Square Cash Vs Apple Pay Best Mobile Payment App in 2024
Mobile payment applications have revolutionized how we send and receive money; it has even changed how many of us pay for purchases. Many folks weren’t sure about NFC payments when they first launched, but now, services like Apple Pay has simply become an everyday way to pay for your bill at the store. And then you also have apps like Square Cash, giving you the ability to pay a friend back quickly and easily without having to run to the bank and pull out cash. It goes without saying, technology is revolutionizing how we handle money, making it all that more convenient.
But, with so many mobile payment apps available, it can be difficult to choose which one to use on the daily. If you’re having trouble making a decision, follow along below. Today, we’re looking at Square Cash and Apple Pay to show you how they stack up against each other.
Square Cash
Square Cash might be the most versatile of the two mobile payments apps. With Square Cash, you can send and receive money almost instantly. Square Cash allows you to add a debit or credit card to your Square Cash account, which will let you send and withdraw money to your bank account instantly. It’s ready to use in just a few minutes. Keep in mind that, if you send with a credit card, there is a 0.03% fee attached to it.
The idea of instant transfers is what makes Square Cash so attractive. If you have a debit card, any money in your Square Cash account can be “cashed out” to your checking out instantly with a small 0.01% fee on the full amount of the transaction. You can add your bank account to Square Cash as well, which will let you transfer funds for free; however, this can take a day or longer to arrive in your bank account, all depending on weekends and holidays.
Square Cash will allow you to send and request money from friends, family, as well as businesses, although the latter usually has a fee attached to it (Square Cash can’t operate for free, after all). One neat thing about Square Cash is that they let you get a Cash Card. They’ll send a card in the mail that will allow you to pay for your groceries and other shopping with the funds available in your Square Cash account. You can even have it pull from your bank account to pay for purchases when you run out of available funds in your Cash account.
Square Cash really is a great app for sending and receiving money, especially with being able to pay your bill at the store with it, too.
Download it now: Google Play
Apple Pay
Apple Pay is a bit of a different ball game. It operates entirely differently than something like Square Cash and Venmo. First, you have to have a supported iPhone in order to use Apple Pay. Next, you can only add debit and credit cards that support Apple Pay. For example, your local rural credit union might not let you add your card to Apple Pay, but something like Chase Bank will make adding one of their cards a seamless process.
You can pay for your purchases and food bills at select stores and restaurants. After you add your card to Apple Pay, you should be able to use your iPhone or Apple Watch to easily make purchases. You simply do a quick security check (usually with your iPhone PIN, Touch ID or Face ID), and then hover it over a payment terminal to process the payment.
Apple Pay will allow you to send and receive money, usually right within the iPhone Messages app — it’s pretty easy to do, although there’s not really a clear or intuitive UI for this like there is with Square Cash. Apple Pay is still primarily for processing payments with your phone at stores.
The downside to Apple Pay is that not all stores support that form of payment. And at stores that do, the process can be a hassle because people aren’t all too familiar with Apple Pay. Many employees will look at you confused when you pull out your phone, and many of them aren’t even sure if their store supports that form of payment or even how to do it. That said, it’s usually just much faster to still pull out your card.
Read more: Apple
Verdict
As you can see, Square Cash and Apple Pay are both great forms of mobile payment apps, but they’re also very different. If you need to send and receive money, Square Cash if the application that will meet your needs best. But, if you’re trying to move over to NFC payments at stores, then you’ll want to use Apple Pay, if you have a supported Apple product, that is.