set to be fairly consistent between 2020 and 2025, with an average annual increase rate of 7.4%. The biggest growth came in 2020, when PayPal added 13.2% more users to hit 184.3 million. The smallest increase is expected in 2025.
The increase in the number of people using PayPal is in line with the payment service’s total payment volume. According to a recent report, the company’s payment volume for Q4 2022 increased 9% year over year, and experts predict a 9.5% rise for 2023.
Number of PayPal users vs. digital buyers worldwide
The number of PayPal users isn’t the only PayPal metric that’s been rising. PayPal’s penetration is also set to grow between 2020 and 2025. In other words, the growth in the number of PayPal users is set to outpace the growth in the number of people shopping online.
In 2020, 7.8% of all digital buyers worldwide used PayPal. This number grew marginally to 7.9% in 2021, before rising further to 8.2% in 2022. By analysts’ calculations, PayPal’s penetration will continue increasing and reach 9.1% by 2025.
This means that between 2020 and 2025, the percentage of online shoppers using PayPal is set to increase by 1.3 percentage points. Analysts credit the increasing use of PayPal to falling demand for cash and skyrocketing reliance on ecommerce, making digital payment methods like PayPal increasingly popular.