Spain’s Gen Z and Millennials Are Rewriting the Rules of Payments

In 2025, Spain is emerging as a leader in Europe’s digital payments landscape, driven largely by its Gen Z and Millennial population. These digitally fluent generations are not only early adopters but are actively shaping the future of payment experiences. With real-time payments now accounting for 53% of all transactions in Spain, significantly higher than the European average of 15%, the demand for instant, seamless transactions is clear.

Mobile payments are experiencing rapid growth, with the market expected to expand at a CAGR of 16.4%, reaching USD 195 billion by 2032. Platforms such as Bizum have become essential to everyday transactions, with over 27.6 million active users in Spain as of 2024. 

Below are three key behavioural trends shaping this evolution, each backed by real-world examples from companies featured in the NextGen Payments & RegTech Forum Barcelona 2025.

1. Mobile-first: Smartphones are the default wallet: For Spain’s digital-native generations, mobile is no longer just a channel — it’s the command centre of their financial life. From splitting a dinner bill to managing subscriptions, payments are expected to be instant, secure, and integrated into everyday mobile experiences. Companies like TSYS are empowering banks and fintechs to offer fully digital-first card issuing and mobile wallet integrations, helping them meet these evolving demands. At the same time, firms like CORE are driving back-end innovation, enabling institutions to digitise their infrastructure and deliver seamless, mobile-ready payment flows. UMCA Technologies complements this shift by helping financial institutions secure mobile-first environments through real-time fraud detection, transaction monitoring, and behavioural analytics, all essential in safeguarding the fast-paced, digital-first experience Gen Z and Millennials expect.

2. Frictionless checkouts: Speed over everything: For Gen Z and Millennials, delays, redirects, or excessive steps at checkout are dealbreakers. They expect payment flows to be fast, smooth, and almost invisible, whether they’re shopping locally or sending money across borders. Payall delivers on this need with its frictionless cross-border payment orchestration, simplifying international transactions for financial institutions and their users. To ensure these fast-moving transactions are also secure, ComplyRadar provides real-time transaction monitoring and fraud detection, helping businesses strike the balance between speed and safety. Vixio, meanwhile, enables institutions to build compliant and frictionless experiences with confidence. Through its Vixio PaymentsCompliance platform, organisations gain access to the latest payments-related regulations, consolidated across global regulators, stripped of noise, and delivered in a clear, digestible format. This empowers product and compliance teams to act quickly and adapt their user journeys without slowing down innovation.

3. Predictive & personalised payments: Financial experience 2.0: This generation doesn’t just want functionality — they want smart financial ecosystems that understand their behaviour, anticipate their needs, and guide their decisions. Vivox AI is leading the way in this space with AI-powered conversational finance tools, enabling providers to deliver personalised nudges, insights, and real-time engagement based on behavioural data. 

As Spain’s younger generations continue to redefine how payments should work — mobile first, lightning fast, and intelligently personalised, the pressure is on for institutions to innovate and adapt. The companies driving this change are not only responding to consumer behaviour but are actively shaping the future of payments in Europe.

At the NextGen Payments & RegTech Forum on 7 May 2025 at the W Hotel in Barcelona, Spain, you’ll hear directly from the leaders of organisations that are shaping this future,  including TSYS, Payall, Vivox AI, CORE, ComplyRadar, UMCA Technologies, Vixio, Bizum, Coinscrap Finance, Macropay, FLOA - BNP Paribas, IBM Consulting, ComplyRadar, PagoNxt (Santander), Mastercard, dLocal, Outpayce from Amadeus, CaixaBank, Getnet, Vendo Services, Neitec, Alipay+, VFX Financial, Finom, Kantox, Kiwi.com, Betsson Group, and many more!

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