Behind the 525% growth of Visa's crypto card: consumer payments are just the beginning, enterprise infrastructure is the real transformation

In 2025, Visa crypto card spending skyrocketed from $14.6 million to $91.3 million, a 525% increase. This figure far exceeds market expectations, and more importantly, it reflects that crypto payments are transitioning from niche applications to mainstream tools. According to the latest news, this growth is not only evident on the consumer side; the potential of enterprise-level applications is the true driving force behind this wave of expansion.

The True Picture Behind the Data

Growth exceeds expectations

According to Dune Analytics data, the net expenditure on Visa crypto cards for the entire year of 2025 increased by 525%. This seemingly abstract figure becomes very intuitive when viewed from a different perspective: from $14.6 million in January to $91.3 million at the end of December, more than a sixfold increase in less than a year.

There are six platforms involved in this growth wave: GnosisPay, EtherFi, Cypher, Avici Money, Exa App, and Moonwell. Among them, EtherFi Cash performed the strongest, with annual spending reaching $55.4 million, accounting for over 60%. Cypher ranks second, with a spending amount of $20.5 million.

This rapid growth indicates a phenomenon: more and more people no longer want to sell their coins but prefer to pay directly with crypto. This shift may seem simple, but it actually signifies a fundamental change in user mentality—from viewing crypto assets as investments to treating them as real money.

Consumer spending is just the tip of the iceberg

According to Leon Waidmann, head of Onchain research, consumer payments are just the beginning. A larger transformation is happening on the enterprise side.

Enterprises are using on-chain payments in the following ways:

• Managing payments and collections on-chain to avoid intermediaries
• Seamless conversion between cryptocurrencies and fiat currencies
• Operating on-chain treasuries to improve fund management efficiency
• Earning yields on idle balances

This means that crypto payments have evolved from consumer scenarios like “buying coffee with crypto” to enterprise scenarios such as “managing cash flow with crypto.” The significance of this shift is even deeper.

What Has Changed with the Participation of Traditional Payment Giants

The involvement of global payment giants like Visa itself is a strong signal. It indicates that crypto payments are no longer just experiments within small circles but are recognized as a direction by mainstream financial infrastructure.

According to the latest news, Visa is also increasing its investment in stablecoins, supporting stablecoin products on four different blockchains. In mid-December, Visa launched a stablecoin consulting team to help banks, merchants, and fintech companies launch and manage stablecoin products. This shows that Visa has made stablecoins and on-chain payments a strategic priority.

Even more noteworthy is that the Solana-Visa payment settlement pilot project has reached an annualized run rate of $3.5 billion. This indicates that the scale of on-chain payments is rapidly expanding and is no longer an edge application.

What Does This Mean

From the data, the expansion speed of cryptocurrency payments has already exceeded most people’s expectations. More critically, this growth is not driven by hype or marketing but by the emergence of real use cases.

The seemingly simple tool of card payments actually removes friction and reduces complexity. It allows users to enjoy the convenience of on-chain payments without needing to understand blockchain technology details. The performance of on-chain balances is increasingly approaching that of traditional currency, which is changing people’s perceptions of crypto assets.

Summary

The 525% growth of Visa crypto cards is eye-catching in itself, but the real highlight is that cryptocurrencies are transforming from an alternative to the financial system into its foundation. Consumer-side growth is just superficial; enterprise applications are the deep driving force. This process may still take time, but the direction is already very clear. Future focus should be on which enterprise applications will be implemented first and how they will impact the entire payment ecosystem.