Klarna

Klarna is a Swedish buy now, pay later company, set up in Stockholm in 2005 by Sebastian Siemiatkowski, Niklas Adalberth and Victor Jacobsson. Its operating business, Klarna Bank AB (publ), has held a full banking licence from Finansinspektionen since June 2017. The holding company, Klarna Group plc, is registered in England and Wales and floated on the New York Stock Exchange in September 2025 under the ticker KLAR. For 2025 it reported $3.5 billion of revenue, 118 million active consumers and 966,000 merchants.

At checkout Klarna shows up as one payment option. Depending on the country, shoppers can pay in full, pay in 30 days, split the cost into three or four interest-free instalments, or take longer financing. Klarna pays the merchant on a contracted payout schedule and collects from the customer itself. It is live in 26 countries, covering most large EEA markets plus the UK, Switzerland, the US, Canada, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand, and works in 15 currencies.

Merchants can contract with Klarna directly, using its API, web and mobile SDKs, a hosted payment page or plugins for Shopify, WooCommerce, Adobe Commerce and Salesforce Commerce Cloud, or switch it on through a PSP such as Adyen, Stripe, Checkout.com or Worldpay. Klarna publishes no standard rate card for direct merchants; fees are agreed per contract and differ by market. Some PSPs do list Klarna rates: Adyen shows 4.99% + £0.20 in the UK and 4.29% + $0.30 in the US and Canada, before its own processing fee.

Klarna fits consumer-facing retailers, online or in store, that sell into its 26 markets. High-risk sectors are a harder sell: licensed gambling, crypto and other money services are restricted and face extra checks, while unlicensed gambling and financial services are banned. In the UK, interest-free BNPL became regulated credit on 15 July 2026, so Pay in 3 and Pay in 30 days now sit under FCA rules.