Credit Card Market Share Statistics

Last updated: June 30, 2024

Highlights. Three (3) companies process 96.8% of all credit card transactions worldwide: Visa, UnionPay, and Mastercard. 

  • Americans charged $6.22 trillion to their Visa cards in 2023, making it the largest card processor in the United States. 
  • Consumers charged $2.59 trillion to Mastercards, making it the nation’s second-most used charge card.
  • U.S. Consumers charged $1.14 trillion to their American Express brand cards. 
  • American consumers charged $218 billion to their Discover cards.
  • Credit card user penetration in the U.S. is 82%; 214.9 million Americans have a credit card account in their name.

*UnionPay does not disclose its global purchase volume.

Dual Pie Charts: Global and U.S. market shares according to Statista and Nilson Report

Credit Card Consumer Market Share

Visa is the world’s second-largest credit card processor with 4.16 billion cards active worldwide.

  • Americans used credit cards for an estimated 62.6% of total retail spending.
  • The United States credit card market is valued at $163.1 billion in 2023; projections indicate that the market will grow to $178.2 billion in 2026. 
  • Over 75% of U.S. households have at least one general-use credit card.
  • American consumers have 596.6 million active credit card accounts, enough for every American adult to have 2 cards.
  • Citibank is the largest credit card issuer in terms of the number of accounts, with 95 million active accounts in 2020.
  • The largest credit card issuer in terms of payment volume is Chase Bank, which facilitated $1.246 trillion in 2023 payments.
  • Americans spent an estimated $4.64 trillion on purchases through the eight (8) largest U.S. networks in 2023.
  • Among credit card issuers, the Top 8 process 79.8% of their collective market payment volume.

Bar Graph: U.S. Credit Card Networks' 2023 Purchase Volumes in billions, including seven (7) networks ranging from Chase/JP Morgan ($1,246), Capital One ($575) and U.S. Bank ($200) according to Nilson Report

Credit Card Processor Market Share

The world’s largest credit card processors are based in the U.S. and China.

  • China’s UnionPay was the second most-used credit card worldwide in 2022 after Visa.
  • Mastercard has 2.94 billion cards active worldwide.
  • The four major U.S. processors (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover) facilitated $24.4 trillion in worldwide consumer transactions in 2023.
  • American Express has issued 80.2 million active proprietary cards worldwide; an additional 61.0 million active American Express cards were issued by third-party institutions.
  • The total number of transactions Visa processed reached 212.6 billion in FY 2023.

Line Graph: Credit Card Brand Share of Global Transactions, including Visa, UnionPay, Mastercard, and Other Brands according to Statista

Credit Card Processor Share of Market Value

Aggregate market value refers to the combined value of its equity stock shares. 

  • The four major credit card processors in the United States are valued at a collective $850.898 billion*.
  • Visa Inc. has an aggregate market value of $364.9 billion or 42.9% of the total market value of the four major U.S. credit card networks.
  • Mastercard Inc. has an aggregate market value of $328.8 billion or 38.6% of the total market value of the largest U.S. credit card networks. 
  • The aggregate market value of the American Express Company is $128.1 billion or 15.1% of the total market value of the largest U.S. credit card networks.
  • Discover Financial Services has an aggregate market value of $29.1 billion or 3.42% of the total market value of the largest U.S. credit card networks.

*Note that market values include other financial markets beyond consumer credit.

Doughnut Chart: U.S. Credit Card Processors' Share: Purchase Volume * Share of U.S. processors' total global purchase volume totaling $24.366 trillion according to Statista

Credit Card Processor Revenue Share

Excluding UnionPay, credit card processor annual net revenue exceeds $121.2 billion.

  • Visa’s global revenue for FY 2023 was $32.653 billion, up 11.4% YoY.
  • Mastercard’s revenue for fiscal year (FY) 2023 was $25.098 billion, up 12.9% YoY.
  • American Express’s revenue for FY 2023 totaled $60.5 billion, up 14.5% YoY.
  • Discover’s revenue for FY 2023 totaled $2.94 billion, down 32.8% YoY.

Doughnut Chart: U.S. Credit Card Processors' Share: Active Cards * Share of U.S. processors' total number of cards active worldwide total 7.550 billion according to Statista

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

Sources

  1. Federal Reserve (Fed) Bank of New York, Center for Microeconomic Data
  2. United States Census Bureau, Population and Housing Unit Estimates Tables
  3. IBISworld, Industry Statistics
  4. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Corporate Filings
  5. Statista, Credit Cards Worldwide – Statistics and Facts
  6. Nilson Report, Newsletter Archives
  7. Fed Board of Governors, Credit Card Profitability