BankAxeptThe only major European card scheme with no interchange, which makes it the benchmark in debates on the cost of acceptance. It is also a national resilience tool (offline mode, cash withdrawal at the checkout).Stø AS (owned by Norwegian banks; also owns BankID) · since 1991No interchange fee; contactless since 2017, available in “X-Pay” mobile wallets (such as Apple Pay) since 2024; works offline and serves as a designated cash distribution arrangement at NorgesGruppen (Norges Bank, December 2025)
Global registry · Europe · Northern Europe
Norway Payment systems
8 systems listed.
CurrencyNorwegian krone (NOK)
Domestic schemeBankAxept
RegulatorNorges Bank / Finanstilsynet
Leading payment methods
Cards (BankAxept)VippsA2ABNPL
E-commerce shares
Cards · 40%Wallets · 25%Account-to-account · 15%Buy now, pay later · 12%Other · 8%
Vipps. A mobile wallet launched by DNB in 2015 and later opened up to other banks: more than 4.5 million users in Norway. Merged with Denmark’s MobilePay into Vipps MobilePay (about 12 million Nordic users), the first third-party wallet to use the iPhone’s NFC in Europe (2024).
Vipps users (Norway)>4.5M
Vipps MobilePay group≈12M Nordic users
Cash share≈2–3% of payments (Norges Bank)
The domestic debit scheme BankAxept handles most in-store card payments at very low cost. Cash has all but disappeared (about 2–3% of transactions).
IBAN · Norway
15 charactersSEPA area2,297 bank codes731 BIC codes
- Total length
- 15 characters
- Bank code position
- 5–8
- BBAN structure
4!n6!n1!n
Structurally valid example
NOcountry code93check digits8601bank1117947account
NO93 8601 1117 947
Learn about this market. The guides and courses that cover it.
Merchant, acquirer, PSPPayment regulationCentral banks and payment infrastructuresAgents, distributors, and banking-as-a-service: who is liable for whatPayments in the BalkansPayments in the Baltics and FinlandAccepting payments in Germany, Austria, and SwitzerlandAccepting payments in Spain and PortugalChoosing a jurisdiction for your payment institutionAccepting payments in the Netherlands and BelgiumAccepting payments in the NordicsAccepting payments in Poland and Central Europe
Card schemes
Instant payments
NICS RealA “prefunding” model that differs from SCT Inst: funds are blocked before the payee is credited, which changes how settlement risk is managed.Bits AS / Finance Norway (owner), Mastercard Payment Services (operator) · since 2020Replaced the Straksbetaling service in 2020; funds are secured before the payee is credited (Norges Bank, Dec. 2025)
StraksbetalingDiscontinuedNorway’s first instant payment service; still mentioned in older bank documentation.Finance Norway / Bits · since 2013Replaced by NICS Real in 2020 (Norges Bank, Dec. 2025)
Clearing and settlement
AvtaleGiroNorway’s domestic direct debit, outside SEPA. Pair it with eFaktura for subscription models in Norway.Finance Norway / Mastercard Payment Services · since 1993Allows payments outside a monthly cycle, unlike Denmark’s Betalingsservice (Norges Bank, Dec. 2025)
NICS (Norwegian Interbank Clearing System)As in Denmark, the domestic card scheme is cleared in the national ACH and settled in central bank money, not through an international card network.Bits AS / Finance Norway (owner), Mastercard Payment Services (operator)Clears credit transfers, direct debits, and BankAxept transactions (Norges Bank, Dec. 2025)
Wallets
VippsThe world’s first third-party wallet to use the iPhone NFC access that Apple opened up under its commitments to the European Commission, a major precedent for all of Europe.Vipps MobilePay AS (consortium of Norwegian banks and Danske Bank) · since 201512.4 million users and 580,000 points of sale across Vipps MobilePay at the end of 2025; the world’s first company to launch an alternative to Apple Pay on the iPhone, in December 2024 (Vipps MobilePay, 2025)
Vipps MobilePayNordic wallet formed by merging the Norwegian (Vipps) and Danish (MobilePay) brands. Finland’s Pivo was supposed to join but was left out on competition grounds. Since P27 was abandoned, it is the leading Nordic retail payment asset.Vipps MobilePay AS (formed by the merger of Vipps (Norway) and MobilePay (Denmark), cleared by the authorities in October 2022; Pivo and its shareholder OP Financial Group, originally part of the deal, were dropped on September 16, 2022, after the European Commission raised competition concerns about the Finnish market) · since 2015
Other
BankID NorgeA near-universal bank-issued digital identity, and the prerequisite for strong customer authentication on most Norwegian online payments.Stø AS · since 2004