Klarna Reaches 55 Million Monthly App Users as Usage Surges 53% Year Over Year

WHY THIS MATTERS: This increase in daily active users signals a critical inflection point for the entire retail banking sector. The challenge for payments-focused disruptors has always been to transition from transactional utility to becoming a sticky, daily engagement touchpoint. Klarna’s success in growing daily usage by 53% year-over-year validates its strategy of broadening its product set—from its core Buy Now, Pay Later offering to debit cards and P2P services—to capture a greater share of the customer’s wallet. This is not merely an app growth story; it is evidence of successful digital transformation as a firm builds a comprehensive financial ecosystem. As McKinsey data suggests, consumers are already willing to leave their physical wallets behind. The real value-add here is that daily engagement proves the company has overcome the hurdle of being perceived as a credit tool and is now a reliable front-end for everyday money management, creating significant customer lifetime value

Klarna, the global digital bank and flexible payments provider, is seeing a sharp rise in both monthly and daily app usage, as more consumers use the global digital bank’s services as part of their everyday money management.

The Klarna app now reaches more than 55 million monthly active users globally, with 9 million people using the app on a daily basis. Daily engagement has increased by approximately 53% compared with last year, highlighting increasingly frequent use of Klarna’s banking, spending and shopping services.

Sebastian Siemiatkowski, CEO and co-founder of Klarna: “When people use Klarna every day, it shows we’re delivering on our vision of becoming the global digital bank for the next generation. Consumers are using the app to stay on top of their spending and manage their money, which is exactly how we see Klarna evolving into an everyday money management app people rely on in daily life.”

The massive app growth follows Klarna’s recent launches including a debit card, membership tiers, cashback, mobile phone plans and peer-to-peer payments in Europe. Together, these offerings advance Klarna’s ambition to provide a single, transparent hub for managing money across everyday spending.

The growth in daily usage reflects wider changes in how consumers manage their finances. According to McKinsey*, around nine in ten consumers in both the US and Europe now use digital payments. The firm also found that one in five digital wallet users often leave home without a physical wallet, pointing to digital financial tools becoming part of everyday habits across markets.

* http://mckinsey.com/industries/financial-services/our-insights/banking-matters/state-of-consumer-digital-payments-in-2024

FF NEWS TAKE: Absolutely, this development moves the needle, particularly in the battle for true super-app status in Europe. The massive growth in daily engagement is the strongest indicator yet that consumers are accepting this platform as a primary checking and spending account, not just a checkout mechanism. Future analysis must shift from looking purely at user volume to assessing the average revenue per user, especially in its new banking verticals. Watch for competitive responses from incumbents as they fight to prevent further leakage of primary accounts to digital banks