Top 5 Adyen alternatives: compare fees, features, and benefits
David Beach
Senior Editor | Payments, banking, financial technology, and global commerce - EMEA
As your business grows, the variety and complexity of the payments you receive will change. New customers, countries, currencies – you name it, it can come into your business. You need a payment processor that can handle it all with ease, as well as providing extra value in places you didn’t expect.
Adyen can do some of these things well and others less so. It’s an option on many company’s lists, but it shouldn’t be the only one. There are enough providers vying for your custom that you can be a lot more selective than choosing a ‘just good enough’ platform.
By the time you finish this article, you’ll know about:
The pros and cons of Adyen
Five alternatives to Adyen
How to build your search criteria for payment processors
How Airwallex and Adyen compare
Let’s get into it.
What is Adyen and who is it best for?
Adyen is a Dutch financial technology company that helps businesses accept payments from their customers. The platform facilitates online, mobile, and point-of-sale (POS) transactions.
It was one of Europe’s first fintech unicorns and, today, has a market capitalisation in excess of €50 billion.1
The platform is used by major global enterprises like Spotify, eBay and Uber. Built to handle large payment volumes and with global payouts to 190+ countries, you might be able to tell that Adyen is more of an enterprise product. Their own website notes that “Adyen’s platform is built to support payment processing for businesses with an annual transaction volume over £5M.”2
Why consider alternatives to Adyen?
If your business processes less than £5m in payments, Adyen may not be the most affordable or sensible choice.
The platform primarily serves the enterprise market – providing a customised service and dedicated account management to large, complex customers. Smaller businesses might not get the level of service they hope for, or that might be available with other platforms.
One issue is apparent with every Adyen customer: The lack of a dedicated business account. Adyen is an acquiring bank, which means they provide merchant accounts for its customers – not eMoney or bank accounts. Merchant accounts are a kind of escrow account, used to store the money you receive from card payments until they are authorised and settled.
Every business that accepts payments needs a merchant account, but Adyen puts a barrier between you and your revenue reaching your bank account. In the worst case, a problem with Adyen’s systems could lead to you not being able to access your funds.
The top five alternatives in 2025
Adyen is clearly a great choice for some businesses, but no platform will be right for everyone. If that includes you, then it’s time to review your options. We’ve selected five alternatives to Adyen that cover a range of use case and business types. These aren’t your only options, but we’ve tried to present a good cross-section of the market.
Airwallex
The global payments and financial platform for growing businesses, Airwallex offers all the financial infrastructure you need in one package. That includes payment acceptance, of course, but also multi-currency accounts, low-cost FX, borderless virtual and physical cards, spend management tools, and embedded finance products.
Best for: Growing businesses with an international footprint.
Limitation: You might already use tools that provide some of these features, so you might not need everything Airwallex offers.
Account fee: From £0/month
Debit card fee structure: 1.30% + £0.20
PayPal Braintree (aka PayPal Enterprise Payments)
An offshoot of one of the world’s biggest and best-known payments platforms, Braintree is PayPal’s global payment processing solution for end-to-end checkout experiences. An extensive global network makes this another good choice for international businesses.
Best for: Enterprise-scale businesses.
Limitation: Many businesses may be too small for Braintree, in terms of the SLAs, support, and customisation they need.
Account fee: £0/month4
Debit card fee structure: 1.90% + £0.20 (discounted rates if you process more than £50,000/month)4
Payoneer
A globally focused fintech that helps businesses and freelancers work and get paid worldwide. Payoneer’s global workforce management, employer of record, and agent of record services also help businesses hire internationally.
Best for: Contractors or small businesses starting to scale up across borders.
Limitation: Fees are relatively expensive compared to others on this list.
Account fee: $29.95 (USD)/year if you receive less than $2,000 (USD) or equivalent in a year.5
Debit card fee structure: Up to 3.99%5
Checkout.com
Despite its name, Checkout.com offers a full range of payment acceptance services, along with treasury and FX products. The company wants businesses to “thrive in the digital age”, so prioritises all kinds of online payments methods.
Best for: eCommerce businesses, due to the flexibility of their checkout builder.
Limitation: Businesses that have a physical presence, as Checkout.com doesn’t offer card or POS terminals.
Account fee: £0/month.6
Debit card fee structure: Not shown on website, prices only enquiry.6
Stripe
Stripe is, broadly speaking, a technology company. Their priority is financial infrastructure, but that comes in many forms, from payments and billing to climate mitigation and data intelligence. As a result, Stripe can do a lot of things for your business if you have the resources to integrate it.
Best for: Businesses with development teams who can experiment with Stripe’s API capabilities.
Limitation: Stripe estimates that it processed 1.3% of global GDP in 2024.3 If you want to get a personalised service from them, you’ll need to be enormous.
Account fee: £0/month.7
Debit card fee structure: 1.5% + £0.20.7
How to choose the right alternative to Adyen
Before you get too far into your search, you should ask these following questions. They should help you understand your own needs and rank providers with more clarity and precision.
Questions to ask of your own business
Firstly, these five questions will help you get clear about what you need.
What is our revenue split across countries and currencies?To help you understand your international payment needs.
What are the most popular payment methods used by our customers?So you can work out costs more accurately.
Do we need payment processing or other services, too?To know whether you need an integrated (e.g. Airwallex) or payments-specific (e.g. PayPal Braintree) provider.
What do we pay for an average month of transactions?So you have a baseline for comparisons.
How resourced are we to integrate a new platform?To help you decide between a plug-and-play option or something more customised.
Questions to ask of your potential providers
Once you have your answers to your own questions, it’s time to head into the market to (kindly) poke and prod at different providers. Some of these you can find by exploring their website, others you might need to book a call or demo.
What is your average customer’s monthly transaction volume? Helps you understand where you’d sit in the proverbial food chain.
What do you charge for my customers’ three most popular payment methods? So you can compare rates between providers.
Do you offer any products or features beyond payments?To understand how else you can work together, either now or in the future.
What would an average month of payments cost us?The big one – the cost of processing payments with each platform.
What kind of onboarding process do you have?To understand the level of support you’ll have when getting started.
Airwallex vs. Adyen: Key differences
We’re going to put Airwallex in the spotlight with Adyen for a minute. The table below explains how we stack up against Adyen – from what we have in common to where we differ.
| Airwallex | Adyen8 9 10 |
|---|---|---|
eCommerce payment gateway and processor |
|
|
Target market | Growing international businesses | Enterprise-scale businesses |
Domestic card payment fees (Visa and Mastercard) | 1.3% + £0.20 | Interchange fee + £0.11 processing fee + 0.60% |
EEA card payment fees (Visa and Mastercard) | 2.4% + £0.20 | Interchange + £0.11 processing fee + 0.60% |
International card payment fees (Visa and Mastercard) | 3.15% + £0.20 | Interchange + £0.11 processing fee + 0.60% |
FX markup | 0.5 - 1% | Not publicly available |
Multi-currency account with local bank details |
|
|
Make payments globally |
|
|
Accept online payments |
|
|
In-person PoS |
|
|
FX capabilities | 180+ transaction currencies | 190+ transaction currencies |
Company card issuing |
|
|
Embedded finance |
|
|
Expense management |
|
|
Bill payments |
|
|
Risk management |
|
|
Global licences | 60+ globally | Australia, US, EU, UK, Canada, and India |
Final thoughts on alternatives to Adyen
Adyen is a healthy business with many happy customers, but not every business is the right fit for them – for many reasons. Plus, there’s absolutely not a monopoly on payment acceptance. This is a competitive industry and you have lots of choices.
All of which is to say: It’s worth knowing about alternatives to Adyen.
Airwallex is one of those alternatives and can provide you with all the financial infrastructure you need to grow your business at home and across borders. That could be with our multi-currency business account, spend management tools, or payment acceptance capabilities.
Find out for yourself how Airwallex compares to Adyen with an interactive tour, live demo, or experiment in our sandbox.
Disclaimer: We updated this article in Q3 2025. The information was based on our own online research and we were not able to manually test each tool or provider. The information is provided for educational purposes only and a reader should consider the specific requirements of their business when evaluating providers. If you would like to request an update, feel free to contact us at [email protected].
Find out for yourself how Airwallex compares to Adyen.
FAQs
Before we wrap up, we want to address some of the most common questions we hear about Adyen and its alternatives. We’re always happy to answer questions, but we want to save you an email or phone call if we can.
Which is best for recurring billing?
Recurring or subscription billing is a common feature among Adyen’s competitors. It’s a key component of most payment processing services.
As a result, the best option for recurring billing can be decided by its complementary features (e.g. data reporting, payment methods, and currency choices). You’ll also want to compare pricing - out of the options in this article that list their pricing online, Airwallex is the cheapest at 0.40%.
Who supports UK/EU payouts fastest?
Most providers agree to a settlement SLA with new customers, based on a number of factors relating to the business. Typical payout timeframes are between one business day and five, but this can depend on many factors.
Do Adyen alternatives support in-person POS?
Yes, many Adyen alternatives provide POS and card terminals. Airwallex’s terminals and POS are launching later in 2025, while PayPal Braintree and Stripe offer card terminals. Other providers can act as the gateway for a physical terminal, but do not offer their own hardware.
For more information on Airwallex, visit Airwallex Business Account and Airwallex pricing.
Sources
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David Beach
Senior Editor | Payments, banking, financial technology, and global commerce - EMEA
David manages the content for Airwallex. He specialises in content that helps EMEA businesses navigate global and local payments and banking.
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