Buy Now, Pay Later Statistics 2026: Adoption, Debt, and What the Data Actually Shows

Buy now pay later statistics show 91.5 million Americans used BNPL in 2025, with 41% paying late on at least one loan. This report covers adoption trends, default rates, provider comparisons, and the CFPB rule change that removed key consumer protections.

You’re at checkout on a furniture site, eyeing a $600 sofa. The page shows a button: “Pay $150 today, then 3 more payments of $150.” It feels manageable. You click it. That’s exactly how 91.5 million Americans started 2025 by choosing installments over one-time payments. And it’s also how 41% of them ended up paying late on at least one loan last year.

The buy now, pay later market grew so fast it’s now attracting serious scrutiny. Late payments are up. Klarna went public, and its stock cratered. The CFPB pulled back consumer protections it introduced in 2024. And FICO now factors BNPL payment history into credit scores, making every missed installment more costly than it used to be.

This report covers who uses BNPL, how much they spend, default rates, and the big regulatory shift that just happened.

How Many Americans Use BNPL?

Roughly 15% of US adults used buy now, pay later in 2024, up from 14% in 2023 and 12% in 2022. The growth has been steady, but if you zoom out, the numbers get more dramatic: BNPL loans in the US grew 970% between 2019 and 2021, jumping from 16.8 million to 180 million.

Today, 86.5 million Americans use BNPL, and that figure was projected to hit 91.5 million in 2025. That’s more people than hold gym memberships in this country.

But the adoption rate isn’t the whole story. While 64% of US consumers were offered BNPL at checkout in 2023, only 29% actually took it. Still, stores that offer BNPL report up to 85% higher average order values. That’s why every major retailer is rushing to add it.

BNPL Usage by Generation

Millennials lead adoption at 48%. Gen Z is closing the gap with 40% overall usership, and eMarketer projected that around 50.7% of Gen Z digital buyers would use BNPL in 2025. Gen X sits at 28%. Baby Boomers are at 13%, the lowest of any group, but here’s the twist: consumers over 60 who are offered BNPL at checkout are the most likely age group to actually use it, at 34.2%.

Among under-36 users, 54.5% say lack of credit access is why they consider BNPL. Ask actual users why they chose it, though, and that reason drops to just 13.8%. The top reason is convenience, at 36.5%. TransUnion data puts 77% of BNPL users in the 18-44 age bracket.

BNPL Market Size and Spending Data

The Richmond Fed’s 2026 economic brief estimated $70 billion in US BNPL transaction volume for 2025, which is about 1.1% of total credit card spending. Other market research puts the figure higher, with some estimates around $122 billion, though methodologies differ.

Globally, gross merchandise volume hit $560.1 billion in 2025, up 13.7% year-over-year. The global BNPL app market brought in $12.5 billion in revenue in 2024. Total provider revenue was about $9.50 billion. Analysts project that figure will hit $80.15 billion by 2033, a 27% annual growth rate.

BNPL now accounts for 6% of US e-commerce transactions, up from just 2% in 2020. BNPL shoppers also spend 72% more per transaction than other online shoppers. That’s why merchants push it so hard.

One thing we’ve noticed tracking deals across thousands of stores: retailers in the furniture and home category push BNPL harder than almost any other sector, and that lines up with the data. Home and furniture is the top BNPL category at 42% of users. Electronics follows at 30%. Fashion, which used to dominate at 80% of BNPL payments in 2019, has dropped to 58.6% as spending diversified into groceries, gas, and other essentials.

Late Payments, Defaults, and the Real Cost of BNPL

This is where the story gets uncomfortable. LendingTree found that 41% of BNPL users paid late in the past year, up from 34% the year before. The Federal Reserve’s own 2024 survey found 24% of users made at least one late payment, up from 18% in 2023. No matter how you slice it, the trend is clear: late payment rates are rising faster than adoption.

The official CFPB default rate for BNPL is 2% on average across 2019-2022. That number looks manageable, but context matters. BNPL relies on auto-debit, which means defaults get categorized differently than credit card charge-offs. Deep-subprime borrowers (credit scores below 580) defaulted at 3.5%, and they made up 45% of BNPL originations in that period. By 2023, the CFPB found the charge-off rate had dropped to 1.83% (down from 2.63% in 2022), while the Richmond Fed’s own calculation showed 0.92% of transaction value.

So what does a late payment actually cost? The average late fee is around $10, down from $15.46 in 2019 per CFPB research. 10.5% of borrowers got hit with at least one in 2021. The good news is that 88% of fee waiver requests succeed when users ask. We couldn’t confirm that figure for 2025, so check with your provider before you count on it.

How BNPL Affects Your Credit Score in 2026

Here’s the biggest development most BNPL coverage is still underplaying: FICO announced it would incorporate BNPL payment data into its FICO Score 10 BNPL products, effective fall 2025. That means the “phantom debt” problem just got a lot more real.

For years, most BNPL loans weren’t reported to credit bureaus. On-time payments didn’t help your score, and late ones usually didn’t hurt it. That invisibility helped BNPL grow fast because it felt lower-stakes than a credit card. Starting in fall 2025, that changed.

Affirm began reporting BNPL loans to credit bureaus in 2025. Klarna and Afterpay have been more cautious. But with FICO now building it into the scoring model, the pressure on all providers to report is mounting.

Practically, this means if you’ve been treating BNPL as “credit-lite” because it didn’t show up on your report, that assumption is no longer safe. Late payments on BNPL accounts can now hurt your credit score just like a missed credit card payment.

The Richmond Fed flagged this as a systemic risk earlier in 2026. Most consumers juggling multiple simultaneous BNPL loans had no idea those loans could become visible to future lenders. Now they can. That $3.02 billion in average BNPL debt outstanding at any given time (which the Richmond Fed calculated from CFPB data) is no longer off the books.

Demographics: Who Actually Uses BNPL?

The income breakdown is more interesting than most summaries suggest. BNPL usage is nearly identical for both the under-$50K and over-$100K income brackets (31%). A 2025 Bankrate survey of 2,354 US adults found the $50-79K bracket actually had the highest usage at 36%. This isn’t just a tool for people who can’t afford things.

That said, financial fragility is common among users. 72.6% of BNPL users earn less than $75,000 annually. Renters are 51.9% more likely to use BNPL than homeowners. And 32.7% of BNPL users have a credit score below 620, a rejected credit application, or a delinquent loan, at a rate 97% higher than the US average.

A Morgan Stanley AlphaWise survey from April 2025 found that more than 25% of US consumers have used BNPL at some point. Among 16-24 year olds, adoption hit 41%. Among households earning $100K-$150K, 38% have used it.

25% of BNPL users have zero non-retirement savings. On average, they hold $11,981 less in non-retirement savings and cash than non-users. That gap tells a story.

Women are 41.7% more likely to have used BNPL than men. But men are 38.8% more likely to be heavy users, with more than 11 BNPL purchases per quarter. Interestingly, 88% of BNPL users have an open credit card, 13 percentage points more than non-users.

What People Buy with BNPL

Home and furniture is the top category at 42% of BNPL usage. Electronics is second at 30%. Fashion and apparel dominated early on, accounting for 80.1% of BNPL payments in 2019, but that share fell to 58.6% by 2021 as the product expanded into everyday spending.

Groceries now account for 25% of BNPL usage, up from 14% just the year prior. Food delivery sits at 27% of users. That’s the structural shift that changed the BNPL risk profile: when people use installment loans to buy groceries, the debt accumulation dynamic is very different from financing a sofa.

Spending on essentials (gas, groceries, utilities) using BNPL totaled $229.2 million in 2021, up 434% from 2020. That was a COVID-era spike, but the pattern has stuck around.

What most BNPL guides miss is the coupon-stacking angle. Home furnishings and electronics are the top two BNPL categories, and they’re also two of the highest-coupon-coverage categories we track across 20,000+ stores. Applying a coupon code before selecting BNPL means you’re financing a lower total. The installment amounts drop, the final cost drops, and if something goes wrong, you’ve minimized your exposure. The DontPayFull Chrome extension tests available codes automatically before checkout, so you can reduce your cart total before splitting it.

BNPL Holiday Shopping Data

Consumers spent an estimated $20 billion using BNPL in the most recent holiday season, up 9.8% from the prior year per Adobe Analytics. Cyber Monday alone drove $1.03 billion in BNPL transactions in 2025, up from $993 million in 2024 and $782 million in 2023.

Black Friday 2025 added another $747.5 million in BNPL spending. A full 82.2% of holiday BNPL transactions were completed on smartphones. November 2025 as a whole drove an estimated $6.1 billion in BNPL spending.

BNPL retail growth is projected at 26.1% annually through 2030. It’s striking how much of the annual BNPL volume gets compressed into a few weeks each fall.

From what our team has tracked around Black Friday and Cyber Monday, the best time to use BNPL for a large purchase is actually before the sale peaks, when coupons are still available and cart totals are lower. Once major sales start, coupon codes often stop stacking with sale prices. The sequence matters: find your code, reduce the total, then select BNPL on the discounted amount.

Major BNPL Provider Data

Five companies control over 95% of the US BNPL market: Affirm, Klarna, Afterpay, Zip (formerly Quadpay), and Sezzle.

Interestingly, PayPal is the most commonly used BNPL provider by user share. A 2025 LendingTree survey found 56% of BNPL users preferred PayPal, ahead of Klarna, Affirm, and Afterpay, each cited by 38% of users. That’s a significant detail most BNPL provider roundups miss.

Klarna. Klarna went public on the NYSE (ticker: KLAR) in September 2025. The IPO was priced to imply a $14-15 billion valuation, but shares jumped 30% on debut day, opening at a $19.65 billion valuation. As of March 2026, the stock has declined significantly, with the market cap falling to roughly $5.1 billion. Klarna had 42.8 million American users as of 2024, averaging $513.47 in spending each. It holds about 35% global market share and generated $2.8 billion in revenue in 2024. Over 375,787 US websites offer Klarna at checkout.

Affirm. Affirm posted FY2025 GMV of $36.7 billion and 23 million active accounts. Q4 2025 was its first-ever quarterly operating profit at $58 million. Affirm charges no late fees and began reporting BNPL loans to credit bureaus in 2025. App downloads hit 2.07 million in Q2 2025, up 30%.

Afterpay. Afterpay handled roughly $24.6 billion in GMV in 2025. 96% of installments were paid on time, and 98% of purchases incurred no late fees. Afterpay launched its physical card in 20 US states in February 2025, allowing for in-store BNPL use. As for credit checks, Afterpay does conduct soft credit checks for new customers on signup. These don’t affect your credit score, but the claim that Afterpay “doesn’t run credit checks” isn’t quite accurate.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison of the three main providers on key metrics:

BNPL lenders earn 13.4% of their revenue from consumer fees and 6.9% specifically from late fees. The rest comes from merchant fees, which typically run 1.5% to 7% per transaction.

BNPL and Merchant Impact

Merchants pay for BNPL because the conversion math works. Adding it at checkout can lift conversion by roughly 30%. Klarna’s platform data supports that number. Average order values can rise by up to 85%. Those are hard numbers to ignore.

For merchants, the fraud exposure is real. BNPL fraud rates run around 3-4% of transactions, per AtData research. Account takeover and synthetic identity fraud are the main culprits. The dispute rights piece also matters here: the CFPB’s 2024 rule would have required BNPL lenders to handle disputes the same way credit card issuers do. That rule was pulled in May 2025.

BNPL Regulation: What Changed in 2025

The regulatory story moved fast, in both directions.

In May 2024, the CFPB classified BNPL lenders as credit card issuers under the Truth in Lending Act. This would have required them to provide dispute rights equivalent to credit cards.

That rule was officially rescinded on May 12, 2025, when the CFPB withdrew dozens of regulatory guidance documents. In June 2025, the agency said it wouldn’t reissue a revised BNPL rule, calling existing credit card rules a “poor fit” for BNPL products.

This means if you dispute a BNPL charge (for a return, fraud, or a merchant issue), you don’t have the same rights you’d have with a credit card. You have to follow the provider’s own rules, and federal law isn’t backing you up.

A 2025 Motley Fool survey found that 32% of BNPL users report running into a problem with their service. The most common issues were returning items (21%), getting refunds (18%), and losing track of payment dates (19%).

Is BNPL a Good Choice for Budget-Conscious Shoppers?

The honest answer is: it depends on how you use it. 57% of BNPL users say they rely on it for purchases they couldn’t otherwise afford. 26% report regretting a purchase once the full cost landed. 47% don’t budget for BNPL payments before they buy.

This explains the late payment trend. BNPL makes big purchases feel smaller in the moment, which leads to purchases people wouldn’t otherwise make. Some of those turn into payment struggles.

But using BNPL strategically is different. If you’re buying something you’d buy anyway, have the funds available, and apply a coupon code before selecting BNPL (so you’re financing a smaller amount), it can be a good way to spread cash flow without costing more. That’s the use case.

The FICO change adds a new wrinkle. Starting in fall 2025, late BNPL payments can affect your credit score the same way a late credit card payment does. That changes the downside math significantly.

Frequently Asked Questions

What percentage of Americans use buy now, pay later?

About 15% of US adults used BNPL in 2024 per Federal Reserve SHED data, up from 14% in 2023. That translates to roughly 86.5 million Americans, with projected usage for 2025 hitting 91.5 million.

What is the default rate for buy now, pay later?

The CFPB found a 2% average BNPL default rate from 2019-2022. However, deep-subprime borrowers (credit scores below 580) defaulted at 3.5%. By 2023, the charge-off rate had fallen to 1.83% of transaction volume. The official rate looks low partly because most BNPL providers use auto-debit.

How does BNPL affect your credit score?

For a long time, it didn’t. Most BNPL loans weren’t reported to credit bureaus. That changed in fall 2025, when FICO began incorporating BNPL data into its Score 10 BNPL products. Affirm also started reporting its loans to bureaus in 2025. Now, late payments can hurt your credit score just like credit card late payments.

Which BNPL provider has the most users?

By user preference, it’s PayPal. A 2025 LendingTree survey showed 56% of BNPL users preferred it. Klarna, Affirm, and Afterpay each came in at 38%. By raw account numbers in the US, Klarna had 42.8 million American users in 2024.

Can you combine BNPL with coupon codes?

Yes, and you should. Apply your coupon code to reduce the cart total first, then select BNPL to split the discounted amount into installments. This lowers both the principal you’re financing and each individual payment.

Is BNPL growing or declining?

It’s still growing. US adoption rose from 12% of adults in 2022 to 15% in 2024, and global volume grew 13.7% in 2025. But late payment rates are rising even faster than adoption, and regulatory oversight is shrinking, so the growth comes with increasing financial risk for users.

What happened to the CFPB’s BNPL rules?

In 2024, the CFPB tried to classify BNPL lenders as credit card issuers, which would have granted consumers the same dispute rights. That rule was rescinded on May 12, 2025. The CFPB later confirmed it would not reissue a revised rule, so BNPL consumers currently have fewer formal protections than credit card users.

Does BNPL appear on credit reports?

It’s starting to. Affirm began reporting in 2025, and other providers are facing pressure to do the same. Since fall 2025, FICO’s new Score 10 BNPL product can use BNPL payment data, so the invisibility that made BNPL feel low-stakes is going away.

Sources

1. LendingTree: Buy Now, Pay Later Tracker 2025: 41% of users paid late in past year, up from 34%; provider usage statistics (2025)
2. Federal Reserve SHED: 15% of US adults used BNPL in 2024, up from 14% in 2023 (2024)
3. Richmond Fed Economic Brief 2026: $70B US BNPL transactions estimate, charge-off rates, phantom debt analysis (2026)
4. Federal Register – CFPB Withdrawal Notice: CFPB rescission of BNPL interpretive rule, May 12, 2025 (2025)
5. CFPB BNPL Market Report: Late fee averages, default rates, consumer use data (2025)
6. Chargebacks911: BNPL Statistics: Merchant conversion data, fraud rates, provider statistics, FICO Score 10 BNPL details (2025)
7. Morgan Stanley: Buy Now, Pay Later Trends: AlphaWise survey data, e-commerce share, income bracket adoption (2025)
8. Motley Fool Money: 2025 BNPL Trends Study: Consumer survey, generational late payment rates, behavioral data (2025)

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