Revenue generated by omnichannel payment platforms is projected to rise from $56 billion in 2026 to $108 billion in 2031 as merchants consolidate payment channels and connect them more closely with other business systems, according to new research from Juniper Research.
The forecast represents growth of 57 percent over five years. Juniper said merchant demand is being driven partly by the operational burden of managing multiple payment channels separately and by the growing value of integrating payments with systems such as enterprise resource planning platforms.
The research also ranked Stripe, Worldpay, PayPal, Square and Adyen as the five leading omnichannel payment platforms in its 2026 competitor assessment.
Payment platforms move beyond transaction processing
Juniper Research said omnichannel platforms are increasingly expected to combine in-store and digital payment activity within a single operating environment. The model can give merchants a more consistent view of transactions while reducing the need to manage separate payment stacks for different channels.
Integration with third-party business software is becoming a larger part of the proposition. Juniper argued that payment providers should prioritize integrations that are relevant to the markets and merchant segments they serve rather than treating connectivity as a generic feature checklist.
That shift changes the role of payment data. Information generated at checkout can be combined with operational and customer data to support functions beyond payment acceptance, including analytics, loyalty and personalization.
“Payment data is evolving from an operational by-product into a source of value,” report author Michael Greenwood said in the announcement. He added that the data can provide a foundation for more sophisticated merchant services, including AI-powered analytics.
Stripe tops Juniper’s 2026 platform ranking
Juniper assessed 16 omnichannel payment platforms for its latest competitor leaderboard. It ranked Stripe first, followed by Worldpay, PayPal, Square and Adyen.
The research evaluated providers using criteria that included channel coverage, feature range and future business prospects. Juniper identified data consolidation as one of the strengths shared by the leading platforms.
The ranking comes as payment companies compete on a broader set of capabilities than transaction routing alone. Merchants operating across physical stores, websites, apps and marketplaces increasingly need a consistent way to reconcile payment activity, manage customer interactions and connect transaction data with finance and operations systems.
For global platforms, that also creates a localization challenge. Payment methods, real-time payment infrastructure and merchant software vary widely by market, which means an integration strategy that works in one country may not transfer directly to another.
Omnichannel growth raises the value of interoperability
Juniper’s forecast suggests that the next phase of payment-platform competition will depend increasingly on how well providers connect payment acceptance with the rest of the merchant technology stack.
The company said its research covers 71 countries and includes more than 48,000 data points. The headline revenue projection is global, so individual market growth rates may differ considerably depending on payment infrastructure, merchant digitization and consumer behavior.