Watch Apple’s “Tap to Pay” feature, which lets the iPhone accept contactless payments without using additional hardware, in use at Apple Park’s visitor center.
Watch “Tap to Pay” in use at the Apple Park visitor center
A developer shared onhis Twittera video showcasing the feature in action. As you can see for yourself, this new Apple Pay feature works just as you’d expect. An app on a retail employee’s phone which runs the Isaac payment system acts as a contactless NFC terminal. A customer then makes the payment by tapping the top of their iPhone gently against the other device. Apple says it created “Tap to Pay” to help small businesses and individuals accept payments on the go without having to use additional hardware such as dongles from Square. The feature effectively turns your NFC-enabled iPhone into a payment terminal.
The Apple Park Visitor Center is one of the only apple retail stores in the US to support contactless pay straight from an iPhone. Awesome to see in person!pic.twitter.com/GiFDiL56OO
— Michael (@NTFTWX)July 24, 2025
Apple has said that “Tap to Pay” will be used across its retail stores, and this is the first known use of the feature in the wild. The Apple Park visitor center is a retail store located on the company’s campus. It has a cantilevered carbon fiber roof that appears to float (it’s only supported by stone-clad cores and no other extraneous columns for support). The store is open only to Apple Park visitors and neighbors.
Your iPhone is now a payment terminal
Accepting credit card payments on a phone via NFC without requiring any additional external hardware is nothing new. What’s new is Apple’s willingness to permit third-party developers to implement this feature in their apps. Previously, no apps could use contactless payments features that require NFC hardware.
“Tap to Pay” should especially cater to small businesses and individuals such as hairstylists, who will soon be able to process tap-to-pay contactless payments right out of the box.Apple announced the Tap to Pay featureearlier in 2022 but didn’t provide a firm launch date beyond a vague “later in 2022” target. But with the Apple Park visitor center now using the tech, it shouldn’t be long before the first “Tap to Pay” apps start arriving. No software update should be required to use this feature because support for “Tap to Pay” isreportedly present in iOS 15.4.
Tap to Pay requirements
“Tap to Pay” will first launch in the United States
The feature requires an iPhone XS or later and a partner-enabled app. The first non-Apple payment platforms to offer “Tap to Pay” to customers will be Stripe and Dutch payment processing company Adyen, with additional partnerships and apps arriving later this year. Read:How to fix iPhone widgets not working or updating
