Kiwi broadens UPI credit play with Yes Bank partnership, Postpaid launch | Finance News

Fintech firm Kiwi is expanding its credit offerings on India’s real-time payments network with the launch of a credit line on Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in partnership with Yes Bank, after having tied up with four credit card issuers since its launch in 2023.

 

The fintech expects at least 0.5 million users to get onboarded on the platform to access products like credit lines on UPI or credit cards on UPI over the next five years, said Sumeet Basrani, chief business officer (CBO), Kiwi.

 

The partnership with Yes Bank for a credit line on UPI feature called Kiwi Postpaid is the first for the company.

 
 

Eligible users can access credit lines of up to Rs 50,000 through the Kiwi app.

 

It has partnered with four issuers for co-branded credit cards, such as AU Small Finance Bank, Yes Bank, Axis Bank and Punjab National Bank (PNB).

 

“There are users with a solid income and track record of other credit forms but they don’t necessarily own a credit card. They have (credit) bureau presence. How do you give them access to credit for consumption, which can be used anywhere on UPI, is what Kiwi Postpaid is really trying to solve for,” Basrani told Business Standard.

 

He joined Kiwi as the firm’s CBO in March 2026.

 

Credit Line on UPI was launched by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) in 2023.

 

While adoption has remained limited since its launch, banks and fintechs are now beginning to embrace the product as they look to expand credit distribution through the UPI network.

 

“As more platforms start distributing this product and more and more users start getting access to the product, education will improve on both the user side and merchant side,” he said.

 

Basrani explained that more lenders were keen on scaling the product going forward.

 

“There’s generally a lot of interest in growing credit on UPI because now it’s proven that consumers need, there are inherent benefits of doing credit on UPI versus not doing it. So, whatever be the form factor, there are more and more lenders that we know are very keen to expand it,” he said.

 

Nearly half of Kiwi Postpaid’s users were new to credit cards, the company said.

 

The firm said that within the first month of its launch, users were recorded using the credit line feature for regular spends as compared to discretionary high-value expenses.

 

“The difference in giving a personal or unsecured loan where there is a cash deposit into the bank account versus giving an instrument like a credit card or credit line on UPI is that a lender can monitor end use and be able to control risk in a much better way,” he explained.