Guizhou and Shanxi are the top ranking provinces for mobile payments through Alipay, with 92 percent of the payments done via users' smartphones, according to the latest figures from Alipay.
Residents in the two provinces generally adopt mobile payments faster than anywhere else in the country, with the nationwide mobile payment proportion at 82 percent, Alipay said yesterday.
There are a total of 11 provinces and autonomous regions where mobile payments contribute to over 90 percent of total spending through Alipay, include Xinjiang Autonomous Region, Hainan Province, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Qinghai Province, and Tibet Autonomous Region.
Mobile payments made up 71 percent of the overall number of payments in 2016, and a growing number of consumers no longer find it necessary to bring along their wallets whenever they're dining or shopping.
Mobile payment is increasingly popular when paying for public transport, too.
Xi'an became the latest Chinese city whose subway system accepted Alipay from Monday, following Shanghai and Hangzhou Metros which have started to allow a simple smartphone swipe to enter and exit subway stations.
Overseas expansion also rose in the past year. Alipay is now connected with tens of thousands of merchants in 36 countries and overseas regions. The total number of payments in these regions rose three times from a year ago.
Apart from connecting with both online and offline micro and mini merchants, Alipay has also been pushing forward environmental protection strategies that are closely linked with its payment business.
Ant Forest, an environmental initiative to encourage Alipay users to keep track of their low-carbon activities, such as selling second-hand home electronics and using public transport, has been launched.
