Apple has been lobbying to bring Apple Pay to India for the longest time. While those plans have reportedly hit a regulatory roadblock, it seems like Apple has made some progress somewhere, as it has now reportedly re-enabled card payments for App Store and iCloud purchases in India after pausing them in 2021.
Apple Complies with RBI Rules to Restore Card Payments in India
A new MoneyControl report has revealed that Apple is testing credit and debit card payments for App Store and iCloud, with select users in India. The Cupertino brand has seemingly agreed with the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) tokenisation mandate and plans to launch widespread card payment functionality in the coming months.
Apple halted card payment support back in 2021 because of the tokenisation mandate itself. For those unaware, RBI launched payment tokenisation 5 years ago, prohibiting merchants, payment aggregators and payment gateways from storing credit/debit card details on their servers. These are instead replaced with a unique, encrypted alternative called a token, used by consumers for faster checkouts.
Now, in 2026, Apple has agreed to comply with RBI's tokenisation rule, and all the card tokens will be stored on servers inside India. Most importantly, the brand will not be able to mirror that data to its own servers, located in the USA, Denmark and China.
This development will be appreciated by iPhone users across the country since currently, the only two payment options are UPI and Netbanking. This prevents users from adding alternate payment options like credit and debit cards and also limits certain autopay mandates.
Hence, with card payment support now coming to the App Store and iCloud in India, it will be a welcome addition. Moreover, this also lays the groundwork for Apple Pay's launch in India. Earlier reports have hinted at a major Apple Pay rollout in India roadblock due to India's top banks, reportedly resisting Apple's commission demands, seeking a share of transaction revenue from credit card issuers.
