ACI Worldwide has joined the European Payments Initiative to integrate the Wero digital wallet into its payments platform.
Through the collaboration, merchants and financial intermediaries across Europe will be able to offer Wero as a payment method to consumers and businesses.
Wero is a pan-European digital wallet that runs on SEPA instant payment rails, intended to unify payments across the continent. The wallet supports P2P transfers, ecommerce and POS purchases, alongside other services. EPI, which launched Wero in 2024, was founded by a consortium of 16 European banks and financial services companies. The wallet currently offers instant account-to-account payments to consumers in Belgium, France and Germany.
Expansion across Europe
According to the official press release, EPI plans to extend Wero to Luxembourg and the Netherlands in the coming months and is continuing to explore further markets. Since autumn 2025, consumers in Germany and, more recently, Belgium have been able to use Wero for online payments, with services such as subscriptions due to follow in subsequent years.
Moreover, French consumers are expected to gain access to similar online payment functionality in autumn 2026, while in-store payment options are planned for 2027.
Regulatory and market context
The integration takes place against the backdrop of the EU's Instant Payments Regulation (IPR), which came into effect in January 2025 and requires banks and payment service providers in the eurozone to be able to send and receive instant payments. Beyond the Wero integration, ACI Worldwide already provides instant payment rail connectivity and orchestration to banks and PSPs across Europe.
In addition, according to ACI Worldwide's Prime Time for Real-Time report, instant payment transactions in Europe are forecast to rise from 17.2 billion in 2023 to 38.6 billion by 2028, with instant payments expected to account for 13% of all electronic payments in Europe by 2028, up from 8% in 2023.
Nick Craig, head of Europe, ACI Worldwide, described the partnership as a way to address the fragmentation of payment methods in Europe by offering a single solution intended to support a secure and efficient payment experience for merchants and consumers. Moreover, Martina Weimert, CEO of EPI, said ACI's participation marks a step towards wider availability of Wero across its core markets, noting that the integration would allow ACI's merchants and their customers to adopt Wero as an additional payment option.
