Top 10 Online Payment Platforms in Nigeria

In an online store, a payment platform is a checkout portal that is used to enter credit card information and credentials for services. So it is very important to know about various Online Payment Platforms in Nigeria.

It is obvious that we are now in the digital age so you should expect more of your customers to pay you through digital platforms. According to statistics, 84% of consumers love to pay through credit card. And this is because it is less stressful and easy to do than paying with a whole bunch of cash at hand. Moreover, it is more appropriate to purchase a product that you see online through a provided payment platform because an online business requires an online payment. Except in rare cases whereby, paying on delivery is allowed.

Therefore, everyone prefers to pay online – including your customers.

Before we proceed on the top 10 online payment platforms in Nigeria, we need to understand that Payment Platforms are better called “Payment Gateways.” And you must have a better understanding of what it is, how it works, and its importance.

What is a Payment Platform?

A Payment Platform also known as Payment Gateway is a financial technological means through which online business owners receive money from their customers or clients through their card. It is the financial checkouts that customers fill before booking your service or ordering your product online.

That is, payment platforms are gateways by which customers use in making purchase to get a product or receive a service. Costumers pay through the payment gateways to get a product or service from a vendor. Having explained the meaning of Online Payment Platforms, the main aim of this content is to disclose to us the top 10 online payment platforms in Nigeria and across Africa.

Top 10 Online Payment Platforms in Nigeria

#1. Paystack

Paystack was introduced by Akinlade and Ezra Olubi in January 2016, which allows businesses to settle payments via credit card, debit card, and mobile money on their website in less than 30 minutes. Paystack builds technology to help Africa’s best businesses grow, from new start-ups, to market leaders who are launching new business models.
Paystack makes it easy for businesses to accept secure payments from multiple local and global payment channels, and they also provide tools to help business owners retain their existing customers, and even acquire new ones.

#2. Interswitch Webpay

Interswitch Webpay was founded in 2002 by Mitchell Elegbe, as a transaction switching and processing company with national focus, Interswitch progressively evolved to integrate consumer financial services with the successive launches of Quickteller, a retail payments ecosystem linking merchants and billers with consumers, as well as Verve.

The Interswitch company was established as a common African financial service provider that maintains exclusively, a wide array of interconnected datacentres in Africa. The company has over 11,000 ATMs on its network, with more users in Nigeria than anywhere else.

#3. Vogue Pay

VoguePay is a secure payment processor and borderless banking platform which offers personal digital wallets and business payment accounts to users worldwide. VoguePay was founded in 2012 by Michael Femi Simeon to solve issues relating to payments in different countries and had since evolved to become a digital bank.

VoguePay has made big contributions to the growth of the Fintech industry in Africa since its emergence. It was set up with the aim of making online and cross-currency payments safer for businesses, traders and customers. In less than a decade, VoguePay has grown into an online platform revolutionising the African payment system.

#4. Fliqpay

Fliqpay is a Crypto currency payment gateway start-up, established in Nigeria and headquartered in Lagos. It was founded by Ayowole Ayodele in 2019, who spent over 8years working for Chevron, Stanbic IBTC Bank PLC, and Quidax; one of the leading exchanges in Nigeria. Fliqpay is a payment gateway in Africa that will instantly direct your crypto payments to your local bank account.

Fliqpay was established in 2019 and yet it has processed over $12M transactions till date.

The two (2) services that Fliqpay provides are:

Accept Payments made in Crypto
Convert payments made in Crypto to your Bank Account

#5. PayU

PayU is a Netherlands-based payment service provider to online merchants. It was founded by Jose Velez, Martin Schrimpff, Arjan Bakker, Grzegorz Brochocki, Nitin Gupta and Shailaz Nag in 2002 which is headquartered in Hoofddorp. It allows online businesses to accept and process payments through payment methods that can be integrated with web and mobile applications. Currently it operates in 17 countries.

#6. PayPal

PayPal was originally established by Peter Thiel, Luke Nosek and Max Levchin, in December 1998 as Confinity, a company that developed security software for hand held devices. Having had no success with that business model, however, it switched its focus to a digital wallet by which it operates as a payment processor for online vendors, auction sites and many other commercial users, for which it charges a fee. PayPal is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system which serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper methods such as checks and money orders.

In fact, PayPal wasn’t even named PayPal when it was founded, its initial name was Confinity, a company founded on the premise of low-cost, almost effortless digital payments for consumers and businesses. But now, PayPal has remained at the forefront of the digital payment revolution for more than 20 years, with about 286 million active user accounts and 9.9 billion payments up till date.

#7. SimplePay

SimplePay was founded by Dave Ungerer who made a very difficult decision to quit a well-paying software development job and establish SimplePay in 2009. Now, it is a fast-growing software company which provides a cloud-based payroll software solution aimed at making processing correct and compliant payroll as stress-free as possible. Today, more than 23,000 companies globally rely on this company for their payroll processing needs.

#8. GTPay

GTPay is a secure internet payment gateway developed to facilitate payments online using debit Cards issued by banks on the Interswitch Network. GTPay plugs in seamlessly with the existing websites of customers and acts as a bridge between the customer’s website and financial institutions (Banks). Benefits of GTPay include:

Convenient means of payment
Acceptance of both local and international cards
Global reach for merchants
Increased sales
Promotes cashless transactions
Instant value for successful transactions

#9. OPay

OPay was founded in August 2018 by Olu Akanmu. OPay is an ePayment wallet launched by Opera software company the developers of the popular Opera mini web browser. It is a mobile payment platform that allows its users to pay for goods and services electronically using a mobile phone via the OPay App. It has achieved an incredible amount in under 3 years: $38 million in revenue till date, and it is currently one of Africa’s leading Fintech companies.

#10. Remita

Remita was founded by John Obaro in 2005 and is fully developed in Lagos Nigeria by SystemSpecs. It is the default payment gateway that facilitates the Federal Government of Nigeria’s Treasury Single Account (TSA), the largest and most impactful of its kind in Africa. Remita also allows businesses to conveniently receive payments from customers in a faster manner, through nine different channels, which are; Remita Mobile App/Website, Internet Banking, Point of Sales (POS) Terminals, Debit/Credit Cards, Merchant’s Website, Bank Branches, Mobile Wallets and Standing Order/Direct Debit.

Wrapping Up: Top 10 Online Payment Platforms in Nigeria

The above listed are the top 10 Online Payment Platforms in Nigeria for a reason, so you should do well to pick out of them because of the relevance it will have on your online business. Let us now understand the importance of these online payment platforms.

The importance of Online Payment Platform

It is easy to set up.
There is a tight security of a payment gateway which eliminates the possibility of customer’s fraud.
It is very fast to operate.
It makes payment and reception of payments easier for both buyer and seller.
It is easier to make payment from any part of the world.