About
M-Pesa is the phone-number-based mobile money service that Safaricom launched in Kenya on 6 March 2007 with Vodafone's backing. Customers turn cash into e-money at agents, then send money, pay bills and pay merchants from a basic phone or the M-Pesa app; shops accept it through Lipa na M-PESA tills and Pochi la Biashara. Each country runs it through its own local operator: Safaricom in Kenya and Ethiopia, and Vodacom in Tanzania, the DRC, Mozambique and Lesotho. In the year to March 2026, Kenya's M-Pesa handled KES 41.68 trillion across 46.4 billion transactions and had 3.1 million merchants.
Safaricom reports platform capacity of ~4,500 transactions/second; volumes still growing at 29.5% YoY in FY2025.
Official site →Countries
