France

France is card-first at the till, but cash is still widely used. In the ECB’s 2024 SPACE survey, cards accounted for 48% of point-of-sale transactions by number and cash 43%; by value, cards reached 52% and cash 34%. The Banque de France reports that in 2025, 72% of in-person card payments were contactless and more than 19% were made by mobile, up from 15% in 2024. The domestic CB scheme processed 14.5 billion transactions in 2025, including 8 billion contactless payments, with 78 million CB cards in circulation. Cheques have become marginal at 1.9% of cashless transactions. CB also supports SoftPOS and Tap to Pay on iPhone acceptance.

The e-commerce federation FEVAD reported French online sales of goods and services of €196.4 billion in 2025, up 7%, from 3.2 billion transactions (up 11%); online now accounts for an estimated 12% of retail trade. France had 42.2 million online shoppers, 80% of people aged 16 to 74, who made 75 online purchases a year on average. Services grew faster (+9%) than products (+4%). Out-of-home delivery, such as pick-up points and parcel lockers, now accounts for nearly one delivery in two, so merchants should offer it alongside home delivery. FEVAD also reports that 65% of French e-merchants sell internationally.

The Autorité de contrôle prudentiel et de résolution (ACPR), attached to the Banque de France, authorises and supervises payment and e-money institutions, and firms licensed elsewhere in the EEA can passport in. The Banque de France chairs the Observatory for the Security of Payment Means (OSMP), whose recommendations shape how PSD2 strong customer authentication is applied. Since January 2026, internet card payments outside 3-D Secure are declined beyond a cumulative €0.01 per card per merchant over 24 hours, a limit extended to UK and Swiss merchants at €1.01 from March 2026; mail and telephone orders are capped at €500 in most sectors. Cash payments by residents to businesses are limited to €1,000 (higher limits apply to non-residents).

Account ownership is near universal: the World Bank Global Findex 2025 put it at 99% of adults in 2024, with 93% owning a debit card. Most people now prefer to pay cashless. In the ECB’s 2024 SPACE survey, 61% of French respondents preferred to pay by card or other cashless means and 15% preferred cash, although 60% said having the option to pay in cash was very or fairly important.