India’s financial landscape is changing way faster than anything. This decade belongs to the fintech revolution. While most of us were discussing how UPI made payments easier, there was another set of changes that kept on happening. Earlier we used to link our debit cards for UPI payments, but now, for the last few years, credit cards have been linked with UPI with the help of Rupay.
When you have a Rupay credit card, you can easily do the payments easily with the UPI. The real turning point came in June 2022, when the RBI announced that credit cards could now be linked with UPI. Until then, UPI was mostly about spending money directly from your bank account or using a debit card. But with this change, people could now make UPI payments using their credit cards.
This step was much bigger than just making payments more convenient. It changed how people could use credit. Suddenly, you could enjoy the benefits of a credit card, such as rewards, a credit period, and easy tracking while making fast and seamless UPI transactions. In short, the two worlds of “credit” and “instant mobile payments” started to come together.
During the same period, a startup was born to take on the opportunity. They realized that if UPI was the way India loved to pay and credit cards were the way India loved to spend, then bringing the two together could transform the way Indians use money. That’s why Kiwi was built to unlock the true potential of credit on UPI and make using a credit card as simple as making a UPI payment.
Kiwi was started in the year 2022 in the month of November. It was started by three founders named Siddarth Mehta, Mohit Bedi, and Anup Agrawal. Kiwi officially launched its product in June 2023, rolling out virtual Rupay credit cards embedded into its app and, crucially, linked to UPI for seamless payments. They initially started with a key partner, Axis Bank, which is enabling users to access a lifetime free virtual Rupay Axis Kwik credit card directly through the Kiwi app.
The response was immediate. Kiwi saw strong product-market fit from day one. Within a short span, they issued over 25,000 virtual Rupay credit cards while also raising pre-seed and Series A funding from investors like Omidyar Network, Nexus Venture Partners, and Stellaris. They saw massive traction, and as of August 2025, they had issued over 2 lakh RuPay credit cards and were processing over five million merchant transactions monthly.
The linkage of a credit card to UPI is beneficial to both consumer and issuer. When people get easy access, they tend to spend more, and eventually banks can see growth in their transaction volumes and loans disbursed. Consumers can survive with extra liquidity and manage their finances. But if they miss out on paying, then it’s a trouble. Well, this one thing led to massive traction. Users of Kiwi are spending an average of INR 22,000 monthly, which is more than the general average of physical cards. So, it clearly shows us how much easier it made crediting.
Another subtle but genius move was Kiwi launched with RuPay credit cards. Why? Because RBI’s circular initially allowed only RuPay cards on UPI. While Visa and Mastercard were still trying to enter, Kiwi was built on RuPay’s early-mover advantage. It positioned Kiwi as the scalable player when the market was most open.
One of the biggest advantages of Kiwi is easy approval. In India, the dropout rate for credit card applications is massive because of KYC, delivery delays, and setup hassles. Kiwi understood this pain point. By combining virtual instant issuance and RuPay-UPI tokenization, they eliminated the wait-time gap. Users could apply, get approved, and make their first UPI credit payment within minutes.
So, all these above-discussed reasons are some of the major reasons, and another dominating reason is the offers that the cards give. This has attracted a major set of audiences to apply for the card and use it. Well, this rise of credit card usage is a mix of both negative and positive, and it is purely subjected to the consumers’ financial behavior. But today, if someone wants to have a credit card, it has become much easier than earlier.
Earlier, getting and using them was hard, as limited options were available, but today the story is completely different. Because of the rise of players such as Kiwi and other startups, Rupay’s market share has grown tremendously over the period. Now if we look at the funding of the Kiwi, it gives us the clear picture of how investors are trusting and supporting Kiwi.
Recently, Kiwi strengthened this momentum by raising $24 million in a funding round led by Singapore-based Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia and India, with participation from existing backers Nexus Venture Partners, Stellaris Venture Partners, and Omidyar Network. For now, it is gaining strong momentum and making headlines with the traction of its platform and funding. Let’s see how it changes the way people use credit cards.
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