In This Article
Onchain payment analytics platform Paymentscan, which indexes activity across 17 blockchains, has been tracking a remarkable story in the crypto card space, one of explosive volume growth and a near-complete shift in which payment networks power it all.
From Zero to $600 Million
Crypto card spending barely registered before late 2023. For most of that year, onchain volumes were flat, then November arrived and everything changed. The ability to pay with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies using Oobit at any Visa or Mastercard terminal had finally found its moment. at any Visa or Mastercard terminal had finally found its moment. The growth since has been steep and consistent: $100M–$150M monthly by mid-2024, $200M–$300M by early 2025, and well above $400M through late 2025 and into 2026. The most recent months are brushing $600M, a figure that didn't exist as a category two years ago.
The trajectory is unmistakably upward and shows no signs of plateauing. In roughly two years, the space has gone from a niche curiosity to a channel processing hundreds of millions of dollars in monthly consumer spending.
The Visa Takeover
Perhaps the most striking story in the data is not just the overall growth, but the dramatic reshuffling of market share between the two dominant payment networks.
In the early period (March–October 2023), Mastercard held essentially 100% of the market. All tracked crypto card volume ran through Mastercard rails during this window, a reflection of the partnerships that the earliest wave of crypto card issuers had established.
Then, around November 2023, something changed dramatically. Visa entered the crypto card space, or more precisely, a major card program on Visa's network launched and scaled quickly. Within just a few months, Visa's share rocketed from zero to roughly 85–90% of total volume, while Mastercard's slice collapsed to around 10–15%. Since then, Visa has consolidated its grip further. By 2025 and into early 2026, Visa accounts for approximately 95–97% of all tracked crypto card spending, with Mastercard holding a thin sliver of roughly 3–5%.
What's Behind the Shift?
The data doesn't explain why this shift happened, but the timing and scale suggest it was driven by a handful of major card programs migrating to or launching on Visa rails. Platforms like RedotPay, KAST, EtherFi, MetaMask, Holyheld, and others, many of which are listed on Paymentscan, appear to have overwhelmingly adopted Visa as their network of choice. The issuers powering these programs (Rain, Wirex, Fiat24, and Immersve) have largely oriented around Visa infrastructure.
Mastercard hasn't disappeared, but its presence in the crypto card space has been marginalized at least for now.
A Maturing Market
The broader picture painted by this data is of a market that has grown up fast. A few things stand out:
The volume growth is onchain and verifiable, Paymentscan notes that its metrics are based on onchain flows attributable to specific card programs, making this data more transparent than traditional card reporting. The platform also tracks 17 chains, capturing spending wherever users hold assets.
The card ecosystem is also becoming more diverse. Over 18 card products are now tracked by Paymentscan, spanning consumer crypto wallets (MetaMask, Bitget Wallet, SafePal), yield-focused cards (EtherFi), and regional offerings (Avalanche Card, Tuyo, Karta). This diversity suggests the crypto card model is being applied across a wide range of use cases and geographies.
The fact that Paymentscan's data has been featured by analytics platforms like The Block and prediction market Polymarket speaks to growing institutional and market interest in this sector's metrics.
Looking Ahead
If the current growth trajectory holds, cumulative crypto card volume tracked by Paymentscan could cross the multi-billion dollar mark in the near term. Monthly volumes already in the $500M–$600M range imply an annualized run rate well above $5 billion, a figure that would have seemed implausible just two years ago.
The bigger question is whether Mastercard can reclaim ground, or whether new challengers, or even newer blockchain-native payment rails, will eventually disrupt Visa's dominance in this niche. For now, the data is clear: crypto cards are growing fast, and Visa is winning.
