Credit card spending in India continued its growth trajectory in May 2026, with transaction volumes rising 26 per cent year-on-year and transaction value increasing 7 per cent, while debit card usage remained under pressure, with both volume and value declining on an annual basis.According to data compiled by 1Lattice based on RBI statistics, total credit card transaction volume increased 6 per cent month-on-month in May to 590 million transactions, while transaction value rose 3 per cent to about Rs 2.03 trillion.On the other hand, debit card transactions showed little momentum. Transaction volumes rose marginally by around 1 per cent month-on-month to 510 million transactions, while transaction value declined 1 per cent to Rs 2.65 trillion. On a year-on-year basis, debit card transaction volumes fell 10 per cent and value declined 6 per cent in May.
Credit cards increasingly driven by online spendingE-commerce continued to dominate credit card usage. Online transactions accounted for 50 per cent of total credit card transaction volume and 62.2 per cent of transaction value in May, underscoring the growing role of credit cards in digital commerce.Point-of-sale (PoS) transactions constituted 48.4 per cent of transaction volumes and 37.4 per cent of transaction value, while ATM usage remained negligible at just 0.1 per cent of volumes and 0.2 per cent of values.Debit cards increasingly used for cash withdrawalsFor debit cards, ATM transactions continued to account for the bulk of usage, making up 80.6 per cent of transaction volumes and 86.7 per cent of transaction value in May.E-commerce transactions represented 5 per cent of debit card volumes and 8.4 per cent of transaction value, while PoS transactions accounted for 14.1 per cent of volumes and 4.9 per cent of value.
