Highlights. In 2023, nationwide credit card transactions totaled 53.8 billion for an average of 147.5 million per day, 6.15 million per hour, 102,450 per minute. or 1,708 per second.

  • Total global credit card transactions were an estimated 724 billion in 2023 for an average of 1.98 billion per day, 82.6 million per hour, 1.34 million per minute, 22,950 per second.
  • The average U.S. cardholder makes 251 credit card transactions per year or one transaction every days.
  • American consumers use credit cards to pay for 4-in-10 in-store purchases.
Nationwide Transactions 2023
Increment Transactions per
second 1,708
minute 102,452
hour 6,147,136
day 147,531,266
week 1,035,556,001
month 4,487,409,339
quarter 13,462,228,018
year 53,848,912,070

Credit Card Transactions per Processor

The world’s three (3) largest credit card processors facilitate over 700 billion transactions per year. 

  • The total number of transactions Visa processed reached 212.6 billion in their FY ending September 2023.
  • Visa, Inc. processed an estimated 268 billion global payment transactions in the 2023 calendar year.
  • UnionPay processed an estimated 300 billion global transactions in 2023.
  • Mastercard processed an estimated 175 billion transactions in 2023.
  • Other credit card processors, including Discover and American Express, processed an estimated 21.2 billion transactions.
Global Transactions 2023
Increment Transactions per
second 22,952
minute 1,377,146
hour 82,628,745
day 1,983,089,888
week 13,919,765,563
month 60,318,984,105
quarter 180,956,952,315
year 723,827,809,261

Credit Card Transaction Volume Statistics

Transaction volume refers to the transacted dollar value.

  • Americans used credit cards for an estimated $5.20 trillion in purchases in 2023 for an average daily purchase rate of $14.2 billion
  • The average U.S. transaction is for $96.49.
  • The four major U.S. processors facilitated $24.366 trillion in global consumer transactions in 2023.
Nationwide Transaction Values
Increment Transaction Values per
second $164,761
minute $9,885,655
hour $593,139,328
day $14,235,343,879
week $99,921,163,766
month $432,991,709,653
quarter $1,298,975,128,959
year $5,195,900,515,836

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

Sources

  1. U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Corporate Filings
  2. United States Census Bureau, Population and Housing Unit Estimates Tables
  3. Statista, Credit Cards Worldwide – Statistics and Facts