By the numbers
Payment routing by the numbers
Last updated: November 2026
Published data shows that the processor handling a payment changes both its cost and its chance of approval, which is the core argument for smart transaction routing.
The Avendo Routing Guide collected these statistics from published reports and articles. Each is quoted as published with its source. None are Avendo's own results, and Avendo's routing criterion is the best available rate, not approval optimization.
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What do the numbers say about payment routing?
They say processor choice matters. Decline rates across US-dollar gateways ranged from 2.8% to 98% in one dataset, and retrying on a different processor recovered far more declines than retrying on the same one. On cost, US merchants paid a record $198.25 billion in card fees in 2025. Read how these ideas apply in the smart transaction routing guide.
Routing, approvals, and declines
Figures on how processor choice and routing relate to approvals.
| Statistic | Source |
|---|---|
| Decline rates ran from 2.8% to 98% across 106 US-dollar gateways in Spreedly’s 2023 data, so the processor you pick moves approvals. | Beast Insights, "Payment Processing Statistics 2026" |
| An instant retry on a different processor recovers about 20% of declines, versus 2% on the same merchant account (Primer). | Beast Insights, "Payment Processing Statistics 2026" |
| Smart payment routing can boost authorization success rates by up to 15%. | Citcon, "Smart Payment Routing Boosts Authorization Rates Significantly" |
| After Twilio switched providers, its authorization rate rose 10% against the previous provider, and Twilio credits roughly 1% of that to Stripe’s machine-learning retry tool. | Financial IT, "Smart Payment Routing and AI: What Actually Moves Approval Rates" |
| A client in a high-risk vertical sat at a 20% payment conversion rate despite several providers; rebuilding the routing scheme around issuer country and user IP, plus a cascade, took conversion above 60%. | Financial IT, "Smart Payment Routing and AI: What Actually Moves Approval Rates" |
Card fees and costs
Figures on what merchants pay to accept cards.
| Statistic | Source |
|---|---|
| US merchants paid a record $198.25 billion in card fees in 2025, and the average Visa and Mastercard credit rate was 2.36%. | Beast Insights, "Payment Processing Statistics 2026" |
| Global payments revenue was almost $2.0 trillion in 2025, per Boston Consulting Group (BCG). | Beast Insights, "Payment Processing Statistics 2026" |
The size of the payments market
Figures on the scale of global payments.
| Statistic | Source |
|---|---|
| Global payments generate approximately $2.6 trillion in revenue from 3.8 trillion transactions and $2.1 quadrillion in annual value flows. | McKinsey, "The 2026 Global Payments Report" |
| Payments account for roughly 41 percent of total banking revenues. | McKinsey, "The 2026 Global Payments Report" |
| Between 2020 and 2025, payments industry revenues grew at an average annual rate of 9 percent. | McKinsey, "The 2026 Global Payments Report" |
| Digital transactions are expected to reach $12 trillion by 2026 (Statista, 2025, as cited by Citcon). | Citcon, "Smart Payment Routing Boosts Authorization Rates Significantly" |
| Citcon cites Baymard Institute (2025) for an average cart abandonment rate of around 70%, which Citcon attributes largely to payment issues. | Citcon, "Smart Payment Routing Boosts Authorization Rates Significantly" |
Published routing case studies from the market
Solidgate, another payments company, publishes these customer case study headlines on its Solidgate, "Intelligent Payment Routing Platform"page. They are Solidgate's figures about its own customers, not Avendo results:
- How Ajax Systems launched EU subscriptions in one week with 90%+ approval rates.
- How Nova Post scaled payments across Europe and the US with 95%+ approval rates.
- How Hily lifted ARPU by about 20% on its iOS US segment.
- From $0 to $10M monthly GMV: how HOLYWATER TECH built a global payments stack.
Common questions
- Why do some payments get declined at one processor but not another?
- Processors and their acquiring banks differ in risk models, issuer relationships, and regional coverage, so outcomes vary. Beast Insights cites Spreedly’s 2023 data showing decline rates ranging from 2.8% to 98% across 106 US-dollar gateways. That spread is one reason merchants connect more than one processor.
- What happens if a payment is declined?
- A decline returns to your checkout as it would with any processor, and the customer can retry or use another card. Industry data shows a second processor can help: Beast Insights cites Primer data that an instant retry on a different processor recovers about 20% of declines, versus 2% on the same merchant account. Ask Avendo how declines work in your setup.
- What is the typical credit card processing cost?
- Costs vary by processor, card type, and pricing model. As a market reference, Beast Insights reports that US merchants paid a record $198.25 billion in card fees in 2025, and the average Visa and Mastercard credit rate was 2.36%. Your own effective rate depends on your card mix and which processor handles each transaction.
- Can smart routing really lower credit card processing costs?
- It can when processors price the same transaction differently. With several processors connected, sending each transaction to the one with the best available rate avoids paying one processor’s price on every sale. That is Avendo’s model. How much you save depends on your volume, card mix, and processor pricing, so no fixed saving is promised here.
- What are payment routing decisions usually based on?
- Across the industry, routing decisions are commonly based on processing cost, card type, issuer country, currency, and processor performance. Financial IT gives a rules example: UK-issued debit over £100 goes to acquirer A, then B. Avendo’s stated routing goal is cost: each transaction goes to the processor offering the best available rate in real time.