Mexico’s Card Payment Market in 2025: Consumer Trends by Category
In the latest edition of our Cards Payments Usage Report in Mexico, which offers a detailed historical and current analysis of card-based consumption in Mexico, the evolution of credit and debit card usage reveals significant insights into consumer behavior by category of goods and services. This research spans data from 2009 to June 2025 and includes over 25 transaction categories, with the most recent update highlighting the five most relevant in terms of volume.
During June 2025, debit cards continue to dominate in transaction volume, with MX$306.8 billion in purchases spread across 682.7 million transactions. Credit cards registered MX$224.9 billion in transaction value through 266.6 million purchases. While both instruments experienced a moderate seasonal decline compared to the previous month—around -5% in value and approximately -3% in volume—the annual figures point to strong underlying growth. Year-on-year, credit card transaction values increased by 20.9%, with transaction volume rising by 20.5%. Debit cards showed a 12.3% annual increase in value and a 16.3% rise in transaction count.
Disaggregating the data by category reveals the segments driving this growth. Among credit card transactions, the most dynamic sectors in terms of annual value growth were aggregators (such as digital platforms and marketplaces), which surged by 29.4%, followed by department stores and large retail chains at 23.9%, and traditional retail at 20.3%. Spending on fuel and restaurant services also expanded, albeit at a slower pace, with increases of 12.0% and 12.9%, respectively.
In the case of debit cards, miscellaneous expenditures—typically including informal commerce, small retailers, and personal services—led the year-on-year growth with a 25.9% increase, underscoring a trend toward more granular, day-to-day spending through digital means. Aggregators rose by 21.6%, showing that debit cards are increasingly used in digital commerce environments. Large-format retailers (11.2%), traditional retail (10.7%), and gas stations (6.3%) also posted positive results.
The report also examines changes in the relative weight of each category within the total spending structure. For credit cards, supermarkets and hypermarkets increased their share of total spending by 0.37 percentage points, followed by gas stations (+0.16), retail (+0.13), fast food (+0.09), and miscellaneous (+0.08). On the debit side, the categories gaining the most relative importance were miscellaneous (+0.17), retail (+0.17), fuel (+0.16), government services (+0.08), and hardware/auto parts (+0.06).
These figures point to a diversification of card usage in Mexico, with both credit and debit cards gaining relevance not only in traditional retail environments but also in digital platforms and day-to-day microtransactions. The robust growth in both the value and volume of card transactions signals a broader shift in consumer payment habits, underpinned by the formalization of commerce and the increasing penetration of electronic means of payment in the country.