Cash vs Credit Card Spending Statistics (2024): Latest Trends

Highlights. Cash is now used in only 12% of in-store transactions in the United States.

81% of shoppers prefer to pay with cards over cash.
183.9 million Americans (70% of adults) have a credit card account in their name.
Shoppers spend up to 3x as much when they pay with credit cards instead of cash.
Consumers are 40% more likely to use credit cards rather than cash for any given transaction.
70% of nationwide retail sales dollars are from credit card transactions.

Grouped Bar Graph: Nationwide In-Store Retail Sales, credit card and cash sales, according to the U.S. Census Bureau and Statista

Consumer Credit Card vs. Cash Statistics

Consumers are most likely to use cards at general merchandise and department stores.

U.S. consumers use credit cards to pay for 70.2% of all retail purchases (in-store and online).
At brick-and-mortar stores, consumers used credit cards for $2.43 trillion in purchases.
Credit cards are used in 40% of in-store transactions.
U.S. consumers spent $728 billion in cash in 2022.
Americans made an estimated $4.98 trillion in credit card purchases out of a total $7.48 trillion in 2023 retail spending.
35% of consumers prefer to use credit cards rather than cash or debit for in-person payments; 19% prefer to use cash.
Less than 25% of consumers live in a household with no credit cardholders.
Americans spent an estimated $10.967 trillion in purchases using credit, debit, and prepaid cards (equivalent to 202% of retail purchases) through the largest credit card issuers in 2023.
The average credit card transaction in the U.S. is for $90.89.

In-Store Retail Payment Methods according to Statista

For purchases under $25, consumers are most likely to use cash.

Use of cash for in-store retail purchases declined 25% from 2017 to 2022.
All consumer cash payments declined 35% from 2016 to 2021.
Consumers aged 55 to 64 years pay for 24% of their purchases in cash, making them the age group most likely to do so.
Americans withdrew $730 billion from ATMs in 2021; the average withdrawal was $198.
Total consumer dollars withdrawn from ATMs declined 3.95% from 2015 to 2021 (from $760 billion), but the average amount withdrawn increased 35.6% (from $146).
49% of person-to-person (P2P) payments are in cash.
While P2P cash payments declined by 12 percentage points, from 2019 to 2021, mobile app P2P payments increased by 18 percentage points.
Consumers aged 50+ are 57.8% more likely to carry cash “just in case” than those aged 18 to 49 years.

Grouped Bar Graph: Nationwide In-Store Retail Payment Methods in credit and cash according to the U.S. Census Bureau and Statista

The most widely used U.S. charge card processors are Visa and Mastercard.

Consumers are 37.5% more likely to prefer debit cards over credit cards for in-person payments.
Debit cards are used in 31% of in-store transactions.
Compared to credit cards, Visa- and Mastercard-holding consumers spend 21.4% more through debit transactions than they do via credit cards.
Consumers charged a total of $2.899 trillion to their Mastercard credit cards in FY 2021.
Mastercard processed a cumulative $3.953 trillion on consumer debit and prepaid cards.
Consumers charged a total of $5.546 trillion to their Visa credit cards in FY 2022.
Visa processed $2.617 trillion in consumer debit transactions.

These data and insights were compiled by the Capital One Shopping team based on publicly available data.