Safaricom is making it easier for Kenyans to pay with M-PESA at physical shops by partnering with payments company Pesapal to bring tap-to-pay to 30,000 point-of-sale (POS) terminals.
Customers with NFC-enabled Android phones or iPhones can now tap their devices on compatible Pesapal terminals to pay through M-PESA, instead of manually entering a merchant’s Till Number. Customers whose phones do not support NFC can use a QR code displayed on the same terminal.
The rollout allows Safaricom to expand M-PESA contactless payments without building its own POS network. Instead, the company is using Pesapal’s existing terminals, which are already deployed at businesses across Kenya.
The service is initially available on 30,000 Pesapal terminals, mainly at restaurants, hotels and selected supermarkets, according to Agosta Liko, Pesapal’s founder. Pesapal spent six months testing the service before opening it to merchants with compatible terminals.
Customers will not pay an additional fee for using the service, just as with a standard M-PESA Till Number payment.
“Thousands of businesses trust our platform, and by teaming up with Safaricom, we are delivering the faster, error-free transactions their customers expect,” Liko said.
How the tap-to-pay system works
The merchant’s existing M-PESA Till Number remains the account that receives the payment. Pesapal provides the POS terminal, while Safaricom processes the M-PESA transaction.
At checkout, the cashier enters the amount into the Pesapal terminal. A customer with an NFC-enabled phone then taps the device against the terminal.
The payment opens Safaricom’s My OneApp with the merchant’s Buy Goods number and payment amount already filled in. The customer checks the details and approves the transaction using an M-PESA PIN or biometrics.
Customers without NFC can instead scan the QR code shown on the terminal.
Safaricom’s existing scan-to-pay service also works with QR codes displayed by other merchants, meaning customers do not necessarily need a Pesapal terminal to make a QR payment.
The company says scan-to-pay is already available at more than 60,000 merchant outlets and plans to increase that number to 500,000 within the next year.
Safaricom is pushing for faster M-PESA payments
The partnership is part of Safaricom’s broader effort to reduce the amount of information customers need to enter when making M-PESA payments.
Through My OneApp, customers can also scan printed or handwritten receipts and, where the relevant information is available, have the app identify the merchant’s Till or PayBill number and payment amount.
Safaricom says My OneApp has been downloaded more than 7 million times.
The goal is straightforward: replace several manual steps with a quicker checkout process.
Instead of finding a Till Number, entering it, entering the amount and then authorising the payment, customers can now have much of that information supplied by the terminal or app before confirming the transaction.
The move also gives Pesapal’s POS terminals a bigger role in Kenya’s payments ecosystem. POS machines have traditionally been associated with card payments, while M-PESA transactions have generally started from the customer’s phone.
Kenya had more than 57,000 POS terminals as of August 2026, according to Central Bank of Kenya data cited by the companies, up from 54,454 at the end of 2025. Pesapal says around 30,000 of those terminals operate on its platform.
“Most of Pesapal’s terminals are deployed at restaurants, hotels and selected supermarkets,” Liko said.
For Safaricom, using Pesapal’s existing network means it can reach thousands of physical checkout points without having to build and distribute a separate POS infrastructure.
For Pesapal’s merchants, it adds another way to accept M-PESA payments using hardware already installed at their businesses.
The service is currently exclusive to Pesapal, although Safaricom says it is discussing integrations with other POS providers.
“For now, Pesapal is the partner on board, but there are ongoing discussions with other POS providers to integrate,” a Safaricom representative said.
The QR functionality has also gone through Kenya’s regulatory framework. The country introduced the Kenya Quick Response Code Standard in 2023 to guide banks and payment service providers on the use of QR codes for digital payments. Pesapal worked with the Central Bank of Kenya before launching the new QR functionality, Liko said.
The companies have not disclosed how many M-PESA payments currently happen through QR codes or how many transactions still require customers to manually enter Till Numbers. They also have not said how many of Pesapal’s remaining terminals could eventually support NFC payments.
Safaricom’s target of 500,000 scan-to-pay outlets within a year points to the scale of its ambition, although it has not set a specific target for customer adoption or transaction volumes.
Safaricom has tried contactless M-PESA before
This is not Safaricom’s first attempt at bringing contactless payments to M-PESA.
In 2017, the company launched M-PESA 1Tap, which allowed customers to make payments by tapping NFC-enabled cards, wristbands and stickers on merchant terminals.
The service was later discontinued after failing to gain enough adoption.
The new approach removes one of the biggest differences: customers no longer need a separate card, wristband or sticker. Their smartphone becomes the payment device, while QR codes provide an alternative for phones without NFC.
The bigger challenge will be getting customers to change an M-PESA habit that already works for them.
Safaricom and Pesapal are betting that tapping a phone or scanning a QR code will feel familiar enough to become part of everyday payments, while keeping the existing M-PESA merchant account system unchanged.
James Maitai, Safaricom’s group chief technology officer, said the partnership is part of the company’s effort to expand what M-PESA can do beyond traditional payments.
“Our partnership with Pesapal is an important part of that journey, bringing together our respective capabilities to shape the next generation of everyday payments,” Maitai said.