New Delhi: Digital payments through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) experienced a nationwide outage on Saturday, impacting millions of users across the country.
Many online payment platforms faced disruptions, affecting local shopping, bill payments, and business transactions. According to the outage tracking website Down Detector, there were 2,358 complaints reported by 1 PM, with 81 percent of issues related to payments and 17 percent concerning fund transfers.
The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which oversees UPI services, stated that the outages were caused by technical issues. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), NPCI said, “We are currently facing intermittent technical issues, leading to partial UPI transaction declines. We are working to resolve the issue and will keep you updated. We regret the inconvenience caused.”
Major banking apps, including those from SBI, ICICI, and HDFC, were also impacted, highlighting a more significant problem within the UPI network infrastructure. One affected user commented, “UPI is down again. Good that I always carry cash. Cash is always King.” Another user expressed frustration, stating, “This is becoming way too frequent nowadays. First UPI goes down, then banks declare their own ‘downtime’ for UPI transactions.”
Despite the outage, UPI had recorded impressive growth in March, with a 13.59 percent month-on-month increase in transaction volume, reaching 18.3 billion transactions, up from 16.11 billion in February, according to NPCI data. The total value of UPI transactions in March hit a record ₹24.77 lakh crore, representing a 12.79 percent increase from ₹21.96 lakh crore in February.
On a daily basis, the UPI network logged over 590 million average transactions, amounting to ₹79,910 crore in daily transaction count. Year-on-year, the record UPI transactions of ₹24.77 lakh crore in March showed a 25 percent increase in value and a 36 percent increase in volume, reflecting the rapid growth of India’s digital payments landscape. UPI has seen strong expansion in both person-to-person (P2P) and person-to-merchant (P2M) transactions.
